What’s the Difference Between Fruits and Vegetables?
Tomatoes, eggplants, and pumpkins are all fruits. Here’s a partial list of common vegetables that are actually fruits.
Even peanuts, beans, and walnuts are technically fruits, as they all fall under the botanical definition of being the edible, seed-bearing ovary part of a plant. (Yes, fruits are ovaries, sorry.) Vegetables, by contrast, don’t really have a scientific definition. Historically they’re usually defined as edible not-fruit parts of a plant, such as green leaves (romaine. Cabbage), flower buds (cauliflower and capers), bulbs (garlic and onions), or roots (carrots and potatoes).
Many of those vegetables are instead categorized as the equally hand-wavey term ‘starch,’ but they’re as much one as the other, by which we mean neither category has much botanical rigor behind it. Also read: When Is It Okay to Cook With Frozen Vegetables?
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- Who: Vegetables
