I’m a little embarrassed to be working at a local restaurant, but human life is unfortunately motivated and lubricated with money. Regrettably, I am no exception to the laws of economics and need some capital for advancement of my botanical pursuits. Although restaurants may not be the most interesting place for the aspiring naturalist, they can inspire some questions.
Before I go further, let me define my use of the word “vegetable.” In horticulture a vegetable is typically a plant that is used in salads or snacks and a fruit is a plant that is consumed for a snack or desert (and is typically considered sweet, sugary). You may be interested to know that Congress passed a law calling tomatoes a vegetable so a tax can be applied to them, but that’s a different topic. Opposed to horticultural terms, a fruit in botanical terms is more or less the structure resulting from sexual reproduction. In my experience with botany, the term vegetable doesn’t really exist; rather vegetative refers to somatic cells and organs not pertaining to reproduction. The definitions are pretty close, but I just wanted to distinguish them. I’ll be referring to vegetables in the horticultural sense and despite tomatoes’ vegetable status, deep down refuse to think they are anything but fruits.
My restaurant duties include making salads. 80% of the salads I make require romaine lettuce and 90% require tomato. Tomatoes are New World (aka the Americas) plants that have somehow insinuated their way into traditional Italian cuisine. I’ve always been amazed with that. Someplace I remember reading that the first colonists refused to eat tomatoes because they were red and thought they were poisonous; a prejudice that still exists in somefolks. Red fruits and vegetables…a whole other can of worms I may open at a later date.
As I am ruminating the adoption of tomatoes by Italian culture and slicing tomatoes for salads in the restaurant, it hits me: How did tomatoes get into salads? Is romaine lettuce a New World plant? What about other common salad characters like radishes, arugula, cucumber, onion, carrots?
It’s not hard to understand why salads exist. Humans are omnivores, we eat an array of vegetables matter, some have more or different nutrients than others, eating these different types separately is kind of silly, so throw them together in the right proportions to get the right amount of nutrients in one location, and badda-bing-badda-boom. Salad.
Humans have always been keen on travelling and in so doing have allowed the introduction and exchange of lots of cultivated vegetables. It is not hard to fathom that cucumbers originating in India, radishes from Eastern Europe, arugula from southwest Asia, carrots- Europe/Asia, romaine lettuce from the Mediterranean, all made in into the same bowl. Onions, interestingly enough, have wild species native to New and Old Worlds, so it is no wonder they are one of the usual salad-suspects. Who invited the tomato?!Was it placed in salad before it was thrown into the pot for sauce? Or did someone want their vitamin C without going through the trouble of cooking vegetable and simply added it "raw" to their leafy greens? It is likely globalization has simply expanded the variety of vegetables we can put in our salads.
What we need to be concerned with is the actual nutrition of these salads. Salads probably resulted because they provided a balanced nutrients and diet. With the addition and subtraction of certain vegies, we should make sure these exchanges maintain nutritional content. A salad should not be considered healthy only because it is vegetables. Without proper components a salad may have the nutritional equivalent to rice cakes; it may be tasty, but lacking in other key dietetic elements. I'm not really sure this is a problem. This paragraph is mostly me thinking out loud. I’m not a nutritionist, but it seems like a valid concern, and easily remedied problem (if it even is a problem).
What is a problem is the amount of food wasted by restaurants. What I would consider fit for consumption, for example the proximal ends of romaine lettuce, is thrown out at the restaurant I work at. This is just one example, but if you were to sort the garbage at any given restaurant, you'd notice what I'm talking about. I will stop here before it this paragraph turns into a ramble.
This website was cited on some of the Wikipedia articles I read. I’ve used it before for some research projects. You can compare countries’ agricultural products by downloading spreadsheets and graphs among other things. You’re smart, you’ll figure it out. http://faostat.fao.org/site/567/default.aspx#ancor
This is a strange website I stumbled upon. I don’t like they way these folks are looking at me: http://www.dole.com/#/superkids/
Wikipedia provided me with a lot of the information on the origins of the vegies mentioned above FYI.
yeah. why are salads the health food mascot? lettuce is hardly nutritious. unless its bitter and dark green. and then you have to eat pounds of it (in addition to some kind of wholesome protein or fat) to consider it a balanced meal. winter green salads like kale are an exception though. take kale, sprinkle with salt, and massage it for a few minutes.. it breaks down some of the alkaloids (alkaloids? i think thats right..) and makes it easier to chew, tastier, etc. where is kale native to? why am i still typing
ReplyDeletealso, i think tomatoes were "invited to the salad party" because they were once highly nutritious and tasty. now they have the consistency of an mealy apple and the flavor of a cucumber. but its hard.. to teach an old dog new tricks?
ReplyDeleteyeah those salads never learn! when will we start eating amaranths? they are all over the place as weeds and pretty nutritious, if i'm correct.
ReplyDeleteis chickweed an amaranth? we often put it in our salad mix in alaska
ReplyDelete