• SexyTimeSasquatch@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    They’re both. The term vegetable can mean either a part of a plant that people eat, or in a culinary sense it can refer to savory plant based foods that excludes things like grains, legumes, nuts, etc. In either case tomatoes, being both an edible part of a plant and savory gets to be a vegetable.

    On a different level, botanically, not only is it a fruit, but it is a true berry.

    So yeah, it can be, and is both things depending on the how you’re looking at it.

    • YAMAPIKARIYA@lemmyfi.com
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      5 months ago

      I don’t even know what “savory” means. What does that mean. I see it all the time but it means nothing to me.

      • Codex@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Savory is the English term for the fifth flavor, often called umami. Savory foods have a distinct flavor different from salt, sour, bitter, and sweet. Sometimes described as “meaty.” Other high umami foods include soy-based foods and mushrooms.

      • macarthur_park@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        One definition: food “belonging to the category that is salty or spicy rather than sweet.”

        It’s a bit of an odd definition but it gets the gist across. An example of using savory: differentiating between pies with savory filling (meats, vegetables, etc) and sweet filling (fruits, custard).

    • Codex@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Time to add a longer tail to the right side of the meme with your post on it with the transcendent “nuanced and complete position” wojak.

  • Lvxferre@mander.xyz
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    5 months ago

    At those times I’m really glad that Portuguese distinguishes between fruta (culinary fruit) and fruto (botanical fruit; also posh word for yield, output). It means that the underlying false dichotomy doesn’t even work in the language.

  • Neato@ttrpg.network
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    5 months ago

    Botany: tomatoes are fruits. But apples aren’t!

    Culinary: tomatoes are the key to a BLT.