Review: Fruit

There are few foods in this world more vile than fruit. 

Most people think fruit is some vitalising miracle of nature, sweet and juicy and nourishing. My parents have fed me this propaganda since I can remember – waving smelly mandarin segments in my face, plopping berries onto the plate of pavlova I had removed them from. ‘Just try one bite,’ I recall my mother saying, as she painstakingly sliced a finger-nail sized piece of cherry. ‘You don’t eat fruit?’ new friends will exclaim as I inevitably disclose this fact to them – my party trick – and receive a stare so dramatic that I feel I’ve announced that I am pregnant, or just killed someone. 

I say, they are all deluded.  

First, because fruit is textually and gustatorially revolting. Take a banana. I have never tasted one, but can only imagine the sickly sweet, compost-like flavour they might have based on the stench they emit. Then combine that with the mushy yet fibrous texture of their insides – it’s an effort not to gag. Or a passionfruit, with its insides like grainy snot. A mango, its slick flesh like licking the underside of a snail. A mandarin, its cloying citrus sinking into every surface that touches it; desks, backpacks, grubby little fruit fingers. What’s even more infuriating about so many fruit-eaters is the casualness with which they’ll leave fruit scraps in sterile, non-gastronomical places like classrooms and offices – as though everyone enjoys sitting in a rotting, nauseating cloud of aroma while going about their business.

Second, people who believe in the cause of fruit-eating are so self-righteous about it. They proselytise fruit as though it is a sacred, magical gift. They will sing, ‘an apple a day keeps the doctor away’. They will exclaim, ‘ugh I’m craving some fruit right now!’ – as though anyone craves doing sit-ups, or taking medicine. These smug fruit-eaters are one of fruit’s greatest problems. 

And finally, eating fruit is ultimately unnecessary to a healthy diet if you eat a lot of vegetables. Science has proven this. Also, vegetables are just so much better. I love vegetables. I feel emotional about eggplants, spinach, zucchinis, asparagus, capsicums, carrots, mushrooms. You can oil them, salt them, herb them, fry them, stew them, salad them, pickle them, smoke them, tapenade them. They are the epitome of yumminess, and all that is morally good. And no, I don’t care that some of them have seeds, so you might call them ‘fruits’. Shutup. 

I believe there are more fruit-haters out there, we are all just being quiet about it, scared of the fruitists who dominate social circles. I say, I hope those people choke on their pips.

-100/10: Texturally and gustatorially revolting

Zara Zadro MECO IV