Frozen Fries = ‘Fresh Vegetables’!!?

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The USDA has declared that frozen French fries are now classified as “fresh vegetables.” I seem to recall that ketchup, according to the US government, is also a “vegetable.” A perfect nutritional pair.
http://www.organicconsumers.org/school/frenchfries061604.cfm%5B/url%5D

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Well, I don’t know what categories they had available to them , or for what purpose the classification was (nutrition? Storage guidelines? transporation regulations?), but (freedom ) fries are made of potatoes, and ketchup is made mostly of tomato puree, and I reckon those are vegetables.

Jim H

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What about olives? Are they fruit or vegetables?

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I think olives are mostly oil and salt.

Actually, I suspect they are a fruit, but that’s just because I can’t think of any vegetables that grow on trees and have a big seed in the middle.

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How come people always ask whether a given food is a fruit OR a vegetable? How come no one ever asks whether spinach is a leaf or a vegetable? Is a carrot a root or a vegetable? “Fruit” is a botanical designation, referring to a specific part of a plant, just like root, stem, and leaf. “Vegetable” is a culinary designation, referring to how a plant is used in the kitchen and how it is eaten. Some fruits are sweet, but most are not. The following vegetables are all fruits: tomatoes, eggplant, okra, green beans, pumpkin, squash (summer and winter), cucumbers, pea pods, peppers, avocado, ears of corn. Think of it this way: if it has seeds, it’s a fruit. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a vegetable.

Fafner

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AFAIK fruit is both a botanical & a culinary designation-and there’s no reason why the two designations need to coincide. (Of course I’m not into cooking-I’m into eating-so maybe I’m wrong about the culinary designation. What’s the culinary designation of an apple?)

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You’re right, of course, that “fruit” can be used as both a botanical and a culinary designation. Rhubarb, for example, is not botanically a fruit, it’s a stem. But it is used in desserts as though it were a sweet fruit and is therefore often classified as a fruit for culinary purposes. But when people say that a tomato isn’t a vegetable because it is a fruit, they are forgetting this distinction between culinary and botanical classifications. That was the point I was trying to make. I just find it interesting that people who worry about whether a tomato is a fruit or a vegetable never worry about whether green beans or zucchini or okra is a fruit or vegetable. (Although I suppose there are other reasons to worry about okra.)

Fafner

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Tomatoes will bring us full circle. Many years ago congress meddled with these definitions and decided that tomatoes were a fruit for a reason I cannot remember. I am sure that a lobbyist and major corporation somewhere is happy with the fresh frozen fries classification.

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I find the classification of frozen food as ‘fresh’ mush stranger than the fruit/vegetable problem.

I tried going to the link to see if it mentioned the reasoning behind this (mis)classification but it seems to be down. Or busy. Or something-whatever the cause I couldn’t reach the site right now.

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I find the classification of frozen food as ‘fresh’ mush stranger than the fruit/vegetable problem.

I tried going to the link to see if it mentioned the reasoning behind this (mis)classification but it seems to be down. Or busy. Or something-whatever the cause I couldn’t reach the site right now.

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If I remember my biology correctly, the fruit has seeds and is the “ovary” of the plant. So, the tomato, cucumber, zuchinni, etc. must be fruits???

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Don’t be confused. Of course they are fruits. This subject was discussed earlier in this thread. “Fruit OR Vegetable” is a false dichotomy.

Fafner

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Don’t be confused. Of course they are fruits. This subject was discussed earlier in this thread. “Fruit OR Vegetable” is a false dichotomy.

Fafner

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If I remember my biology correctly, the fruit has seeds and is the “ovary” of the plant. So, the tomato, cucumber, zuchinni, etc. must be fruits???

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Tomatoes will bring us full circle. Many years ago congress meddled with these definitions and decided that tomatoes were a fruit for a reason I cannot remember. I am sure that a lobbyist and major corporation somewhere is happy with the fresh frozen fries classification.

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You’re right, of course, that “fruit” can be used as both a botanical and a culinary designation. Rhubarb, for example, is not botanically a fruit, it’s a stem. But it is used in desserts as though it were a sweet fruit and is therefore often classified as a fruit for culinary purposes. But when people say that a tomato isn’t a vegetable because it is a fruit, they are forgetting this distinction between culinary and botanical classifications. That was the point I was trying to make. I just find it interesting that people who worry about whether a tomato is a fruit or a vegetable never worry about whether green beans or zucchini or okra is a fruit or vegetable. (Although I suppose there are other reasons to worry about okra.)

Fafner

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AFAIK fruit is both a botanical & a culinary designation-and there’s no reason why the two designations need to coincide. (Of course I’m not into cooking-I’m into eating-so maybe I’m wrong about the culinary designation. What’s the culinary designation of an apple?)

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How come people always ask whether a given food is a fruit OR a vegetable? How come no one ever asks whether spinach is a leaf or a vegetable? Is a carrot a root or a vegetable? “Fruit” is a botanical designation, referring to a specific part of a plant, just like root, stem, and leaf. “Vegetable” is a culinary designation, referring to how a plant is used in the kitchen and how it is eaten. Some fruits are sweet, but most are not. The following vegetables are all fruits: tomatoes, eggplant, okra, green beans, pumpkin, squash (summer and winter), cucumbers, pea pods, peppers, avocado, ears of corn. Think of it this way: if it has seeds, it’s a fruit. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a vegetable.

Fafner

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I think olives are mostly oil and salt.

Actually, I suspect they are a fruit, but that’s just because I can’t think of any vegetables that grow on trees and have a big seed in the middle.

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What about olives? Are they fruit or vegetables?

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It’s sad that the term FRESH has been taken by frozen food manufacturers/distributors. In the UK there is a store that sells frozen food (Iceland

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Here! Here! Not only is your point well made it is well written. Cudos and my support to you on both counts. The term “Fresh Frozen” belongs right up there with:

1.) “Picked Fresh” for those fruits and veggies (regardless of what you believe belongs in either of these two groupings) that are not locally grown.
2.) “Fresh Baked” for those baked goods that are not baked on premesis.
3.) “Fresh Packed” for those canned items that …. well I just don’t know what they think they are implying here.

I am sure that there are more examples but these are the ones that get me the most.

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I’m not sure what locally grown has to do with your objection to Picked Fresh. Since the phrase refers to the condition at the time of picking, and not at the time of sale, it would be perfectly applicable to both locally grown & non-locally grown produce if it meant anything. But regarding its meaning, please tell me how you could pick something without it being fresh? (That’s not a rhetocical question-some of you have such ingenious imaginations that I can’t wait to see what you come up with.)

IMO Fresh Packed is different from Packed Fresh. Perhaps Fresh Packed would refer to items that are packed on the premises, just like Fresh Baked would? (We have a couple of local packing plants where you can get ‘Fresh Packed’ salmon and it really is Fresh Packed. But I think that’s the exception rather than the rule.)

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I’m not sure what locally grown has to do with your objection to Picked Fresh. Since the phrase refers to the condition at the time of picking, and not at the time of sale, it would be perfectly applicable to both locally grown & non-locally grown produce if it meant anything. But regarding its meaning, please tell me how you could pick something without it being fresh? (That’s not a rhetocical question-some of you have such ingenious imaginations that I can’t wait to see what you come up with.)

IMO Fresh Packed is different from Packed Fresh. Perhaps Fresh Packed would refer to items that are packed on the premises, just like Fresh Baked would? (We have a couple of local packing plants where you can get ‘Fresh Packed’ salmon and it really is Fresh Packed. But I think that’s the exception rather than the rule.)

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Here! Here! Not only is your point well made it is well written. Cudos and my support to you on both counts. The term “Fresh Frozen” belongs right up there with:

1.) “Picked Fresh” for those fruits and veggies (regardless of what you believe belongs in either of these two groupings) that are not locally grown.
2.) “Fresh Baked” for those baked goods that are not baked on premesis.
3.) “Fresh Packed” for those canned items that …. well I just don’t know what they think they are implying here.

I am sure that there are more examples but these are the ones that get me the most.

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Some products such as peas and sweetcorn deteriorate so rapidly when picked, that if frozen within a couple of hours of picking and bought from the freezer cabinet a month later,they are often “fresher” than items a day old bought as “fresh”.

My pet gripe is “home made”. This is often seen on items in supermarkets. Whose home were they made in?

Pat

PS. Can one of you clever graphics types come up with smilies for pedant and smug?

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“Home made” doesn’t bother me. It just means “made on the premises.”

You are right about the frozen vegetables, but they are still not fresh, because fresh means, among other things, never frozen. Freezing also changes the texture of vegetables, so regardless of how fresh they were when frozen, they will not be the same as vegetables that were never frozen.

In addition to the oxymoron “fresh frozen,” the one that gets me is the idiotic “fresh baked.” Can anyone think of a baked good that wasn’t fresh baked when it first came out of the oven? Of course, it may have been on the store shelf for two months, but it was fresh at one time. Good to know!

Fafner

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Of course the term you’re writing about should be ‘freshly baked’. One of the reasons advertisers use such poor grammar is that it turns a meaningful (but dishonest) term into a meaningless one-and questions of honesty don’t apply to meaningless phrases.

And to me, “Home made” should mean made in a home, not just ‘on the premises’. And I think that ‘homemade’ should fall into that meaningless word category I was talking about, but I checked an online dictionary & found it as a word with the same meaning as ‘home made’. I suspect pollution of the English language by advertisers, but if it’s been accepted then I guess I’d just be wasting my time protesting that “it just isn’t right”.

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Of course the term you’re writing about should be ‘freshly baked’. One of the reasons advertisers use such poor grammar is that it turns a meaningful (but dishonest) term into a meaningless one-and questions of honesty don’t apply to meaningless phrases.

And to me, “Home made” should mean made in a home, not just ‘on the premises’. And I think that ‘homemade’ should fall into that meaningless word category I was talking about, but I checked an online dictionary & found it as a word with the same meaning as ‘home made’. I suspect pollution of the English language by advertisers, but if it’s been accepted then I guess I’d just be wasting my time protesting that “it just isn’t right”.

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“Home made” doesn’t bother me. It just means “made on the premises.”

You are right about the frozen vegetables, but they are still not fresh, because fresh means, among other things, never frozen. Freezing also changes the texture of vegetables, so regardless of how fresh they were when frozen, they will not be the same as vegetables that were never frozen.

In addition to the oxymoron “fresh frozen,” the one that gets me is the idiotic “fresh baked.” Can anyone think of a baked good that wasn’t fresh baked when it first came out of the oven? Of course, it may have been on the store shelf for two months, but it was fresh at one time. Good to know!

Fafner

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Some products such as peas and sweetcorn deteriorate so rapidly when picked, that if frozen within a couple of hours of picking and bought from the freezer cabinet a month later,they are often “fresher” than items a day old bought as “fresh”.

My pet gripe is “home made”. This is often seen on items in supermarkets. Whose home were they made in?

Pat

PS. Can one of you clever graphics types come up with smilies for pedant and smug?

Reply | Quote

It’s sad that the term FRESH has been taken by frozen food manufacturers/distributors. In the UK there is a store that sells frozen food (Iceland

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