Almost every vegetable or fruit breeder
out there is selecting for sweetness, since that's what the consumers
want nowadays. We have “super sweet” sweet corn, sweet carrots,
sweet cabbage, sweet broccoli, and sickly sweet fruit. There is also
a selection for “milder” tasting fruits and vegetables, with
carrots tasting less like carrots, and apples less like apples. To
me, it seems every plant product is tending towards some form of
sugar delivery system.
This irritates me, as I want to cook
with “serious” vegetables. Carrots that with slap you in the face
with their terpene content, and flavor the shit out of soups. I'm
also looking for fruits that actually taste different from each
other, in other words, fruits that have higher concentrations of
phenolics, and aromatics. In the past years I've been enjoying
“antique” apples, and eating many different kinds, since some
have more spicy notes reminiscent of licorice, or more milder notes
like bananas and strawberry.
Another thing that I've been thinking
about, is that since many of the compounds that give fruits and
vegetables their characteristic are actually there for defense
against pathogens and herbivores, by selecting against these
compounds, were actually selecting for plants that are essentially
harder to grow. Instead of plants defending themselves against
pathogens, we have to take the roll with insecticides and pesticides.
If we just bred plants for being what
they are, and not focusing on making a bland, sweet consumable for
the masses, we could enjoy more kinds of flavors in our foods, and
grow them better.
Now I just need to get some of these
heirlooms varieties and breed my own.
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