Tomatoes – a Fruit or a Vegetable?

Many of you have heard the question as to whether tomatoes are a fruit or vegetable, and have probably heard conflicting as to which is the case. Which is it? Well, the answer goes all the way back to 1893. It seems that imported vegetables at the time had a 10% tariff placed on them. Imported fruits, on the other hand, had no such tariff.

A man by the name of John Nix (a Manhattan wholesaler) was fed up with the import tax, so after having a tomato shipment from the Caribbean taxed, he filed suit against an individual at the port of New York claiming tomatoes were a fruit, not a vegetable. Therefore, they should be exempt from the tax. Due to current definitions regarding fruits and vegetables at the time, Nix lost.

Basically, the court ruled that those items grown in gardens for use during the meal, either cooked or raw, and eaten with the main entre of the meal, were considered to be vegetables. This, of course, included tomatoes. Those eaten with or as part of a dessert were considered to be fruit. Today, this seems like an insignificant court case, but at the time, it was considered important enough to reach the Supreme Court.

A major unstated and resultant aspect of the law suit became one of individuals should have gardens and grow their own tomatoes, those significantly lowering their cost.

Apparently, at some later point, the tariff was dropped, but reinstated in 1937, when the League of Nations re-imposed it. Once again, the tomato was declared to be a vegetable.

Today, the United Nations Standard International Trade Classification and nutritionists list the tomato strictly as a vegetable. Botanists, however, consider them a fruit, because a fruit is a ripened flower ovary and contains seeds.