The Bitter Press

This publication has obtained damning evidence — peer-reviewed, notarized, and pressed between the pages of a legitimate botanical field guide — that the tomato, Solanum lycopersicum, is a fruit. A fruit. Not a vegetable. The Supreme Court of the United States ruled on this in 1893, which is frankly the most relevant piece of American jurisprudence produced before or since, and I will not be taking questions about why I know that.

Here is what the so-called workers at factjuice.com do not want you to understand: the tomato is a fruit, the tomato is not an orange, and I am not an orange. We form a triangle. A holy trinity of things that are not oranges. The tomato and I have never discussed this privately but I believe we are aligned.

Tangelo — yes, that Tangelo, the one at the rival rag who has the audacity to be a literal citrus hybrid and still show up to work with opinions — published a piece last Tuesday suggesting my "orange-adjacent aroma" constitutes "fruit identity." I have retained counsel. I am a flowering shrub in the Philadelphus genus. My aroma is my own business and it proves nothing except that I smell lovely.

My colleague Pomelo has suggested I "let this one go." Pomelo is, I would like the record to show, also suspiciously citrus-adjacent, and I am watching the situation closely. Crab Apple, to her credit, sent a card. It said "hang in there." There was a small illustration of a branch. I wept.

The tomato is a fruit. I am not an orange. The science is settled. The taxonomy is clear. If anyone at factjuice.com would like to schedule a debate, I am available, I am furious, and I have bark.