North Small Market Beijing Organic Farmer Market
Who defines the beauty and ugliness of this world?
What are our criteria for choosing food?
The food that we have abandoned,
What have you been through?
Nature's gift is so generous and rich
But we can't let us splurge...
Put aside stereotypes about the appearance of food
Let's get to know the world of "ugly fruit" together...
The ugly fruit in the eyes of farmers
Dictation/ Li Lijun
Interview finishing / Ma Xiaochao
▲ Farmer Li Lijun's apple crisps are the favorite of Jiyou
In nature, the purpose of plant growth, flowering and fruiting is not to provide food for humans, but to reproduce. The fruit of a plant, some sunny, some grow at the bottom, not every fruit can be divided equally between all the natural conditions conducive to its growth, so, just like each of us, the fruit also has its own characteristics, it can be said that there are no two fruits that are exactly the same.
▲ Pumpkins growing on the same vine have different shapes and sizes
Initially, people chose foods that taste good in nature, also because these foods are full of rich nutrients that can help people continue to reproduce and evolve. If you don't think something nutritious is delicious, then people's evolution may be threatened. From this point of view, it is also natural for people to choose fruits with good taste.
However, today, when the material is extremely rich, our choice is so many that it is difficult to distinguish the quality of food, and looking at the appearance has become the easiest and most intuitive method, and the fruit has slowly been divided into three, six, nine, etc., and the taste and nutrition have been put in the second position.
▲ Wild sour dates on the market, not too sweet, with a faint sour taste
Color, size, uniformity or not determines the value of a fruit, an orchard with very good field management, according to the strict standards of the market, you can select about 50-60% of the "first-class fruit", other fruits to be sold at a price lower than the first-class fruit, or made into juice, jam and other processed products.
▲Farmers make blemished peppers into chopped peppers, which are delicious and environmentally friendly
Why are there so many "secondary fruits"?
Some fruits do not pollinate evenly when the plants flower, some places grow fast, some places grow slowly, resulting in uneven fruit; some extreme weather such as hail, drought, etc. will also have a great impact on the fruit, forming spots and scars on the peel.
These "crooked dates" have been naturally harmed, growing in adversity, after a certain stimulation, will produce some texture formation substances, which will make the flavor of the fruit more sufficient, and good taste is linked to nutrition. Therefore, those fruits that leave traces of nature are not "secondary".
▲ Affected by the climate, the bitter melon in the market has become "ugly", but the flavor is more sufficient
There are also some cases where people want the fruit to be more in line with the ideal standard, such as the earliest characteristics of cucumbers are curved, and people choose to use hybridization, hormones and other means to make the fruit more "standardized".
▲ Apples that do not use pesticides are easy to attract insect bites, but the taste is not bad
Human needs and species are not the same, and we are constantly modifying crops that provide food and nutrition to meet people's needs. Is appearance and delicious nutrition really that important? I believe that the premise of conforming to the law of crop growth is more conducive to our transformation.