Tomatoes Are Actually Berries

Botanically, tomatoes are true berries. A true berry comes from a single ovary with three fleshy layers, which puts tomatoes alongside grapes and aubergines. Strawberries are not berries at all. When Spanish conquistadors encountered tomatoes in Mexico after 1519, Hernán Cortés brought seeds back to Europe where they were planted as ornamental curiosities, not food, feared as poisonous nightshade. For almost two centuries they decorated gardens and balconies across Spain and Italy. The first recorded recipe for eating them appeared only in 1692, when Antonio Latini, chef to the Spanish Viceroy in Naples, published Salsa di Pomodoro alla Spagnuola — Spanish tomato sauce — in his book Lo Scalco alla Moderna. A decorative berry became dinner.