Fruit or Vegetable

[nobbynoo57]

If a fruit is the edible seed or seed covering of a plant and a vegetable is the edible leaf,stem or root of a plant, why does everybody refer to peas as vegetables because by definition they are fruits

[Fibonacci]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pea

[nobbynoo57]

thanks for the link but even wiki doesnt clarify the query

[woofgang]

what is not clear about this?
Peapods are botanically a fruit
and this
peas are considered to be a vegetable in cooking

[dzug2]

Because your 'if.....' is not a universal truth. It's just one of several definitions which are right as far as they go but are not wholly consistent with each other

[boxtops]

tomatoes are fruit too, but they's always in the veg section

[Old_Geezer]

Everything is either animal, vegetable, or mineral. Since I don't figure a pea as being animal or mineral I guess it has to be vegetable. ;-)

[Old_Geezer]

Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

I suspect you may be right, technically it looks as if it should be considered the fruit of the pea plant, but I'd not put peas in the fruit salad either.

[Old_Geezer]

Oh for an edit facility.

Thinking further on it an apple is the fruit, not the apple pip which is the seed. I think woofgang may have a point. In which case maybe a pea is neither, maybe it's a legume ?

[woofgang]

OG my posts are a direct quote from the "unclear" wiki entry

[Old_Geezer]

And you could have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for that pesky conscience.

[woofgang]

Lol OG... I just couldn't understand why the OP thought that wiki was unclear.

[heathfield]

Peas are legumes. If you call them that, you won't be wrong. But legumes do bear fruit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legume

[chris1957au]

Always thought peas were a legumes same as Cashews that get called nuts ( a bit like me) and I guess tomatoes just don't look right in a fuit salad either.

Goes back to ''it's the exception that proves the rule''.