Hybrid fruits and veggies that are delicious, and good for you
Humans have been cross-pollinating produce to make new fruits and vegetables for hundreds of years. Many of the fruits and vegetables we’ve known and loved our whole lives started out as man-made hybrids, bringing two or more species together to form a new plant.
Some people think that genetically engineering plants causes them to be less healthy or even dangerous, but this is not true. In fact, from a technical standpoint, all fruits and vegetables are hybrids, though instead of human intervention with nature, it used to be the bees and the wind mixing pollen and seeds together.
Man-made plants may be GMOs (genetically modified organisms) in a certain sense, but they are not the kind to be concerned about. The GMOs that combine DNA in an attempt to “improve” a plant by artificially pumping them with vitamins and minerals can pose health threats.
However, when hybrid fruits and vegetables are created, their nutritional values come together to make something entirely new just to have something new. They’re simply a cross between two plants. As such, people should welcome the new additions of man-made fruits and veggies with open arms.
Tangelo
A tangelo is a man-made fruit, a cross between the tangerine and the pomelo. It’s not hard to see where it got its name from knowing its two parent fruits. Tangelos look and taste similar to tangerines, orange, and mandarins, but they are a unique type of fruit.
The first tangelos are believed to have been cross-pollinated by insects rather than humans 3,500 years ago in Southeast Asia. However, today’s tangelos were created from human intervention and selective breeding starting in the 1800s.
Much like many of their citrus relatives, tangelos provide lots of vitamin C, vitamin A, and dietary fiber, as well as potassium and magnesium.
Broccolini
When most people see broccolini, they assume it’s baby broccoli. However, this is incorrect. Broccolini is a man-made vegetable that is a hybrid between broccoli and Chinese kale. It tastes slightly sweeter than broccoli, particularly in its stalks, which are soft and chewy when cooked.
Both kale and broccoli are some of the healthiest vegetables around, so it should come as no surprise that broccolini is extremely good for you as well.
Broccolini was originally cross-bred in Japan in the late 1980s by a seed company that was looking to expand its horizons. Broccolini occurred to them because broccoli and kale are close relatives and combining them would lengthen the growing season.
Both kale and broccoli are some of the healthiest vegetables around, so it should come as no surprise that broccolini is extremely good for you as well. One serving will get you 150 percent of your target daily vitamin C intake, not to mention providing vitamin K, vitamin A, potassium, folate, and iron.
Pluots
Man-made pluots are a cross between apricots and plums. Based on their looks, pluots more strongly resemble plums. However, their flavor profile represents a more equal mix of each fruit. They are overall very sweet and juicy (more so than a plum) but can have a hint of sour tartness to them.
Over 100 years ago, the horticulturist Luther Burbank first bred the plumcot, a 50-50 split between the plum and apricot, the plumcot. Pluots are a step further in hybrid fruits, thanks to Floyd Zaiger. They are 75 percent plum and 25 percent apricot, a more palatable mix, as it turns out.
Pluots are rich in antioxidants and are also a good source of potassium and vitamin C.
Broccoflower
The broccoflower’s “flowers” are beautiful: spirals with smaller and smaller fractals of spirals inside of those.
Broccoflower, which is also called Romanesco, is a man-made vegetable resulting from the cross between broccoli and cauliflower. It has a firm texture and nutty-earthy flavor, though when it is cooked, it becomes much sweeter and very tender. It looks a lot more interesting than either of its already pretty interesting-looking parent plants, too. The broccoflower’s “flowers” are beautiful: spirals with smaller and smaller fractals of spirals inside of those.
In modern history, broccoflower comes from Holland. It arrived in the US in 1989 and has been steadily growing in popularity ever since. There is evidence to suggest that broccoflower dates back much further than that though, all the way to the Italian selective breeders of the 16th century.
Broccoflower contains lots of vitamin C, and it is also a good source of both fiber and folate.
Plango
Plangos are not popular everywhere yet, but perhaps they will be when we all realize how delicious they are. Plangos are hybrids of the plum and the mango. They look and taste much more like mangos, though they have the added benefit of edible skin, a quality they seem to have gotten from their plum side. While mangos can be tough to eat because of their skin, plango-eaters don’t encounter that issue.
Plangos are not popular everywhere yet, but perhaps they will be when we all realize how delicious they are.
Plangos are a bit smaller than mangos but have the same bright orange meat on the inside. They are tropical fruits that grow natively in Thailand, where they were originally invented. There they call the prango “ma prang.”
Blood lime
To catch sight of the inside of a blood orange is startling enough, even though the red flesh isn’t so different from a normal orange’s interior. A blood lime, then, can be extremely startling. They look like limes in shape and size, but instead of being green, they are red on the outside and red on the inside, too.
Blood limes are a cross between red finger limes and the sweet orange and mandarin hybrid fruit called the Ellendale mandarin. They grow on medium-sized, thorny trees and only available in Australia currently, where they were originally developed in 2004. Their flavor is tangy and sweeter than a lime, though they are still acidic enough to be hard to eat straight. Mostly, blood limes are used as garnishes or to make sauces, beverages, and marmalades.
Kalette
The nutritional value of kalette is one of its most attractive features.
Crossing Brussels sprouts and kale together is the genetic recipe for kalette, a new man-made vegetable on the hipster vegetable scene. They taste light a lighter, less bitter, less intense version of kale. They do look a lot like kale, only smaller.
The nutritional value of kalette is one of its most attractive features. It provides 120 percent of a person’s daily recommended vitamin K intake and 40 percent of their recommended daily vitamin C intake. This is much less than kale alone would provide a person.
Since many people don’t like the bitterness of kale, kalette could be a great alternative.
Kalette is very new to the hybrid vegetable scene. It was created by Tozer Seeds in 2014, though that was after 15 years of work to perfect it. The idea was to make a more palatable version of kale, which seems to be a success. As kale and Brussels sprouts are from the same species, it was natural to combine them.
Tayberry
Berries lovers rejoice over tayberries, which are a cross between red raspberries and blackberries. Their flavor is both sweet and tart, and they are a deep red color, a perfect blend between their parents’ flavors and colors.
Because it is very difficult to machine-pick tayberries, they are not commercially grown. They are very soft, even more so than raspberries. As a result, it is hard to find them in traditional grocery stores. You’ll be much more likely to spot them at a farmers’ market. Their softness also makes them an ideal fruit for jams.
Berries lovers rejoice over tayberries, which are a cross between red raspberries and blackberries.
While tayberries do not have quite as much fiber per serving as either of their fiber-rich parents, they do have a good amount, as well as lots of vitamin C, antioxidants, and bioflavonoids.
Pluerry
Most cherry lovers are often left wanting more, as cherries are so small. Luckily, the pluerry could be the answer to this issue. This is a man-made fruit, a hybrid between the plum and the cherry. Pluerries are bigger than cherries, though slightly smaller than plums. They look much more like plums overall.
The flavor profile of a pluerry is a perfect blend between its parent flavors. It has the sweetness of cherries and the tartness of plums all in one. Their pits are comparable in size to those of cherries rather than the larger plum pits.
The man-made fruit’s nutritional benefits include a good amount of vitamin A, dietary fiber, vitamin K, and antioxidants.
From Modesto, California, the pluerry was originally named the cherum when cherry was its more dominant fruit. Then, the plum became its dominant fruit, so the named changed to reflect its plum element to be first in its name.
Black Galaxy tomato
The black galaxy tomato was developed in Israel by crossing cultured tomatoes with wild varieties of tomatoes. They have black skin but are still red on the inside.
The dark color comes from a pigment that is similar to that of blueberries. That pigment also happens to be very high in vitamin C and antioxidants, which may mean black Galaxy tomatoes are even more nutritious than regular red tomatoes.
Black galaxy tomatoes may look strange, but they taste pretty similar to other kinds of tomatoes. It’s really their color that makes them stand out. Some people have said they look like small eggplants.
Jostaberry
The jostaberry not only improved on its parents’ flavors, it is also much easier to grow.
The jostaberry turned out to be sweeter than both of its parents, the gooseberry and the blackcurrant. It is a berry, almost totally black in color, though it tastes like a blackberry mixed with grape, kiwi, and blueberry, somehow. Whether you consume jostaberries fresh or turn them into jams, they are great no matter what.
The jostaberry not only improved on its parents’ flavors, it is also much easier to grow. Currants tend to have disease problems, but the jostaberry bush is disease-resistant. Gooseberries grow with thorns but jostaberries do not.
This extremely vitamin C-rich hybrid fruit began their development in West Germany in 1955 by Dr. Rudoplh Bauer. They were not released until they were perfected in 1977. The jostaberry’s name comes from combining the words for blackcurrant and gooseberry in German.
Meyer lemon
The man-made Meyer lemon is a cross between standard lemons and mandarin. What happens when you cross the two is a much sweeter fruit. The acidity of the lemon is not totally absent, however. Its skin is dark yellow and a lot smoother and thinner than a normal lemon.
Meyer lemons were originally from China, where they were mainly used as home decor plants.
Meyer lemons arrived in the U.S. in the early 20th century because of an agricultural explorer who went to Asia in search of new plant species. His name was Frank N. Meyer, and Meyer lemons were named in his honor.
It is hard to ship Meyer lemons long-distance because their skin is so thin and soft. This exact quality makes them ideal for cooking, however.
Rabbage
It is not easy to cross plants that are not clear relatives, but it can be done. It has been done with the rabbage, a cross between the radish and the cabbage. For all cabbage lovers out there, this man-made vegetable is for you. It tastes a lot like cabbage, though thanks to the radish, it is a little bit spicier.
Rabbage also looks a lot like cabbage, those its leaves are a bit softer and looser. It also takes some of its color from the radish and ends up as a green and purplish-red color.
The Societ Union first developed the rabbage in the 1910s. it was designed to self-propagate and it worked. While it may not be the most popular vegetable, it’s still out there.
Peacotum
The peacotum is the first-ever hybrid fruit made of three parents.
The peacotum is the first-ever hybrid fruit made of three parents. Those parents are the peach, the plum, and the apricot. It took more than 10 years to develop the peacotum, which makes sense given that it’s not easy to create a fruit out of three parents.
We all have Floyd Zaigar to thank for the peacotum’s existence. It was made using natural methods, instead of genetically modifying the plants.
The peacotum tastes like a plum and an apricot combined without much of the peach’s flavor profile, making it pretty mellow as far as fruit goes. It does look like the peach, however, with its size and slightly fuzzy texture.
Pineberry
Pineberries, contrary to what it might sound or seem like, are not a hybrid of pineapples and strawberries. They are a man-made creation that combines the Wild South American strawberry (found in Chile) and the North American strawberry.
Pineberries taste and smell a lot like pineapple, though they look like small, white strawberries with red seeds.
Their appearance is actually quite striking and strange. There used to be more strawberries like those found in Chile that helped to create the pineberry, but Dutch farmers phased those qualities out a long time ago when they were discovered.
The pineberry’s creation took six years of selection and cultivation. Though they are grown commercially on a small scale in Belize and some parts of Europe, they are mainly a novelty fruit at this point. Perhaps someday that will change if the idea of a pineapple-tasting strawberry starts appealing to more people.
Jess Lakritz 