By Tomato Queen

You would think that the tomato would have been lustily embraced by my people, the Jews, since they first popped them into their mouths.

And in a way, this is true.

Now a thriving staple of Israel’s diet, economy and food culture, the tomato was once considered so bloody a fruit that it was deemed unkosher.

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By Michelle Fabio

We know tomatoes as juicy, tasty, and simply delicious, but it wasn’t always this way.

The tomato is said to have been around since as early as 700 A.D. growing wild in the Andes of South America and cultivated by Incas and Aztecs; somehow tomatoes eventually ended up in Central America, and when the Spanish began colonizing America, they took red, seedy fruit to the Caribbean, the Philippines, Asia, and, of course, Europe.

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