We need to have a word, guys. You’ve heard of the avocado, right? The once humble ‘is it a fruit, is it a vegetable?’ conversation starter that, much to my childhood dismay, used to find its way into the salads that for some ridiculous reason kept popping up at my birthday parties. Fast forward about 15 years or so, this fruit that until recently was little more than a huge pain in the ass to eat, is now the coveted emblem of millennialism. For some unbeknownst reason, we’re really fucking excited by this pretty bland, questionable textured non-pear thing, and are desperate to preserve its cultural relevance.
I know. The ‘hang on, you’re being a bit harsh here Jaz, mate. You’re starting to sound like that pesky generation of judgemental grown-ups who just don’t get what it is to be part of the generation-Instagram’ conversation is happening in my head too. How sacrilegious of me to suggest that avo ain't all that. But can we just take a minute to reassess everything, please?
As we know them, avocados are ‘cool’. But apparently, the 'cool' avocados as we know them are only cool when they reach a certain size. They're only cool when they're about the size of an average human hand. If any of these smaller, un-cool avocados are grown, they simply get thrown away out of fear that no body will want to buy them. How sad it must be for all of these small avocados never making it to our supermarket shelves. As a result, there has been a shit load of uncool avocados being needlessly thrown away for not making the cut.
As an attempt to 'tackle food waste from farm to fork', Tesco are selling these small, uncool avocados. But the only way to sell them, of course, is to attach a cute little gimmick to them. So they've popped six of them into egg cartons and called them Zilla Eggs. No, I don't know what that means either but in reality Zilla Eggs = egg-vocados = NORMAL AVOCADOS JUST A LITTLE BIT SMALLER THAN USUAL.
It's all just a bit sad. Not that these baby avocados are being suddenly sold - that's a very good thing. It's exceedingly annoying that it's actually a very sensible thing that probably should have been happening before, but in essence, selling them is pretty good for everyone. It's just a bit sad that the only way to get people to eat smaller, otherwise seemingly disposable versions of such an obsessively consumed food item, is to rebrand the fruit. I'm sorry, but Zilla Eggs are not a thing. Neither are egg-vocados. Small avocados are a thing. And if they're being put in packs of six under the guise of them being a brand new thing just to get 'em sold (because, whether we like it or not they're going to make an absolute killing), then fine, I'm all for saving the planet and the reduction of waste. But let's call it what it is: an Instagram-friendly way to sell the bits that we otherwise wouldn't want.
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Follow Jazmin on Instagram @JazKopotsha
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.