What surprising food facts have you only discovered recently?

[Meetmeunderthemoonlight]

Well I never!

For tonight's dinner I made salad, wholemeal pasta, tuna and dh made boiled eggs to go with it. Dh peeled the eggs and I watched him doing so as we chatted away (stay with me here) anyway, we sat down eating and chatting I looked down and my eggs had vibrant blue spots!!!!! Dh Googled and apparently red cabbage (was in the salad) can turn eggs blue!

This was all new to me at the grand old age of 45. Any fun facts you recently found out?

Edited to say it can be any fact. The title is mumsnet Ai

The older a cheese is, the lactose breaks down, so Parmesan over 30 months is lactose free as is some very mature cheddar and that Gorgonzola is naturally lactose free. It's been a joy to eat cheese again!

The excellent head chef at my work didn't know it was made from wheat. He was very good at giving me gluten-free meals until he served me couscous.

Him: it's not wheat, it's couscous.

Sultanas are also dried grapes. The difference between raisins and sultanas is the type of grapes they are made from.

The internet tells me sultanas are dried Thompson grapes, a white (green) seedless grape. Raisins are often made from black/red grapes, eg Muscatel.
I don't know if that's true.

Sorry, what?! Lord above, tell me more!

Beta-glucan in oats can remove forever chemicals from your gut.

Yes!!! I was in my 50s (and still am) when I was told this and took to Google to disprove it (and proved myself wrong)

Mushrooms have never been classified as a plant surely? They're a fungus.

Camila P.B once worked as a chimney sweep in our old, quite affluent , village. She did rod draining on the side too when she was in need of the cash.

Only found out two days ago that giant couscous is pasta. I thought it was a couscous grain.

They sell pineapple plants in M&S sometimes. I have one on my windowsill and it grows one tiny tiny pineapple per year

Bananas dont grow on a tree, its a plant -actually a giant herb.
A flower appears and gets bigger and bigger then rows of tiny bananas start growing, they keep growing bigger and bigger.
When they are done (they are still green ) the whole massive bunch of bananas are removed, then moved **somewhere to ripen/to transport.
The herb/plant/non tree will never produce bananas again -so it’s cut down to a stump and then shoots grow from it. One of these will then start to grow into the massive plant/herb/non tree and the whole cycle starts again -takes 2 years.
I used to live in Africa and we had banana plants -along with pineapples & many other fruits- so saw it in action.

** we used the airing cupboard.needs tobe warm & dry.

Yes it is true.

It is? Did not know that! Love broccoli, hate kale, eat tender stem often!

When you eat raw pineapple, it eats you back.

It’s to do with a specific enzyme (bromelain).

On the ground

You can blame Black Lace for that misinformation.
Agadoo doo doo
Push pineapple, shake the tree...

I also believed they came from a tree until a few years ago.

That beans and lentils are almost a perfect food! I absolutely hated beans and lentils as a child and apart from hummus, which I did eat, I only started eating them in my 30s.
But I only recently discovered that they're soooo good - high in protein, high in fibre, good source of low GI carbs, heaps of vitamins and minerals. Great for maintaining a healthy weight, last basically forever in the pantry and so cheap! You can pretty much live off them with a few veggies and the occasional piece of fruit and be healthy. Maybe everyone knew this but it was a surprise to me.

Twix chocolate bar gets its name from TWo stIX

A friend of mine very confidently announced that pork scratchings contained absolutely zero pork, and that of course I, as a vegetarian, could eat them and not to be so silly. I lost a lot of respect for her after that 😁

That cooking at even a modest altitude can really mess things up. Not just with boiling eggs but everything really.

It's not you, it's the mountain.

Haha! Love this!

Oh what??? That’s a shock!

I was in my thirties when I passed a melon field in Portugal, discovering for the first time that gourds - melons, squash, etc - grow along wriggly vines on the ground.

I knew about the vine part, but must've imagined them on frames like giant grapevines or something

Same year, I saw and ate my first cashew fruit. I'm excusing myself that, though, you never imagine nuts protruding from fruit like some kind of overgrown clitoris!

Yes I had the blue garlic thing happen recently for the first time. Completely freaked me out as the garlic looked like blue maggots in the pasta. I realised it was perfectly safe after googling but had been put off eating by then. Apparently more common in older garlic.

I remember finding out when I was a teen working in hospitality that capers were effectively ‘inside out daisies’. It blew my mind!

I was similarly surprised about how cashews grow. The cashews grow underneath the fruit, not inside. And animals only eat the fruit, because cashews are poisonous (they ooz a corrosive liquid).

www.foodunfolded.com/article/cashew-nuts-how-its-made