Speaker 1: Guess what, Mango, what's that?
Speaker 2: Well, well, I know you like to turn to me
Speaker 2: to keep up with like the coolest things going on
Speaker 2: in the world, or like trends happening, So I wanted
Speaker 2: to let you in a little secret. Have you heard
Speaker 2: about the coolest way to use an avocado right now?
Speaker 1: So I'm not really off on super hip avocado trends.
Speaker 1: Like I saw a restaurant ridiculed online for serving this
Speaker 1: deconstructed avocado toast which was just half an avocado on
Speaker 1: one side of a play and then a piece of
Speaker 1: toast on the other. And they didn't even do the
Speaker 1: work of smashing them together. It was just like overpriced laziness.
Speaker 1: But I don't know what trend are you talking about.
Speaker 2: It's actually not a dish. So the coolest thing you
Speaker 2: can do right now with an avocado is to propose
Speaker 2: with one. And I'm not kidding about this. So the
Speaker 2: not Cosmo and all these other places have declared that
Speaker 2: the avocado proposal it's here, Mango, it's here.
Speaker 1: I'm excited, but I don't know what it is. Tell
Speaker 1: me all.
Speaker 2: Right, So, basically, people are slicing an avocado in half,
Speaker 2: taking out the pit and then sticking a little ring
Speaker 2: in so it stands up right. Actually, this is kind
Speaker 2: of grossing me out, but I'm trying to go with it.
Speaker 2: And so then the moment is right and you just
Speaker 2: queue up cold play, You get down on one knee,
Speaker 2: you take that avocado out of your back pocket. I
Speaker 2: don't know why they're suggesting to keep it in your
Speaker 2: back pocket, and then you crack it open like a
Speaker 2: ring box and as then puts it quote, if you
Speaker 2: love the farmer's market, this might be your dream proposal.
Speaker 1: I like that it's the official proposal of like farmers' markets.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've always looked for one of these. Well, today's
Speaker 2: show is all about the creamy green fruit from Why
Speaker 2: you Should Thank a Mailman for your guacamole obsession to win.
Speaker 2: Avocado theft became so trendy, So we're about to get
Speaker 2: knee high on avocado's let's dive in. Hey their podcast listeners,
Speaker 2: Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson, and as
Speaker 2: always I'm joined by my good friend Mangesh hot Ticketter
Speaker 2: and on the other side of the soundproof glass, demonstrating
Speaker 2: the absolute worst way to peel an avocado. I Honestly,
Speaker 2: I can't even look at it.
Speaker 1: I know, I don't think you're supposed to use a
Speaker 1: vegetable peeler on Tristan.
Speaker 2: Oh, well, anyway, I'm gonna turn my head. But that's
Speaker 2: our friend and producer Tristan McNeil. So I realized, you
Speaker 2: know mego, this is a slightly grim way to start
Speaker 2: the show. But I was reading about this recent wave
Speaker 2: of avocado related injuries, or what they call avocado hand
Speaker 2: and people are doing serious damage to their hands by
Speaker 2: trying and of course failing, to cut into their avocados.
Speaker 1: So that's pretty crazy. Like I hadn't heard about people
Speaker 1: injuring themselves on avocados. But it does feel like the
Speaker 1: same as when bagels became really popular in the nineties
Speaker 1: and suddenly like every local news story was about people
Speaker 1: cutting themselves with bagels and how to appropriately slice a
Speaker 1: bag It doesn't seem bad difficult, but I mean, I
Speaker 1: guess you don't get avocado's presliced. What's the solution.
Speaker 2: Well, it's actually become a big enough problem that there's
Speaker 2: this British plastic surgeon and he's been pushing for warning
Speaker 2: labels to be added to avocados. In the UK really
Speaker 2: and apparently, yeah, seriously, apparently he treats an average of
Speaker 2: four patients a week, four patients a week for avaquada
Speaker 2: based injuries. So I mean, it may seem weird to
Speaker 2: put a sticker and that it may actually sound silly,
Speaker 2: but you can't really blame him for wanting to do
Speaker 2: something about this epidemic of avocado fails.
Speaker 1: That's so weird. Like I mean, I feel like you
Speaker 1: can cut an avocado with a butter knife. You don't
Speaker 1: need something super sharp to do it.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 1: While prepping for today's show, one of my biggest takeaways
Speaker 1: was that most Americans have always been pretty clueless when
Speaker 1: it comes to these leathery fruits, and this confusion actually
Speaker 1: goes all the way back to the early twentieth century.
Speaker 1: That's when avocado production was first taking root in the US.
Speaker 1: But before we get into the state side history, I
Speaker 1: do want to go back a little further in time
Speaker 1: because humans have actually been cultivating avocado trees for thousands
Speaker 1: of years now. It goes as far back as five
Speaker 1: hundred BC, and this was mostly taking place in Central
Speaker 1: and South America as well as Mexico, where the Aztecs
Speaker 1: were calling the fruit a word that they used for testicle.
Speaker 2: And so that was based on what like the fruit shape.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but also because avocado's typically grown pears, which I
Speaker 1: guess further the resemblance.
Speaker 2: But h I get it, I get it.
Speaker 1: I go. Yeah, it's a great joke that kills at recess.
Speaker 1: But they also used to be considered something of an afrodisiac.
Speaker 1: But that might have just been Europeans reading too much
Speaker 1: into the words origin. Like apparently King Louis the fourteenth
Speaker 1: nicknamed avocado's the good pear in French, you know, pear
Speaker 1: the fruit, not pair pai r. But he called it
Speaker 1: that because he claimed avocado's got him in the mood
Speaker 1: and boosted his desire to mate.
Speaker 2: Well, Louis definitely wasn't the last person to compare avocados
Speaker 2: to the shape of a pair, because when avocados first
Speaker 2: started to catch on in the US, people were actually
Speaker 2: calling them alligator pears. Makes sense, I mean, obviously that
Speaker 2: tough outer skin, it has that bumpy texture and green coloring.
Speaker 2: I mean, he does kind of look like an alligator,
Speaker 2: but he didn't really make for the most appetizing association,
Speaker 2: as you can imagine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I guess like biting into an alligator
Speaker 1: seems like a tough cell.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's exactly what the California Avocado Growers Exchange
Speaker 2: found when they were trying to expand their business just
Speaker 2: beyond that home state. And they claim that grim association
Speaker 2: with you know, with reptiles was kind of ruining the
Speaker 2: whole operation. And even worse, it was, you know, of course,
Speaker 2: besmirching the good name of the Laurel tree family to
Speaker 2: which these avocados belong. And this is serious because in
Speaker 2: nineteen twenty seven, the trade group released the statement and
Speaker 2: here's what it says. That the avocado, an exalted member
Speaker 2: of the Laurel family, should be called an alligator pair
Speaker 2: is beyond all understanding.
Speaker 1: I love that they thought this would be the thing
Speaker 1: to change people's minds. Like, I know how we'll get
Speaker 1: people on board. Let's appeal to everyone's love for Laurel trees.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's all it took. Well, I mean, it was
Speaker 2: maybe kind of a strange play, but they did get
Speaker 2: smarter about the rebranding. The growers slowly weaned the public
Speaker 2: off of the alligator pear as a nickname, and they
Speaker 2: first replaced it with a much more appetizing butter paar,
Speaker 2: and then the somewhat redundant avocado pear before they finally
Speaker 2: just got people to start calling them avocados. But even
Speaker 2: once customers started calling them by the right name, avocados
Speaker 2: still faced a pretty uphill battle.
Speaker 1: So why is that.
Speaker 2: Well, for one thing, if you think about it, they're
Speaker 2: unlike any other fruits that people were eating because they're
Speaker 2: not sweet, they're not really good for cooking. They ripened
Speaker 2: off the tree. I mean, people didn't really know what
Speaker 2: to do with them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's funny to think that Mexican culture and cuisine
Speaker 1: just took to it so quickly, but just one country north,
Speaker 1: we were so perplexed by this fruit, like it took
Speaker 1: so much rebranding and marketing for us to catch on.
Speaker 1: I mean, the process took most of the twentieth century
Speaker 1: to get us on board.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's true, But it actually is kind of fun
Speaker 2: to look back and see how avocados kind of gradually
Speaker 2: took on the characteristics that we most associate with them today.
Speaker 2: For example, the need to grow avocados only in the
Speaker 2: mildest parts of the country, you know, where you'd find
Speaker 2: the water and short supply. That really meant avocados often
Speaker 2: cost more than other domestic fruits, and of course marketers
Speaker 2: were aware of how expensive their product was becoming, and
Speaker 2: that's really why they started pushing for avocados to be
Speaker 2: paired with other upscale foods like grapefruit or lobster. And
Speaker 2: in fact, in the late nineteen twenties, and I had
Speaker 2: not seen this before doing our research for this week,
Speaker 2: but the California Avocados Society started taking out ads in
Speaker 2: Vogue and The New Yorker, and they were proclaiming the
Speaker 2: avocados to be the quote aristocrat of salad fruits.
Speaker 1: I like, the avocados need to come in top hats
Speaker 1: and monocles just so likely. But you know, to me,
Speaker 1: that's less advertizing than just calling them alligator pairs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but the fruits fancy status kind of stuck, and
Speaker 2: by the nineteen seventies, avocados had developed this reputation as
Speaker 2: really more of a luxury item. For example, in nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy four, the price of a single avocado had soared
Speaker 2: as high as a full dollar. Now keep in mind
Speaker 2: that's the equivalent of almost five dollars in today's money.
Speaker 1: That is crazy So what about avocado's other big claim,
Speaker 1: like the idea that they're one of the world's healthiest superfoods.
Speaker 1: When did that really come about?
Speaker 2: Well, it really took off in the nineteen eighties, and
Speaker 2: as you might remember, this is when nutrition experts really
Speaker 2: started to crack down on America's fat consumption. So low
Speaker 2: fat food started appearing on store shelves, and every celebrity
Speaker 2: you could think of was pushing some sort of patented
Speaker 2: diet or crazy new piece of exercise equipment. And you know,
Speaker 2: as people began looking for more and more ways to
Speaker 2: reduce their fat intake, avocados became a pretty popular target.
Speaker 1: But wait, aren't avocados full of like the good kind
Speaker 1: of fat that kind of actually helps us reduce cholesterol? Like,
Speaker 1: why would experts tell people not to eat them?
Speaker 2: Well, at the time, nutritionists were worried that the American
Speaker 2: public wouldn't be able to wrap their heads around that
Speaker 2: distinction between the types of fats, you know, between the
Speaker 2: good mono unsaturated fats and the bad saturated fat. So
Speaker 2: instead they just told people to avoid fats all together.
Speaker 2: And that's why, strangely enough, it actually fell to the
Speaker 2: avocado growers to educate the public about the fruit's true
Speaker 2: nutritional value. So in the late eighties, the California Avocado Commission.
Speaker 2: They worked closely with researchers and funded all sorts of
Speaker 2: studies on the health benefits of their product. And then
Speaker 2: the grower spread the good news with a TV ad
Speaker 2: campaign and it starred Angie Dickinson, and the ads were
Speaker 2: a huge hit, but they were also pretty scandalous for
Speaker 2: the time. So here's what the ad was. It showed
Speaker 2: Angie stretched out in these gold stilettos and a white
Speaker 2: leotard and she was eating half an avocado with a spooch. Sure,
Speaker 2: And after she lays out how tasty and nutritious the
Speaker 2: avocados are, she turns to the camera and asked, would
Speaker 2: this body lie to you? I had forgotten where I
Speaker 2: got that line from. I know I used that line
Speaker 2: a lot, I didn't remember that Angie had created that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess the nutrition experts were wrong to
Speaker 1: doubt the American public like, we can absolutely understand the
Speaker 1: health benefits of avocados as long as they're explained to
Speaker 1: us by beautiful movie star. So I do feel like
Speaker 1: uh Kanye as I'm about to say this because Angie Dickinson,
Speaker 1: you did a good job, and I'm gonna let you finish.
Speaker 1: But mister Ripe Guy is the best spokesperson in the
Speaker 1: avocado industry.
Speaker 2: I can't say I'm familiar with his work. So who
Speaker 2: is mister Ripe Guy?
Speaker 1: I can't believe you're asking me that. No. This goes
Speaker 1: back to the avocados struggle. So after surviving the anti
Speaker 1: fat movement of the eighties, sales were still suffering to
Speaker 1: the public's lack of knowledge about the fruit. So one
Speaker 1: prime example is that people weren't even sure when to
Speaker 1: eat avocados. People kept trying to eat them when they
Speaker 1: were like bright green, because that's when they looked the prettiest,
Speaker 1: instead of waiting until the fruit to turn like a
Speaker 1: murky brown color, and that's actually when it's most delicious
Speaker 1: or the ripest to eat. But to combat the problem,
Speaker 1: the Avocado Commission partnered with an ad agency and created
Speaker 1: their very own mascot, mister Ripe Guy. And in true
Speaker 1: eighties fashion, this California character was basically just an anthropomorphic
Speaker 1: avocado with a pair of sunglasses on.
Speaker 2: Wait, you know what this reminds me of? And I
Speaker 2: collected all of these from I can't remember whether it
Speaker 2: was McDonald's or Hearty's or what it was, but you
Speaker 2: remember the California.
Speaker 1: Raisin definitely, So it definitely feels like a California raisin
Speaker 1: rip off. But someone would show up in an avocada
Speaker 1: suit at various events, and this was around the country.
Speaker 1: They'd share tips as mister Ripe guy on how to
Speaker 1: pick and prep avocados and just generally sing the fruits praises.
Speaker 1: But the best part of the campaign was in nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety five when the Commission launched a nationwide search to
Speaker 1: find Miss Ripe, and women were encouraged to mail and
Speaker 1: video cassettes of themselves explaining why they deserved this coveted honor,
Speaker 1: and apparently the winner would receive a free trip to
Speaker 1: Hollywood and a walk on roll on Baywatch Nights.
Speaker 2: I like cut didn't even occur to them that maybe
Speaker 2: they should win a lifetime supply of avocados. I feel
Speaker 2: like maybe they didn't think through this campaign fully.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean maybe they would have gotten more people
Speaker 1: to enter, but in the end, least one woman was
Speaker 1: interested in what was on offer. The lucky winner was
Speaker 1: Robin nardone of Chicago who I'm sure you remember, and
Speaker 1: he told reporters, going to be Miss Ripe is like
Speaker 1: a dream come true. I will bear the title proudly.
Speaker 2: That's really sweet. And of course everybody still talks about
Speaker 2: that episode of Baywatch Nights that she was on, right, definitely. Well,
Speaker 2: I'm curious, so did these kinds of stunts pay off
Speaker 2: for avocado growers.
Speaker 1: Well, it's hard to say exactly how much of the
Speaker 1: industry's growth is due to mister and missus Ripe guy,
Speaker 1: but there's no doubt that the avocado consumption has gone
Speaker 1: way way off since the nineties. For example, by nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety nine, the average American was eating about one point
Speaker 1: five pounds of avocado per year, whereas in twenty sixteen
Speaker 1: that number had actually grown to seven point one pounds
Speaker 1: per year according to USDA. Yeah, and to put that
Speaker 1: in perspective, the hass Avocado Board reported that four hundred
Speaker 1: and eighty four million avocados were consumed in two thousand,
Speaker 1: which sounds like a lot, right, But you fast forward
Speaker 1: to twenty twelve and the total had risen to nearly
Speaker 1: one point five billion, which is basically a three hundred
Speaker 1: percent increase over just a decade.
Speaker 2: I mean, that is pretty amazing. It's also pretty amazing
Speaker 2: that it's taken us this long to finally mention the
Speaker 2: H word. So I do want to shift gears and
Speaker 2: talk about what is undoubtedly the biggest name in the business,
Speaker 2: and that's the Hass avocado. Now, I know we need
Speaker 2: to explore how the variety came to dominate the market,
Speaker 2: as well as what that monopoly might be causing us
Speaker 2: to miss out.
Speaker 1: On, which sounds good. But before we get into it,
Speaker 1: let's take a quick break.
Speaker 2: You're listening to Part Time Genius and we're talking all
Speaker 2: things avocado, Okay, mango. So we've been charting the course
Speaker 2: of how misunderstood fruit like the avocado wound up as
Speaker 2: one of the world's trendiout superfoods. And so now we're
Speaker 2: getting to what's probably my favorite part of the story,
Speaker 2: which is the contribution of a Californian mailman named Rudolph Hass.
Speaker 2: And while this story isn't widely known, I'm willing to
Speaker 2: bet that the name sounds familiar to most of our listeners,
Speaker 2: and for very good reason, because Hass avocados are hands
Speaker 2: down the most popular avocado, not only in the country,
Speaker 2: but in the entire world. In fact, there's a good
Speaker 2: chance that most people have only ever eaten the hass avocado.
Speaker 2: And that's because ninety five percent of the avocados sold
Speaker 2: in the US and about eighty percent worldwide are hass avocados.
Speaker 1: I'm honestly not sure I could even name a different
Speaker 1: kind of avocado.
Speaker 2: Well, here's what's crazy, though, is that there's actually more
Speaker 2: than nine hundred varieties of avocados. You know, some of
Speaker 2: these things have very different shapes and textures and flavors
Speaker 2: than that single type that we're used to. But thankfully,
Speaker 2: the one type we do have is a pretty good one.
Speaker 2: Hass avocados have a strong flavor, they're packed with healthy oil,
Speaker 2: so it's not like we're getting the short end of
Speaker 2: the stick on this. And there's a reason Hass is
Speaker 2: the most popular name in avocados, even if that popularity
Speaker 2: does result in a real lack of diversity on the
Speaker 2: store shelves.
Speaker 1: So speaking of the name, this is sort of embarrassing.
Speaker 1: But I used to think that Hass was just the
Speaker 1: name of the family farm or like the company that
Speaker 1: grew them, you know, like Dole or Chikita. But I
Speaker 1: didn't know it was actually a fruit variety.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I don't think most people do know that.
Speaker 2: But so to get back to that, let's get back
Speaker 2: to Rudolph Hass and he was a postman by trade
Speaker 2: in the nineteen twenties and then got into horticulture after
Speaker 2: he saw this magazine ad that showed an avocado tree
Speaker 2: with dollar bills growing out of it. I mean, that
Speaker 2: sounds pretty convincing. So he was hoping to make some
Speaker 2: money on the side and started buying up seeds and
Speaker 2: raising these resulting trees at his family home. And this
Speaker 2: was just outside of La so he was grassed from
Speaker 2: the larger plants to multiply that crop. But there was
Speaker 2: one seedling in particulars He described it a stubborn baby
Speaker 2: tree grown from a Guatemalan seed of unknown parentage, or
Speaker 2: that's how one local newspaper put it. That it wouldn't
Speaker 2: accept a graph no matter how hard has tried. He
Speaker 2: considered cutting it down, but instead he just said to
Speaker 2: decide and let it grow unattended as a somewhat of
Speaker 2: an experiment. And this turned out to be the best
Speaker 2: decision of Hass's life, because when the tree finally bore fruit.
Speaker 2: It's avocado's tasted better than any other of the varieties available.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, first of all, i just love that
Speaker 1: the world's most popular avocado is a result of like
Speaker 1: dumb luck. But also I'm really curious about these other
Speaker 1: varieties that predate the Hass, Like what were the go
Speaker 1: to avocados at the time, and what made the Hass
Speaker 1: one so much better.
Speaker 2: Well, at the time, the prevailing avocado was called the fuerte,
Speaker 2: which means strong and Spanish. And admittedly, the fuerte looks
Speaker 2: more appetizing than the hass. You know, you don't have
Speaker 2: that bumpy, thick, black skin of the hass. The fuerte
Speaker 2: avocado has more of a smooth and kind of a
Speaker 2: thin skin, and it actually turns a green color as
Speaker 2: it ripens. But you know, when you think about taste,
Speaker 2: Hass avocados are way richer and nuttier and creamier than
Speaker 2: the fuertes, And so this gave them a big advantage
Speaker 2: in Rudolph Hass's mind. But of course taste wasn't the
Speaker 2: only thing they had going for them. Another big advantage
Speaker 2: is that the Hass avocado trees were easier to grow
Speaker 2: than the fuerte trees. They also have longer harvest seasons
Speaker 2: than other avocados, and they can produce larger quantities of
Speaker 2: fruit after just a couple of years. But there's one
Speaker 2: thing that's maybe even more important than all of those things,
Speaker 2: and that's that these avocados are easy to handle and
Speaker 2: even ship long distances. And that's thanks to that alligator
Speaker 2: thick skin that we were talking about before. So when
Speaker 2: Rudolph Hass realized that he'd stumbled upon something special, he
Speaker 2: patented his tree in nineteen thirty five and started working
Speaker 2: with a local grower to promote this new variety.
Speaker 1: You know, it's funny when you're talking about the packability
Speaker 1: of these avocados. You think about other fruit like the
Speaker 1: red Delicious or the cavendish bananas, and they are always
Speaker 1: sacrificing flavor for that durability, and it's amazing to think
Speaker 1: that the avocado doesn't do that. But yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: think I realized you could actually patten a tree.
Speaker 2: Well I didn't neither, and apparently neither did anybody else,
Speaker 2: because you know, sadly the patent was all but ignored
Speaker 2: by its competitors. In fact, this is how Rudolph's granddaughter
Speaker 2: Cindy Miller, explained the ordeal in an article about her
Speaker 2: family's story. She writes, since it was the first patent
Speaker 2: ever issued on a tree, it got no respect. Growers
Speaker 2: would buy one from mister Brokaw, who had the exclusive
Speaker 2: right to produce the nursery trees. They would then regraph
Speaker 2: their whole grove with the budwood from that one tree.
Speaker 2: For that reason, Rudolph has made only five thousand dollars
Speaker 2: in royalties on his first patent.
Speaker 1: That's pretty insane, like five grand for coming up with
Speaker 1: the world's tastiest avocado.
Speaker 2: It's crazy. Yeah, it's a weird story, but there is
Speaker 2: a silver lining for that name. So the avocados that
Speaker 2: bear his name have become ubiquitous with the fruit, and
Speaker 2: today millions of his trees can now be found all
Speaker 2: over the globe. And maybe the craziest part about this
Speaker 2: whole thing is that all of those trees are genetically
Speaker 2: descended from that single mother tree that has planted on
Speaker 2: his property, and that was nearly one hundred years ago.
Speaker 2: In fact, it's estimated that about eighty percent of all
Speaker 2: US avocados are descendants of the hass avocado mother tree.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's just so weird to think about. And
Speaker 2: the original tree actually lasted quite a while too. It
Speaker 2: was on that Hass property until it finally lost the
Speaker 2: battle with something called root rot disease, and that was
Speaker 2: back in two thousand and two. But according to Alice Obscura,
Speaker 2: you can still make a pilgrimage to see the preserved
Speaker 2: woods from the tree at the Brokaw Nursery and Ventura
Speaker 2: and there's even a plaque there to market it's original
Speaker 2: location in Lejabra.
Speaker 1: Which I think that takes care of my summer vacation
Speaker 1: plans for the good good. But you know, Hass having
Speaker 1: his patent undermine like that kind of reminds me of
Speaker 1: something weird I noticed while researching, and that's the sheer
Speaker 1: volume of crime that the fruit detracts. Like I wouldn't
Speaker 1: think this before, but you know, you mentioned earlier that
Speaker 1: avocados were worth equivalent of what like five dollars each
Speaker 1: in the nineteen seventies, and at the time, that high
Speaker 1: value sparked a wave of avocado that's throughout the org
Speaker 1: of southern California. And this was hardly an isolated incident.
Speaker 1: So just last year, three men were arrested in California
Speaker 1: for selling over three hundred thousand dollars worth of stolen
Speaker 1: hass avocados. I mean, that's insane. And when avocado prices
Speaker 1: spiked in New Zealand back in twenty sixteen, farmers were
Speaker 1: hit with over forty large scale thefts within a six
Speaker 1: month period. Wow.
Speaker 2: I mean, I had no idea that avocado crime was
Speaker 2: so prevalent, But if you think about it, me, it
Speaker 2: does make sense. I remember back in our episode on cheese,
Speaker 2: we talked about how cheese is the most shoplifted item
Speaker 2: in the world, and that's because it's relatively a small item,
Speaker 2: it's always in demand, and it does tend to cost
Speaker 2: more than other food. So it feels like we've got
Speaker 2: the same thing going here with the avocados exactly.
Speaker 1: And we already mentioned how avocados have long been viewed
Speaker 1: as a luxury food due to their price, so in
Speaker 1: a way, all the crime surrounding them is to be expected.
Speaker 1: But one thing nobody expected was the way that avocado
Speaker 1: farmers in Mexico have been fighting back against their own
Speaker 1: local form of avocado crimes. Because there's actually one town
Speaker 1: there that has its own paramilitary avocado Protection Force.
Speaker 2: Wait, so where is this.
Speaker 1: It's in a town called Tansataro and it's in the
Speaker 1: micho acm region of Mexico. It's basically avocado country. The
Speaker 1: township's over a million dollars worth of fruit every single day.
Speaker 1: But back in two thousand and six, drug cartels, who
Speaker 1: are feeling the pinch of a law enforcement crackdown, started
Speaker 1: turning their attention to Tansataro's avocado producers. So of course
Speaker 1: things get insane, right like the growers quickly become the
Speaker 1: target of threats. They're kidnappings, even some murders. There was
Speaker 1: a talk of the cartel season control of the orchards entirely,
Speaker 1: and that's when the avocado producers decided to ban together
Speaker 1: and fight back. They created their own local protection force,
Speaker 1: which was half funded by the government, and today they
Speaker 1: wear a body armor, they carry these high powered weapons
Speaker 1: to ward off the cartels and also it gives the
Speaker 1: citizens a sense of safety. I mean, this sounds scary
Speaker 1: to me and kind of extreme, but actually it's worked.
Speaker 1: So avocado crimes are way down in Tansatura, which has
Speaker 1: allowed the town to once again focus on what it
Speaker 1: does best, which is avocados, And in twenty thirteen, we
Speaker 1: saw this when a group of four hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: students in the town set a record for the world's
Speaker 1: largest serving of guacamole, a weighed and astounding six thousand pounds.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, I mean, I guess it makes sense that
Speaker 2: they had those guards on hand, because if you think
Speaker 2: about that much guacamole is definitely gonna attract at least
Speaker 2: a few thieves, I would imagine. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But now that we've tackled the CDI world of avocado crimes,
Speaker 1: there's at least one part of avocado history that I
Speaker 1: want to get to. But first, let's take another quick break.
Speaker 2: Okay, mango, So I told you my favorite story. Now
Speaker 2: it's your turn. What's your favorite story from the avocado history.
Speaker 1: So at the top of the show, we talked about
Speaker 1: the recent and accidents where people have stabbed themselves while
Speaker 1: prepping avocados, and while there's definitely some user error at
Speaker 1: play there, the real problem is that the avocado has
Speaker 1: this enormous pit, and while most fruits contained seeds small
Speaker 1: enough to be swallowed or excreted by humans and other animals,
Speaker 1: avocado pits can be as big as golf balls, which
Speaker 1: means that swallowing them is off the table for most
Speaker 1: of us.
Speaker 2: I've always actually wondered about that because from an evolutionary perspective,
Speaker 2: it doesn't seem like the most effective way for this
Speaker 2: plant to spread its seeds around.
Speaker 1: Well, it isn't anymore, but it used to be incredibly effective.
Speaker 1: So the part of avocado history that I love the
Speaker 1: most is the part that explains why the pit is
Speaker 1: so huge, and for that we actually need to travel
Speaker 1: all the way back to the dawn of the Cenozoic Era,
Speaker 1: which is the period after the extinction of dinosaurs when
Speaker 1: mammals first started to take the stage. But the mammals
Speaker 1: of the Senozoic era weren't just any mammals.
Speaker 2: They were actually.
Speaker 1: Enormous species known as megafauna, and they've roamed the Western
Speaker 1: hemisphere in droves.
Speaker 2: All right, So you're talking about things like, you know,
Speaker 2: sabertoothed tigers and mammoths and those rhinos that were honestly,
Speaker 2: I think they were like the size of house.
Speaker 1: Boats, right, Yeah, that's right. So another dominant megafauna species
Speaker 1: was the lestoedon, which were these fifteen foot tall, two
Speaker 1: ton ground slots, and they wandered the grassy plains of
Speaker 1: the Americas, and just like the slots of today, lustedons
Speaker 1: mostly eight leaves and grass to survive, but occasionally they
Speaker 1: would chow on on more satisfying trees, like the tasty avocado.
Speaker 2: Huh so the avocado. It's also a product of the
Speaker 2: cinazoic era.
Speaker 1: It is, And actually that's really when the avocado plant
Speaker 1: came to its prime. So these giant slots would swallow
Speaker 1: whole avocados. And because these creatures were so massive, their
Speaker 1: digestive systems were able to process the big seeds without
Speaker 1: a problem. So they'd kind of feast and then travel
Speaker 1: around with the seeds and their stomachs and then they'd
Speaker 1: PLoP them out in some far away place and new
Speaker 1: trees could thrive without competition. It was basically an evolutionary
Speaker 1: win win for everybody. And that's probably why we still
Speaker 1: have these large pitted avocados today.
Speaker 2: Wait, are there still mammals that can eat the avocado
Speaker 2: pits like that? I mean, you know, megafauna are one thing,
Speaker 2: but I feel like most slows would choke if they
Speaker 2: tried to eat a whole avocado at this point.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're right. I mean, climate change kind of wiped
Speaker 1: out most of the megafauna in the western hemisphere. This
Speaker 1: was about thirteen thousand years ago, so according to researchers,
Speaker 1: North America lost about seventy percent of its megafauna at
Speaker 1: the time, and South America lost eighty percent. So the
Speaker 1: vast majority of these large creatures that helped these avocado
Speaker 1: trees flourish in the first place, we're no longer around
Speaker 1: to feed on them.
Speaker 2: So I don't get it. I mean, why would wild
Speaker 2: avocados still produce such large pits if it's not beneficial
Speaker 2: for them.
Speaker 1: No, it's a good question. And I was actually flipping
Speaker 1: through this book by Connie Barlow called The Ghosts of Evolution,
Speaker 1: and she says that avocado's giant seeds are what we
Speaker 1: call an evolutionary anachronism. So none of today's slots could
Speaker 1: possibly digest to seed that large, but the big pits
Speaker 1: persist anyway, And as Barlow puts it, quote after thirteen
Speaker 1: thousand years, the avocado is clue that the great mammals
Speaker 1: are gone, and the truth is thanks to us. That's
Speaker 1: completely fine, right, Like the avocado doesn't need to change
Speaker 1: because it's got new champions. We've learned to deal with
Speaker 1: the big seeds and spread them out in ways that
Speaker 1: don't involve our digestive tracks.
Speaker 2: Well, I guess that makes sense. But what about those
Speaker 2: thirteen thousand years between the death of the megafauna and
Speaker 2: human cultivation of these avocados. It feels like in all
Speaker 2: those intervening years, the big seeds they still somehow managed
Speaker 2: to get spread around even without those giant mammals.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So, one theory is that squirrels and other rodents
Speaker 1: could have found avocados rotting on eeden on the surface
Speaker 1: and then buried the pits for safe keeping, and then
Speaker 1: they'd return later and find that there were these massive
Speaker 1: trees that had sprowed in the place. But I also
Speaker 1: read an article in Smithsonian, and it suggested that jaguars
Speaker 1: might have been able to swallow and digest the seeds too. So,
Speaker 1: as they put it, quote, the identities of the avocados
Speaker 1: dispersers shifted every few million years. But from an avocado's perspective,
Speaker 1: a big mouth is a big mouth, and a friendly
Speaker 1: gut is a friendly gut.
Speaker 2: I feel like those are words to live by. Mango,
Speaker 2: or at least for an avocado. Really though, it's wild
Speaker 2: to think that we have these giant sloughs to thank
Speaker 2: for all of our avocado toasts and orders of chips
Speaker 2: in guacamole. And you know, while they aren't swallowing avocado's
Speaker 2: whole like our megafauna buddies once, did you know humans
Speaker 2: have planted them all over the world. So all in all,
Speaker 2: I feel like we've been pretty good stewards for the avocado.
Speaker 1: Well, unlikely, it is, right, because not only is the
Speaker 1: avocado pit way too large for humans to swallow or digest,
Speaker 1: it can also be toxic to us. So animals like rhinos,
Speaker 1: which are descended from those house boat sized ancestors you mentioned,
Speaker 1: they can actually stomach the toxic pits just fine, but
Speaker 1: humans and most other mammals lack enzyme systems and livers
Speaker 1: strong enough to ward off that kind of toxicity. And
Speaker 1: in fact, there's this old South American recipe for rat
Speaker 1: poison that I just found that instructs the users to
Speaker 1: mix some avocado pits with traditional rodent bit like cheese
Speaker 1: or lard, and that'll take care of the problem.
Speaker 2: I do like that a little tox pit isn't going
Speaker 2: to stop us from eating nearly two billion pounds of
Speaker 2: avocados each year. Speaking which, how's I don't want to look,
Speaker 2: but how's Tristan doing over there? We're going to need
Speaker 2: to take another trip to the er.
Speaker 1: No, but those avocados really aren't peeled, So why don't
Speaker 1: we do a quick fact off and then we can
Speaker 1: help the poor guy out. So most people have heard
Speaker 1: that a good way to ripe an avocado's fast is
Speaker 1: to put them in a paper bag with like bananas
Speaker 1: or ripe apple. But if you're looking for more avocado
Speaker 1: gear and accessories, you can always purchase an avocado sock.
Speaker 1: It's ae hundred percent world bag that supposedly ripens the
Speaker 1: fruit within twenty four hours, and according to the website,
Speaker 1: it ripens it more gently than a paper bag. Also,
Speaker 1: it works as a convenient carrying sock for when you
Speaker 1: want to sling an avocado over your shoulder and just
Speaker 1: transport the fruit and style.
Speaker 2: Well, let me know how it goes if you order
Speaker 2: one of those. I think I'll wait on your experience first.
Speaker 2: All right, So here's a trend I definitely won't be
Speaker 2: indulging in, and that's the avo late. Now, this is
Speaker 2: an Australian specialty where you serve a latte in the
Speaker 2: hollowed out husk of half an avocado. And while it
Speaker 2: started out as an Instagram joke at the Truman Cafe
Speaker 2: in Melbourne when an employee mixed coffee and milk and
Speaker 2: an avocado shell, apparently customers have started pouring in for
Speaker 2: the drink and other cafes have started serving it in response.
Speaker 1: Well, if you love avocados but hate the pits, Marx
Speaker 1: and Spencer is apparently selling a cocktail avocado, so this
Speaker 1: is according to the Telegraph. But the fruit looks less
Speaker 1: like a traditional alligator pair, you know, the kind we
Speaker 1: all know and love, and more like a zucchini. But
Speaker 1: the big advantage, of course, is that they don't have
Speaker 1: a seed in them. And while the fruit is grown
Speaker 1: in Spain, they're apparently really hard to find. Marx and
Speaker 1: Spencer only carries them in December for some reason. But
Speaker 1: maybe we'll be getting them stateside soon.
Speaker 2: All right. So we were talking about avocados being a
Speaker 2: member of the prestigious Laurel family previously, and I was
Speaker 2: a little curious what that meant, so I looked it
Speaker 2: up and in addition to the laurel reads that you
Speaker 2: might get for competing in the ancient Greek games. The
Speaker 2: avocado has some pretty well known relatives in the laurel family.
Speaker 2: The fruit is cousins with bay leaves, sassafras, and cinnamon.
Speaker 1: Oh, it's a good family to be a part of.
Speaker 1: So one of the strangest facts about avocados is that
Speaker 1: they never ripened on the tree, so basically farmers can
Speaker 1: plan when they want to pluck them and just store
Speaker 1: them up there afresh for six or seven months.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, here's an avocado variation that no one needs,
Speaker 2: and it's avocado light. It's a diet avocado that apparently
Speaker 2: contains thirty percent less fat than your average avocado. Apparently
Speaker 2: it's a milder taste, but it's a juicier avocado. I've
Speaker 2: got to say, I am avocado with fewer calories that taste
Speaker 2: more watery. Just it doesn't appeal to me. But if
Speaker 2: they can make an avocado zero, maybe I'll consider it. Well.
Speaker 1: I think between a diet avocado and proposing with avocados,
Speaker 1: you truly have your pulse on the worst things to
Speaker 1: do with an avocado. So I'm gonna have to give
Speaker 1: the trophy to you well. Thank you very much, and
Speaker 1: thank you guys for listening. I'm sure we've forgotten some
Speaker 1: great facts about avocada. We've been looking forward to doing
Speaker 1: this episode because of the national obsession with avocados these days,
Speaker 1: so we'd love to hear from you. You can always email
Speaker 1: us part Time Genius at HowStuffWorks dot com. You can
Speaker 1: call our twenty four to seven fact hotline that's one
Speaker 1: eight four four pt Genius, or hit us up on
Speaker 1: Facebook or Twitter.
Speaker 2: Thanks so much for listening, Thanks again for listening. Part
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