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Originally Posted by
Tutkun Arnaut
I come often in NY City. Close by where I live is big fruit market. Now is the season of apples and outside there are crates with apples, visibly appealing, large sizes, healthy looking. Until you taste them! What a disappointment when I compare with my country of origin apples. I think they come from New York area, but it must be the soil. So I insist quality of food depends where the ingredients are coming from. England imports large amounts of food from elsewhere, so it could be their food nowadays taste good. In Mediterranean area there are about 300 sunny days per year so every food has enough heat and light to be ripe. I don't think that's the case with English produce
It's not the case with American produce either. Plus, they pick the fruit when it's not ripe to account for the time that will be eaten up by transport and stocking in supermarkets.
It's more than the soil, and the shorter growing time, however.
They've changed the varieties for visual appeal or size and sometimes flavor is sacrificed. That's the case with tomatoes, which are absolutely terrible in the U.S. in my opinion. The ones I buy from farm stands on Long Island in August and September have ripened on the vine, but they're still nowhere as flavorful as they are in Italy or other countries bordering the Med.
This is what they wanted visually and for ease in transport (they don't bruise as easily), but they bred the flavor right out of them.

Some local farmers have gone back to what they call "heirloom tomatoes", which are not uniform at all, but are better tasting, and for whatever reason the cherry tomatoes are still good. Hard to slice cherry tomatoes
for a sandwich, though. :)

Even with Italian tomatoes, however, the rich, volcanic soil of the areas of Campania near Vesuvio produce tomatoes that are better than any others I've ever eaten. All the produce in Campania is fabulous. Ours in the north doesn't compare at all, although infinitely better than what I can get here. Their seafood is much, much better as well, although the Adriatic coast aquatic resources come close.
Non si fa il proprio dovere perchè qualcuno ci dica grazie, lo si fa per principio, per se stessi, per la propria dignità. Oriana Fallaci