特易購超市驚現“奇葩”粉紅蘋果

For those of us with modest expectations, it is exciting enough to see British apples finally back on the shelves after months of woolly-textured imports. But Tesco clearly doesn’t think the return of the russet is enough to get us to open our wallets. Instead, it is trying to shock us into shelling out with a new hot-pink variety rejoicing in the uniquely irritating name, the Surprize (because, the company’s fruit product developer explained, “of the fantastic reaction it gets”).

Tesco says that the apples, which would gladden the heart of the late Barbara Cartland, taste as good as they look, which is at least some comfort to us fans of less glamorous, but reliably tasty varieties – after all, this wouldn’t be the first “quirky” fruit to grab the headlines, only to disappear without trace.

Anyone remember the pineberry, for example; an unnervingly pale, pineapple-flavoured strawberry stocked by Waitrose for a few short weeks back in 2010, or the same supermarket’s more recent experiment. M&S countered with the papple, a pear that looked a bit like an apple (for those pear-lovers who just want to fit in at the office) and the grango, a painfully named grape which tasted “a bit like a mango”.

The media may have swarmed like wasps to a fruit basket, but none actually seems to have taken off with consumers who would come in looking for strawberries that tasted like strawberries, or pears that didn’t sound like something you would only resort to after major dental work.

That said, there is a fine history of mucking about with the genetics of fruit. No doubt the grapefruit, a cross between the bitter pomelo and the sweet dessert orange, caused quite a stir when it first appeared in the 18th century, as did the logan and tayberry, with their dusky raspberry looks and sharp bramble flavour.

But such lasting successes are few and far between; the developers of the pluot, a cross between a plum and an apricot, or the limequat, which you can probably guess the ancestry of, have yet to see their creations strike it big with supermarkets.

Red bananas, yellow raspberries – the novelty seems to wear off as quickly as the colour of those pretty purple carrots you paid a premium for, only to find that, once peeled, they are still orange. I wish the Herefordshire farmer who developed the Surprize all the best, but I for one will be surprised if we see it again next year.對於對生活沒有太高期望的我們來說，吃了幾個月乾巴巴的進口蘋果後，看到英國的蘋果上架已經足夠讓人興奮了。但特易購公司顯然認爲這還不足以讓我們心動。因此，特易購公司試圖用一個新的花樣來震驚我們——出售豔粉色的蘋果。這種蘋果有個奇特的、引人注目的名字——“驚喜”（公司的水果開發者解釋說，這個名字取自這種蘋果獲得的超凡的反響）。

這種蘋果可能會很得芭芭拉·卡特蘭（Barbara Cartland）的歡心。特易購公司表示，這種蘋果嚐起來就和它的外表一樣美味。這至少讓我們這些不怎麼重視外表但很關注味道的人放心了。畢竟，這並不是第一種上頭條的“奇葩”水果了。這類水果一般很容易很快就消失無蹤了。

例如，是否還有人記得菠蘿莓？一種顏色蒼白的、菠蘿味的草莓。在2010年，維特羅斯（Waitrose）超市只庫存了短短几周。還有其他超市近期更多類似的試驗。

瑪莎（M&S）百貨公司出售過蘋果梨（papple），一種看起來有點像蘋果的梨（在那些只想融入辦公室生活的梨愛好者看來），還有芒果葡萄，一個取名很彆扭的葡萄，只是吃起來味道“有點像芒果”。

在水果相關話題上，新聞媒體蜂擁而入，各出奇招，但他們對日常的人們沒有興趣。日常的人們只想買吃起來像草莓的草莓，買一般的梨，而不是買那種聽起來像在一個大的牙科手術後纔會吃的東西。

據說，把水果的基因相混合有着悠久的歷史。無疑，苦柚和甜橙雜交出的葡萄柚，在18世紀第一次出現時引起了很大的轟動。羅甘莓和泰莓也一樣，他們有着黑色覆盆子的樣貌和樹莓的味道。

但這種嘗試，要不就成功，要不就完全失敗。杏李或萊姆金桔的開發者認爲他們的“創造性”行爲一定可以震撼超市。杏李是杏和李的雜交，而萊姆金桔，你可以猜到它的來源。

紅色的香蕉，黃色的覆盆子，各種各樣新奇的水果層出不窮。當你買了你確信是紫色的胡蘿蔔，結果剝掉皮才發現它們裏面還是黃色的，此時這種水果顏色上的新奇感會迅速消退。我對開發出“驚喜”蘋果的赫裏弗郡的農民們致以良好的祝願。如果明年我們還能看到“驚喜”蘋果，那我一定會很驚訝。