Re: [gardeners] tomatine?

Kay Lancaster (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Fri, 10 Apr 1998 14:51:24 -0700 (PDT)

On Fri, 10 Apr 1998, George Shirley wrote:

> understanding, and I've done it for years, that peeling the tater took the
> hazard away. Now ordinarily I don't peel potatoes except when company's
> coming, figuring the peel probably has most of the good stuff in it but
> green ones I do. Do other parts of the tater get green? 

Nope, but the solanine is present in other parts once the greening starts.

As for tomatoes, I
> don't want to hear this, I do like my fried green tomatoes and, then, what
> about those tomatoes that ripen green?

Apply the test of common sense.  How long have you been eating fried green
tomatoes?  How long have I been making and eating green tomato chutney and
green tomato pie and green tomato salsa?  And we ain't dead yet.  Haven't
even gotten the trots from it. 

For pity's sakes, pick some chemical you don't like -- arsenic,
for instance -- and search it on the PhytochemDB... you'll come up with
at least 150 hits, including everything from cinnamon to celery to
tomatoes to cabbage to peppers to oranges... if you try to exclude
foods from your diet based on the mere presence of "bad stuff", you're
going to be pretty hungry.

Once again, "The dose maketh the poison". -- Paracelsus.

Kay Lancaster    kay@fern.com
just west of Portland, OR; USDA zone 8 (polarfleece)