Small Streams

Emergent Fruit

I had never thought of it before, but as I went through the checkout line one day, I overheard the cashier saying that the numbers on the fruit labels are the same no matter what market you're in — say, a Fuji apple is a 4129 at the Giant Eagle, the Whole Foods, or the Shop 'n' Save. I guess that's why they call them Universal Product Codes. I have to wonder, though, if the varieties of fruit are infinite or are always working that way as Michael Pollan, author of Botany of Desire would have it, doesn't numbering them trivialize them?

Even as the hard edges of commerce might deaden experience, John Seabrook writes that there are people like the Fruit Detective, a former millionaire stockbroker and heroin addict named David Karp, who keeps looking to stretch the boundaries of fruit.

Most people experience a truly great piece of fruit very rarely — that perfect peach you ate one summer day long ago, a taste you hope for in every subsequent peach you eat but never quite recapture. Karp's goal is to have that experience again and again.