中国婴儿型梨和心脏形的瓜

StephenW

Gallery: Meet China's baby-shaped pears and heart-shaped melons                                                                                                               

Bec Crew

Friday, 22 August 2014

Baby-shaped pears, heart-shaped watermelons and square apples are hitting supermarkets in China and Japan. But are these fruits just frivolous fun? Image: Fruit Mould Co. Since the beginnings of agriculture, humans have been customising their fruits and vegetables to suit their needs. Early on, bigger fruits and higher yields were the most important considerations, and while these factors still outweigh the actual taste factor, other, slightly less pressing desires have come into play over the past decade or so. Namely, people want to eat fruit that doesn’t look like regular fruit. Which is how baby-shaped pears have come into existence. Grown by China-based manufacturing company, Fruit Mould Co., these strange little shapes have been selling like crazy in China, along with square-shaped apples, and heart-shaped watermelons and cucumbers. Their Buddha-shaped pears are apparently extremely popular. The way these fruits are created, says Carl Engelking at Discover Magazine, is by placing very young fruits - still attached to their vines or branches - into a plastic mould. The moulds are then clamped shut with screws and shielded from direct sunlight using a sheet of tough, water-proof paper. At a certain point in the fruit’s maturity, the mould can be removed and the fruit will continue growing into the desired shape. This last bit can be very tricky, and farmers have spent many years getting the final shapes right. According to Brian Ashcraft at Kotaku, it took farmers in Japan three years to perfect their version of the heart-shaped watermelon. While this all looks like some frivolous fun, there is the opportunity to apply practical applications to this technology. Packing round fruits for transportation, storage, and display in supermarkets takes up lots of space, which means more money and trucks on the road, and securing their roly-poly shapes in trucks and display spaces takes time. The square watermelon idea originally came to be because Japanese supermarkets don't have a lot of room to display their large, round shapes, so local farmers developed easily-stackable square ones. Of course, they're around three times more expensive than regular watermelons, presumably due to the amount of work that went into their development, but as the technology ages, the prices should eventually come down. See below for more images of Fruit Mould Co.'s current offerings: Pears in their moulds. Credit: Fruit Mould Co. Credit: Fruit Mould Co. Credit: Fruit Mould Co. Credit: Fruit Mould Co. 婴儿型梨，心脏形西瓜，方形的苹果击中在中国和日本的超市。但这些成果只是轻浮的乐趣呢？ 婴儿梨 图片：水果模具有限公司 由于农业的起源，人类一直在定制他们的水果和蔬菜，以满足他们的需求。在早期，更大的果实和更高的收益率是最重要的考虑因素，虽然这些因素仍大于实际口味的因素，其他的，稍显不足迫切的欲望已经开始发挥作用，在过去十年左右的时间。 也就是说，人们想吃的水果，看起来并不像普通的水果。 这是多么的宝宝形梨已生效的存在。由中国的制造企业不断壮大，水果模具有限公司，这些奇怪的小形状已销售像疯了似的在中国，伴随着方方正正的苹果，和心脏形的西瓜和黄瓜。其佛形梨显然是非常受欢迎的。 创建这些水果的样子，说卡尔Engelking在探索杂志，是通过把非常年轻的水果 - 还连着他们的葡萄树或树枝 - 成塑料模具。然后打开模具夹住关上的螺丝，用坚韧，防水纸张，避免阳光直射屏蔽。 在某一点，在果实的成熟，该模具可以被删除，果实继续生长成所需的形状。最后这一点是非常棘手的，农民已经花了很多年获得最终的形状权利。据布莱恩·阿什克拉夫特在小宅，花了农户在日本三年完善自己的心脏形西瓜的版本。 虽然这一切看起来有些轻佻的乐趣，还有机会实际应用适用于这项技术。包装圆形水果运输，储存和显示在超市占据了大量的空间，这意味着更多的钱和卡车的道路上，并保证他们的不倒翁形状卡车和展示空间需要时间。方形西瓜的最初想法来是因为日本超市没有很大的空间施展大而圆的形状，所以当地农民开发的易于堆叠方形的。当然，他们是约三倍，比普通西瓜贵一些，大概是由于工作的进他们的开发量，但是随着技术的青睐，其价格最终会降下来。

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