For a Long Time, Tomatoes Were Best Left Alone
When examined in the context of its time, the fear of tomatoes isn’t that weird. Tomato plants not only look like deadly nightshade, a suspected ingredient of witches’ magic goop. They are also just about identical to the untrained eye. Similarly, some tomato varieties, such as yellow cherry tomatoes, look remarkably similar to hallucinogenic mandrake fruits, another ingredient of the witches’ goop. So at a time when Europe was engulfed by hysteria about all that had to do with witches, a plant that looked like an “evil” ingredient was problematic.
In the 1540s, many thought that tomatoes could turn them into werewolves. Even those who were not superstitions had reason to avoid tomatoes. If they possessed the plant or its fruit, their superstitious neighbors might accuse them of witchcraft. Unsurprisingly, many decided to leave tomatoes alone. Indeed, the only place where it was safe to have them was Spain, where the Spanish Inquisition had temporarily declared that the belief in witchcraft was heretical. The Spanish and Italians eventually incorporated tomatoes into their diets wholesale. However, the English and French remained in the “tomatoes are demonic” weird camp for a ridiculously long time.
