News Flash! Avocados Conquer Earth!

Super Bowl Sunday is reputed to be the day on which Americans wolf down guacamole like there’s no tomorrow – a precaution against one’s team’s losing, I suppose. And there seems to be no shortage of avocados at the grocery store, so let the dipping begin.

I remember as a kid in the Philly burbs hearing radio commercials for avocados, presumably because they were just being introduced to that market, so I feel like my life has ridden the crest of the avocado wave. (Fun fact: The word “avocado” comes from the Nahuatl ahuacatl, which means “testicle.”) I don’t know that I ever encountered guacamole before moving to Arizona in 1979, but it won me over from the first dip. Even so, I think it took a couple of years before I actually bought one and figured out how to open it; now it seems I’m fondling them for firmness at every shopping trip.

The big news, of course, is that the split seasons for avocados seem to have passed. Used to be that in winter the black Hasses gave way to the green Bacons, which were never quite as good; now we have Hasses all year, with the little code stickers in the domestic off-season indicating their Chilean origin.

Now, here’s what gets to me. When I go to the grocery store and see a bin full of avocados, I will occasionally flash on the fact that there are similar bins full of avocados all over town. And all over the state. And all over the country.  And week after week, they’re being replenished. And I’m picturing these container ships coming in from Chile on a regular basis carrying millions of avocados. And it blows my mind.

Why don’t I have the same reaction with oranges or tomatoes or onions? I guess because for the longest time I considered avocados a luxury item, a non-necessity, with the good Hass variety only available seasonally. And it’s not that I’m reacting in horror to the carbon footprint of this delightful fruit (although that’s certainly in the back of my mind), I just can’t get over how many avocados are crossing the equator on a regular basis. Yet Chile only ranks sixth in avocado production (behind Mexico, Indonesia, the U.S., Colombia, and Brazil), so I’m guessing that what I’m seeing at the market is merely the tip of the guacamole.

Maybe I sound like I just fell off the turnip avocado truck. But I’m beginning to fear that avocados are waiting to take over the world. And those big pits? Whatever you do, don’t put them under your bed!