Which fruit has its seeds on the outside?
Quick answer
The strawberry is the best-known fruit with its seeds on the outside. An average strawberry carries about 200 tiny yellow “seeds” on its surface. Botanically, each one is actually a separate tiny fruit called an achene, with a real seed inside, and the red flesh is a swollen part of the flower’s stem.
What’s really on the outside
| Part | What most people call it | What botanists call it |
|---|---|---|
| Tiny yellow specks | Seeds | Achenes: true fruits, each holding one seed |
| Red flesh | The fruit | Receptacle: the swollen base of the flower |
| Green top | Leaves | Calyx (sepals) |
That makes the strawberry an aggregate accessory fruit: “aggregate” because it forms from many tiny fruits, and “accessory” because the part we eat doesn’t come from the flower’s ovary.
So, is a strawberry a berry?
Not botanically. A true berry develops from a single ovary and has seeds inside its flesh. By that definition:
| True berries | Not true berries |
|---|---|
| Bananas | Strawberries |
| Grapes | Raspberries |
| Tomatoes | Blackberries |
| Blueberries | Mulberries |
| Kiwis, avocados, peppers |
Another seed on the outside: the cashew
The cashew nut grows outside its fruit too. Each nut hangs in a kidney-shaped shell below a fleshy, pear-shaped “cashew apple.” The shell contains an irritating oil related to poison ivy’s, so cashews are always sold shelled and heated.
Strawberry facts
- Strawberries are members of the rose family.
- The modern garden strawberry was bred in France in the 1700s by crossing a North American species with a Chilean one.
- They’re one of the few fruits that don’t keep ripening after they’re picked.
- A cup of strawberries provides plenty of vitamin C, which helps cut fruit stay fresh; see why apples turn brown.
For more surprising plant facts, see what spice comes from flower stigmas.
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