Skins

Skins are the best parts of any fruit. I say this partially as a political statement: one’s skin is one’s interface to the world, the barrier between what is and is not … one (this britishism is awkward, let me change to the more conversational you) … Your skin is both how you perceive and how you are perceived. In this way, it is one of the more important parts of your body. (And of course it’s permeable and more complicated, but my point is elsewhere.)

Fruits’ skins are the same; why wouldn’t they be? Ditto their other internal parts: seeds, core, pith. Most parts of most fruit are edible; take, eat!

I remember being about seven years old and eating the granny smith apple skins my mom peeled off the fruit as she was putting them in our lunches. I remember trying some orange peel, raw, and blanching (it’s quite bitter!). Reading Parker’s post (and the reply), I was frankly surprised that neither of them had eaten the kiwi skins before. That’s like, the whole experience to me, and now that my kid asks for kiwi a lot I have more opportunity to think about kiwi skins than I have in years.

Skins are complicated. My mother-in-law hates peaches because of their fuzzy skin. She likes nectarines; it’s just peaches that she shuns. My wife hates muscadine grapes because of their thick, tannic skins. I love them for the same reason. When I ate meat, I ate shrimp with the tough shells—their skins—on.

Maybe it’s how I grew up. My dad would call the pizza crust—a skin in a way—the “bone;” he said it was the best part. Nowadays I agree. I remember very well the one Bill Nye bit where the kid is just stuffing this bread in his mouth, stuffing it and stuffing it (without the crust), and his parents are like “Eat your crust,” “Eat your crust Billy,” and he doesn’t, and then there’s a huge earthquake and I imagine they all die. Maybe that’s why I eat the crust, really, to not kill everyone I love.

Some things form a skin when cooking, like pudding and tofu. I’ve never had tofu skin, but pudding skin is kind of good.

Anyway look. The point is, skins are liminal. They delineate but they also permeate, negotiate. They are the biological borders of the universe. I say, let’s taste those skins! They tell us so much about what’s inside of them.