2. Pineapples: A Tropical Fruit on Its Own Little Pedestal
Picture a pineapple plantation. If your first thought involves tall trees with fruit hanging overhead, bring the camera down. A pineapple grows upright on a stalk in the center of a leafy plant, surrounded by long, stiff leaves that fan outward near the ground.
The fruit looks almost as if someone placed a supermarket pineapple on a garden ornament. Its familiar leafy crown sits at the top, while the supporting plant spreads below. There is no palm trunk and no bunch of pineapples dangling from a branch.
The other surprise is hidden in the patterned skin. A pineapple is a multiple fruit: many small fruits develop from a cluster of flowers and fuse into one larger structure. Those repeating sections on the outside are clues to how it formed. The object you slice into rings started as a tightly packed collection of flowers.
