Fruit - Round 1

We deserve a break after pulling so hard for our favorites in the last category, don't we? Well I think Fruit will provide a friendly and funny time as opposed to the grand silliness and shouting that went on with Home Cooked Dishes. I'm gonna be honest with you, this was a very hard bracket to make. It's 32 different types of fruit on this list. You try to name 15 types of fruit without looking at the bracket. It's hard!
That said I think the number #1s are safe and will all easily move on (Although a number one has lost in the first round of both of the prior tournaments, so anything is possible.). You all are very familiar with Apples, Oranges, Bananas and Grapes so let's look at their competition in the first round.
Cranberries. You ever tried to just eat a cranberry? That is some old tart and bitter shit right there. You'd have to wonder how we as a species didn't give up on that and just leave it alone. But as a credit to it's usefulness we figured out that it has some wonderful medicinal qualities and it's juice, when mixed with enough sugar, becomes one of the mixers of choice for vodka.
Clementines. I didn't even know a clementine was a fucking fruit! At best I thought it was a flower. Truthfully, all I really know is that it was the name of somebody's darling in the song Huckleberry Hound used to sing.
Kumquats. This is an interesting little fruit. It looks like a cross between an orange and a football that got zapped with a shrink-ray. It's like the cherry tomato of the citrus world. You just pop the whole thing in your mouth and go at it, peel and all. My grandparents had one of these on the side of their house so my childhood summers are filled with the memories of playing and eating these things. Funny name though. Sounds like a really good insult. Come'ere you little kumquat! Well Kumquats you have my vote.
Let's be honest. Limes are good for about 3 things. They go well in alcoholic beverages, key-lime baked goods, and cherry-lime rickeys. While the others have quite the fan following, about 13 people have drank a cherry-lime rickey since 1959.
The #2s vs #7s should go down pretty easy in favor of the #2s. But let me say something about a couple of the matches Watermelon vs Plantains. One of my closest friends, Kevin, is Jamaican. That means growing up I ate a lot of his mom's cooking. She made awesome jerk chicken amongst other great dishes. But man, there was nothing like having a plate of fried plantains! I don't know if I was supposed to eat it like this but I would seem to lose all my couth over fried plantains and pick them up with my fingers, throw them in my mouth and gobble them down. Plantains you get my vote. And Pears vs Guava. I've never eaten a guava. I've never even seen a guava. If it wasn't for the fact that I sometime drink Jumex guava nectars I would swear it didn't exist. So sorry Guavas, my vote goes to Pears.
For the #3 vs #6 match-ups, my vote goes with all of the #3s even though I love pomegranets, I'm from Michigan where we know a thing or two about growing some of the best cherries in the nation. Sorry Pomegranets the home state favorite gets my vote.
And finally the #4 vs #5 match-ups. I am going to give my votes to all of the #4s.
All in all some pretty conservative voting from me. I only get behind a couple of underdogs. Let's see what you pick.

Later.
RR