Why I hate cucumbers

No, I am not a toddler. Yes, I eat my vegetables. But of all the bulbous plants that sprout from the soil, the dishumble cucumber stands as a pathetic outlier.

First, cucumbers are just water masquerading as a boring vegetable. Did you know that 96% of a standard cucumber is water? Why have a food which pretends to be one thing, but is actually another? If you want to eat a cucumber, you might as well drink from the tap.

The taste itself is pathetic as well. The little that exists taints all that it touches. The juice seeps a taste like tepid grasswater, making the plain-tasting equivalent taste worse. Whenever a hotel serves water on tap, I baulk when cut-up slices of cucumber float on its surface, seeping its bland taste through the tank. The same goes for salads, juices seeping among more flavoursome leaves and veggies. Why even bother? The best parts of the salad are the dressing, and a dastardly cucumber can sap the joy of a good salad.

“But cucumbers are healthy!” I hear you say, munching down cucumbers like breadsticks from Pizza Express. Yes, they are healthy – because they contain nearly nothing. Cucumbers barely have any calories, because they have barely anything inside them. What is the point of a meal if it barely fills you? Better and more filling vegetables exist, like the hearty squash.

“But what about the Vitamin C?” Ah yes, Vitamin C. True, cucumbers have a healthy dash of Vitamin C that lurks across its barely-tangible flesh. But if you are worried about your Vitamin C intake, live a little and actually taste something. Go eat an orange, or munch on a banana. Chop tomatoes, arguably the greatest fruit that ever exists. Being healthy doesn’t mean you need to get down to the cucumber’s level.

If cucumbers never existed, I doubt anyone would notice. It would seep away into the ground, unknown and unacknowledged, as its bolder peers grow strong and hardy.