Toot

I will never fail to lose my sense of marvel and astonishment at the Arab World. It's been a 22-year love affair for me so far (with the occasional unexpected pot hole) - and yet I'm still finding new things around every corner. If I've learned one thing, it's that I've so much yet to learn.

So breakfast today in Amman with pal and colleague Ammouni brought a new discovery, one so basic that it left me breathless with the weight of my ignorance.

Toot.

Now I always thought Toot was a Jordanian blog aggregator, or perhaps even Columbian Marching Powder, but I failed to spot the fruit behind the name. Toot is a pale, slightly greenish fruit, something like an anaemic gooseberry colour that has the shape of a slightly elongated, and smaller, raspberry.

And it's delicious. And I'd never heard of it before. And it's unique. And now I'm going to look out for it wherever I can.

So I am, as the barrister once admonished the judge, none the wiser, but better informed.

I feel slightly better to learn that I got to it before Wikipedia did. But only slightly.