Fresh from the controversy over the scientific rebranding of aubergines, peppers, tomatoes and cucumbers as fruit that forced a major reshuffle in supermarkets around the country, scientists have now announced that broccoli is not a vegetable either.
Previous furore erupted when bananas were claimed to be a herb, no less, which meant that bananas had to be sold alongside oregano and basil in the supermarket.
Nor is broccoli the only former vegetable to receive the brush off from biologists.
"Broccoli is a flower," said Chris Antheum. "It will now have to be sold in florists, alongside cauliflowers. The name kind of gives them away. Broccoli florets. I mean, duh."
Also moving from the greengrocers to the florists are lettuce, spinach and cabbage.
"These are leaves," said Antheum. "Not vegetables. We are also attempting to get onions, garlic and leeks moved to the garden centres, as these are bulbs."
So what remains in the vegetable aisle?
"Currently," said Antheum, "we are ensuring that parsnips, carrots and turnips can still be classed as vegetables, even though they are roots. Those clever farmers believe they have one over us by branding them 'root vegetables', but we will find a way around this."
Antheum denies he is on a personal crusade to eradicate vegetables due to a childhood trauma with a pile of peas.
"It's not possible," he said. "Peas are seeds, not vegetables. Along with sweet corn. However, it's a good point. This may well stop those problems with not being able to feed vegetables to children. I'd not thought of that."
It appears that nothing is safe from reclassification. "We haven't got to celery and rhubarb yet," said Antheum. "Mainly because they're horrible."
One question he cannot answer is: what will vegetarians eat?
