Kiwi Is the Ingredient Your Guacamole Is Missing

Pandemic supermarket surplus(!) showed me you can be creative and have great snacks when things are upside-down

Photos (L–R): Picture Alliance; David Macias/EyEm/Getty Images

Here’s a thing that happened early in the pandemic: After people went crazy stockpiling, among empty supermarket shelves, there was a lone ingredient in the produce aisle — a lot of kiwis were left behind.

I don’t know why this is. I love kiwis. Every time I buy a kiwi I think, “Why don’t I buy kiwis all the time?” And then I don’t buy them again for a while.

Pretty much every kiwi I see in N.Y. markets comes from Italy. I hadn’t noticed that until kiwis were the majority of fruit in stores. I definitely thought kiwis came from New Zealand.

Kiwis! Photo: Sara Pepitone

Kiwis originated in China and arrived in New Zealand in the early 1900s (the nickname “Kiwi” is about a flightless bird native to the country, not the fruit). New Zealand began exporting kiwis — initially called Chinese gooseberries — to the U.S. in the 1950s. Today, according to the California Kiwifruit Commission, California produces some 98 percent of the kiwi grown in the U.S. I guess they don’t…