Tomatoes at Honda’s media lunch impress Twitter: ‘I would steal and purchase Honda showroom’

Tomato salad on offer at a lunch for journalists by Honda (Image credit: @kushanmitra/Twitter)

On the fourth day of the National Media Test Drive for the all-new Honda Elevate, the automobile company had an impressive array of dishes for the journalists’ lunch – and perhaps most impressive of all was the salad on offer, comprised entirely of tomatoes.

The price of tomatoes has skyrocketed in the last few weeks, transforming the humble fruit into a prized commodity. In fact, fast-food chain McDonald’s has even removed tomatoes from all its dishes, citing unavailability for the foreseeable future. Other restaurants have followed suit, doing away with tomatoes in salads, using purees instead of fresh tomatoes where possible and generally coming up with cheaper alternatives.

But Honda India did not pinch pennies at its media event, as a tweet from automotive journalist Kushan Mitra shows. “So at the lunch after the drive of the @HondaCarIndia Elevate, they went all out to impress automotive journalists by having this at the lunch spread…” Mitra tweeted. He shared a picture which shows “green salad” at a buffet-style lunch served to journalists, except there is nothing green about the salad. Instead, it is made up entirely of tomato slices.

So at the lunch after the drive of the @HondaCarIndia Elevate, they went all out to impress automotive journalists by having this at the lunch spread… pic.twitter.com/XBzbFlT5sk

— Kushan Mitra (@kushanmitra) July 28, 2023

“A very elevated salad I say,” joked one commenter, playing on the name of Honda’s latest car launch in India.

“I would steal some, sell them & purchase a Honda showroom in Ludhiana,” another quipped.

“Well they did say they would be importing some premium products to build their brand image,” a third remarked, while a fourth wondered if the company had deployed bouncers around the salad.

“Now I am convinced Honda is a premium brand. Only the rich can afford display these many tomatoes in the open,” a Twitter user joked.

Used widely in Indian cooking, prices of tomatoes have hit record highs in recent weeks as monsoon rains disrupted supplies at a time when seasonal production is typically low, forcing the government to organize mobile vans for subsidised sales. Many McDonald's and Subway outlets have dropped tomatoes from their menu items, citing quality issues, but higher food prices are having a broader impact across the industry, while pushing headline inflation numbers above the central bank's medium-term target.

(With inputs from Reuters)