Charles Rotter

Behold the All England Club, that august bastion of strawberries, cream—and yes, the zesty, buttery splendour of the avocado—now bowing before the high priesthood of sustainability. In a move so monumentally absurd it could only spring from the fever dreams of eco-zealots, Wimbledon’s brass have decreed that avocados must go the way of the dodo, “substitut[ing] them with crushed British peas as part of sweeping sustainability measures” .

According to The Sunday Times, the ban forms part of Wimbledon’s broader environmental strategy.

The crushed pea alternative represents a shift towards locally sourced ingredients, eliminating the environmental costs associated with importing avocados from overseas.

https://www.gbnews.com/sport/tennis/wimbledon-ban-avocado

Picture it: rows of genteel Brits, tennis whites gleaming, anticipation humming through Henman Hill—only to be handed a soggy slurry of green goop. The very fruit that wound its way onto our tables for its “nutritional value,” now banished in favour of a pasty pulp so grim it makes mushy peas look like caviar . One can almost hear the avocados weeping in their compost heaps: “We came all this way from Mexico so you could sprinkle us on your toast. And this is what we get?”

This isn’t just food politics; it’s a cultural crucifixion. Avocados are more than just a guacamole ingredient—they’re an icon of modern life, a symbol of morning ritual and brunch revelry. Yet our sustainability religion, with its unproven claims and unchecked fervour, has decreed that exotic is evil, local is holy—never mind that crushed peas taste like the aftermath of a hedge-trimming accident.

What’s next? Will they ban strawberries because they’re shipped from warm fields at the cost of a few extra carbon atoms? Will the hallowed cream be replaced with powdered oat slurry to save a teaspoon of bovine methane? If Wimbledon surrenders its most beloved indulgence for a mealy mash that even the rabbits in the grounds won’t touch, then nothing—not even tradition, taste or sanity—is safe from this eco-dictatorship.

The real tragedy isn’t that a tennis tournament has lost its avocado; it’s that a once-proud nation appears ready to let a few grams of carbon guilt rob us of simple pleasures. In the name of an “environmental strategy” that treats us like lab rats in a global-warming experiment, we’re surrendering joy and flavour at the altar of crushing carbon—a crusade that, in its earnestness, feels like a caricature of virtue itself.

So here’s to crushed peas—this year’s official taste of virtue. May they remind us that when sustainability becomes a religion, it devours everything that once made life worth living.