Utah has a new state fruit: the cherry. And a new state cooking pot: the Dutch oven.
Does that make cherry cobbler cooked in a Dutch oven the official state dessert? Not yet.Amid all the furious debate over taxes and morals, Utah lawmakers found time to pass several bills that some might consider of lesser significance, if not downright trivial.
One was HB33, which designated the cherry as Utah's official state fruit. Rep. Fred Hunsaker, R-Logan, sponsored the measure, which was presented to him by students at Millville Elementary School in Cache County. The students spent much of the past year researching Utah husbandry practices regarding fruit and polling students at other Utah schools.
As it turns out, Utah is second in the nation in the production of tart cherries and fifth in the nation in the production of sweet cherries. No other state ranks in the top five in both categories.
"The real story here is the student involvement," Hunsaker said. "It gave them the feeling they can get involved in the political process and they can make a difference."
Ironically, some 20 years ago a group of students from Richfield successfully lobbied the Legislature to designate the rainbow trout as Utah's official fish. But lawmakers dumped that designation this year, giving the honor instead to the Bonneville cutthroat trout.
The trout debate was one of the more spirited of the legislative session as rural lawmakers argued the rainbow - a fish not native to Utah, but which is Utah's most common game fish - had served Utah well and should be retained.
Senate Majority Whip Leonard Blackham, R-Moroni and leader of the so-called Rainbow Coalition, even read letters from schoolchildren that indicated lawmakers would hurt the feelings of the rainbow trout by changing the designation.
Sen. Pete Suazo, D-Salt Lake, sponsored the bill in a spirit of historical accuracy. The Bonneville cutthroat is native to Utah and was an important food source for American Indians and Mormon pioneers. In fact, the cutthroat was instrumental in saving the early settlers from starvation.
Suazo's bill had the support of the Division of State History and the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers. And he probably would have had the support of many of Utah's historical figures, who wrote of the cutthroat's virtues in their pioneer journals.
So can you cook cutthroat trout in Dutch ovens? Probably, but there was so little debate on Rep. Craig Buttars' bill designating the Dutch oven as Utah's official cooking pot that many lawmakers did not realize they had passed it into law.
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ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Utah's official . . .
State bird: California sea gull
State tree: Colorado blue spruce
State flower: sego lily
State fish: Bonneville cutthroat trout
State fruit: cherry
State cooking pot: Dutch oven
State rock: coal
State fossil: allosaurus
State song: "Utah We Love Thee"
State emblem: beehive
State gem: topaz
State animal: elk
State insect: honey bee
State grass: Indian ricegrass
State motto: "industry"