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If you love pumpkins, you might want to visit New Hampshire. On April 20, 2006, the state’s Senate approved HB 1111, which designated the pumpkin as the official New Hampshire state fruit. Governor John Lynch signed the bill into law during a ceremony held the first weekend of May.

Apparently, third and fourth graders at the Wells Memorial Elementary School in Harrisville created the bill, learning about civics in the process. The “class took on a bill head on and pushed it the entire way through,” said . Sen. Bob Flanders (R-Antrim), whose district includes Harrisville. “They ran into staunch opposition, those [who] favored the apple and blueberry, and they pressed on nevertheless.”

Now, just in case you are wondering, pumpkins are, biologically speaking, fruits. However, due to legal mumbo jumbo, they are classified as vegetables, just like tomatoes.

Did you know that men find the aroma of pumpkin pie arousing? At least that’s was Dr. Alan R. Hirsch, neurologic director of the Smell & Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago, says in his book What’s Your Food Sign? How to Use Food Clues to Find Lasting Love.

The book’s thesis is that our food preferences can show others what we’re really like. According to Dr. Hirsch, people choose foods that reflect who they are and “couples and not-quite-yet couples can learn about their future compatibility by observing what the other person eats.”

“We tested 18,631 married people over 20 years,” Dr. Hirsch told The New York Post. Using established personality tests, he and his team determined specific character traits of his subjects. Then they looked at the study participants’ food preferences using a “forced-choice” methodology, in other words, test subjects had to choose from among five or six options to answer questions.

This research, originally created to help psychiatrists diagnose conditions in their patients, led Dr. Hirsch to believe that “food preferences can help you gain insight into who [a person you are dating] really is.” He also claims that his findings, reported in the book, are “statistically significant – that is to say, they are the case 95 percent of the time.”

Of course, “There are certain limitations to the study,” Dr. Hirsch acknowledged. “We didn’t ask people what they ate; we asked them what they would like to eat. We don’t know the strength of preferences. And we did these tests in the Midwest - so, in the United States, the Alaskans and the Amish might have food preferences we didn’t examine at all.”

Dr. Hirsch covers several different areas in his book, one of which is our sense of smell. In his research, Dr. Hirsch found the most stimulating scent for men “is a combination of lavender and pumpkin pie; number two is a combination of doughnuts and black licorice; and number three is a combination of pumpkin pie and doughnuts.”

Notice how pumpkin pie was mentioned twice? So, ladies, I guess if you want to get close to your man, bake a pumpkin pie. Now that’s a passion for pumpkins!