Why is this weird? "Apple" used to be the generic word for fruit in many different languages, it wasn't until recently that it took on the meaning of a specific type of fruit. I don't think calling potatoes "fruit of the earth" is at all strange. The English equivalent to this is the word "pineapple" -- a fruit that kind of looks like a pine cone.

American: "Have french people never eaten a good apple?"

Frenchman: "Have Americans never enjoyed a tasty potato?"

if you think ground apples isn't an apt description, you've never eaten potatoes raw.

In a lot of languages the word for apple used to refer to all kinds of fruits, particularly new ones from more or less exotic lands. Pineapples also don't look much like apples, do they?

isn't apple used in many languages as a generic term for fruit?... it's not like pineapple has anything to do with apples either.

I grew up on a farm along a small river called the Pomme De Terre and we didn't grow potatoes. But we did have a potato lifter to harvest the 1/2 acre or so we would grow for our own consumption.

There was also a small county picnic area in the middle of nowhere by the same name. And no one knew why it was there.

Recently I watched an press event with a Canadian politician, who was switching between French and English as we must sometimes. He was talking about a bag of apples (which his colleague was holding) costing a stupid amount of money. He made the mistake of saying a bag of potatoes, which i found fucking hilarious as I speak both languages and understand the mistake. Unfortunately for him, the people criticising him were morons and were like WHY WOULD HE SAY POTATOES IS HE STUPID.

Counter point:

In Germany they are called Kartoffeln (which is also a slur for the Germans itself).
But potatoes are also called Erdäpfel (ground apples) or in southern dialect Krombire (bent pear).
More variants here:
Source (German): https://die-kartoffel.de/wissen/schon-gewusst/kartoffel-deutsche-dialekte/

Have a look at how some early apple varieties looked like, before they were cultivated:

https://birdsongorchards.com/pages/welcome-to-wondrous-diversity-of-heirloom-apples

"apple" used to be a generic term for fruit. So it's actually "fruit of the earth", the French are poetic like that

The English for "ananas" is "pineapple", did the English really think they grew on pine trees?

Let the language which is without sin cast the first stone.

Look, we're talking people who call ninety-nine “four twenty ten nine”; you can't expect them to name things properly.

Not just French

Grosse Pomme is New York