西红柿
xī hóng shì · HSK 5
tomato
🍅 西红柿 = west + red + persimmon (a red persimmon from the West)
Tomatoes came to China from the Americas via Western traders, so they were named 西 (west) + 红 (red) + 柿 (persimmon) — the red persimmon-like fruit from the West.
西 — top 覀 (cover) + bottom 儿 (legs); originally a bird in nest
Originally a pictograph of a bird settling into its nest at dusk. Because birds return to roost when the sun sets in the west, the character was borrowed to mean 'west.' The original 'nest' meaning was later written with 棲/栖.
红 — silk radical 糹/纟 + work 工 (phonetic)
红 is a semantic-phonetic compound. The silk radical 糹 (simplified 纟) signals the meaning, since the character originally referred to a kind of pink or light-red dyed silk. The right side 工 supplies the sound. Over time the meaning broadened from the dye color to 'red' in general.