How great are vegetables, right? Nutritious, full of fibre and thanks to the ol’ eggplant emoji, bursting with sexual innuendo.

But rather than a purple appendage, this time it’s a large zucchini that’s causing a social media ruckus.

When Twitter user Zoe received an ~ interesting ~ gift from her boss, she felt compelled to share it online.

my boss gave me a zucchini… like just plopped this shit on my desk and winked. What…. pic.twitter.com/HliLbKd0E4

— Zoë (@FilthyArt_) August 7, 2017

“My boss gave me a zucchini… like just plopped this shit on my desk and winked. What….” she captioned the tweet, which has since been shared over 2,000 times.

“Looks like a good one too. Saute that up in a bit of olive oil,salt,pepper, garlic, red pepper flakes and top with good parmesan,” one user replied.

“Wow nice, I got this one for Chriss miss (sic),” wrote another.

Wow nice, I got this one for Chris miss pic.twitter.com/lhCQexz7Up

— 16 Handles fan accou (@BasedKashiBar) August 8, 2017

While the post was clearly all just a bit of fun, workplace banter, some comments said a bit more about society’s unconscious gender bias.

“Human Resources. I would like to file a complaint,” replied one user.

“If he invite you to his house and you walk in and see this. RUN,” wrote another.

“Do not pass go. Go straight to HR. Collect $2m,” a user commented, referring to the millions she could win in a sexual harassment case.

Watching the confusion unfold, Zoe later took to the Twitter thread to clear up any misguided assumptions.

“LMAO. My boss is an older white woman who takes pride in her garden, it was just the wink that did it,” she wrote

“She’s an old lady who likes to garden. Girl you and everyone else was CONVINCED I was boutta [sic] get this big payment from HR.”

Rather than cause for a lawsuit of some kind, it turns out it was a case of a thoughtful boss concerned for her employee’s vitamin consumption all along.

And just in case anyone is misinformed, this incident is 100 per cent not a juicy pillow fight-esque thing female colleagues do either.

I would know – I work with 90 women and not once has a phallic-like object ended up on my desk… unless I put it there myself.

Have you ever received a strange gift from your boss? how did you react?