How can I use the value of a scalar as the name of an array variable?

[atch]

Suppose we have a tab-separated data file like this:

fruit   apples
fruit   oranges
fruit   bananas
meat    sausages
dairy   eggs
dairy   milk
meat    bacon

And we have this program:

my( @fruit, @meat, @dairy );

while (<>) # input redirected appropriately
{
    chomp;             
    my( $category, $item ) = split /\t/;
    push  ???$category???, $item;   # what now??
}

The idea is to push the item into the array whose name is the same as the value in $category. I don't want to have an if else statement for each array.

Originally posted as a Categorized Question.