Java: Call and Access array by its name, which is stored in a string inside different array or variable

Question

I have multiple arrays and depending on the users input, which is stored in a string, I need to access the corresponding array. For example, the user types "/kit food" and presses enter, the string then gets sub-stringed to become "food". Lets say I already have an array called food and I want to print all of the items inside of it out into the console. here is an example code to what I'm trying to do:

String[] food = {"apple","carrot","pickle"};
String[] tools = {"hoe","shovel","rake"};

userInput = "food";   //already sub stringed from "/kit food"

for(String item : userInput){   //I need it to access the array food
    System.out.println(item);
}

Would this be possible to do? or should I just manually code each if/else statement for every kit?

Answer 1

Using Java 7

public static void main(String[] args) {
        String[] food = {"apple", "carrot", "pickle"};
        String[] tools = {"hoe", "shovel", "rake"};

        String userInput = "food";   //already sub stringed from "/kit food"

        Map<String, String[]> map = new HashMap<>();    
        map.put("food", food);
        map.put("tools", tools);

        for (String item : map.get(userInput)) {   //I need it to access the array food
            System.out.println(item);
        }
    }