Of Cabbages and Foolishness

Here are some onions and a small cabbage from our garden, which I harvested in early July. I took that cabbage and made cole slaw with it, which I shared at a Fourth of July picnic hosted by our friends Jim and Anita. I recount these mundane facts because they lead up to the following interchange between myself and our friends, who, by the way, are successful vegetable and fruit gardeners themselves. In fact, the example of Jim and Anita's garden was a direct inspiration of my own humble efforts in the dirt.

As I served up the cole slaw and enjoyed receiving the compliments, I couldn't help making the Proud Gardener's Comment that it came from our own garden (along with the onions).

"Really?! You were able to grow cabbage?!"

"Well, they were small, but yes we had a few...." I answered sheepishly. You see, we live in Sacramento, where the summer temperatures are regularly in the high nineties or even low 100's (though not so much this year, blessedly). One simply doesn't plant cabbages in the summer. But One (OK, my husband) sometimes buys cabbage seedlings because One finds them on sale next to the tomatoes and peppers and onions and One buys them anyway.

Then One's wife, not knowing better herself, makes cole slaw with it.

There is a lesson, here, People. The kind of lesson One learns by tending a garden, and that is: Nature will often find a way despite human ignorance and stupidity. Because Nature loves to call our bluff.

But next time I'll plant cabbages in the cool spring months or in the late summer, when the heads will mature during the cooler months. Although One can never be too sure about cabbages.

Comments

[lotusgreen]

hi andrea--

well, i myself am a serious cabbage addict (really!) (brussels sprouts and broccoli too) (but not cauliflour) so i am very impressed, and a little jealous.

i guess if it will grow in sacramento it would grow in berkeley, but whenever i decide there's a spot in my garden that needs something i go break off some part of another iris and stick it in the dirt.

but congrats on the crop!

[Nirmala]

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