Vegetables – The Forbidden Fruit
By Victor Epp
I was thinking about vegetables the other day. Well, that's what it’s come down to. I guess when you retire you get time to think about things other than how early you got to get up and how many things you got to do and how little time there is to do them in - things like that. Once you get over the habit of looking over your shoulder for somebody else wanting something from you, different thoughts drift over and settle in your mind. Oh, at first there's all the important, heady stuff like world affairs, and can they really do without you at the shop, and what will you do to keep busy? Then one day you're just sitting there minding your own business, being careful not to be a nuisance to the wife and - boom! There it is in your head - Vegetables! Whoa, where did that come from? Well, once its there, its there. The question is - why?
Oh yeah, now I remember. We had been talking about kids and the state of their health. There was a big debate about that around our table one night and what it came down to as the root of the problem was - you guessed it - vegetables. What a dilemma! In the wealthy countries, we can't get the kids to eat their vegetables. And in the poor countries we can't get the vegetables for the kids to eat. Now with all the high priced help that's around working on this conundrum, you'd think they'd come up with a solution. Oh sure, that's right likely isn't it?
I thought I'd do the responsible thing and put in a little research into the subject myself before I went overboard on my facts. The first two searches I did on the Internet had about a hundred thousand sites each. Well, that was enough for me! You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out what that game is all about. There's a huge - I mean HUGE industry out there of physicians, researchers, consultants, drug and chemical companies and who knows what all else, hoping that kids will never start eating proper vegetables. Can you imagine what it would do to the economy if our children suddenly all got healthy?
Oh, don't get me wrong. We've got vegetables coming out of our yin yang. Kids eat them too. They eat potatoes - if they're fried in some melted lard. They call them French fries. Trouble is; they get to eat the lard too! For variety, you can get your hands on what's known as potato chips, you know, those dried up skinny wafers that come in any flavor but potato. And then there's the tomato - if you count ketchup as tomatoes. Now that's something they eat lots of. They put it on everything. They'd even put it on Jell-O if you’d let them. Well it's no wonder. That stuff comes in about every color of the rainbow these days. It looks great but I really wonder how many actual tomatoes go into a bottle of ketchup. Oh, and don't let me forget corn. The way corn looks these days it could be a potato chip, only it’s a little fatter and they claim it’s made from corn. What they do as far as I can figure is to grind the corn up beyond recognition and throw in a bunch of other stuff to glue it all together. Then they force it through a molded orifice at high pressure - and out comes a corn chip. The technical name for that sort of product is 'extruded' snack food. Holy Hanna! What will they think up next? The last thing I remember about extruding is making aluminum window frames, or steel beams, or pre-stressed concrete. It has to do with taking a bunch of material of some sort or another and the forcing it through some predetermined orifice until it comes out the other end in that exact shape. Ugh! When it comes to food, there's a certain mentality about extruding though that I find disgusting. I don’t want to talk about it and I guess that's why you'll never find a package on my shelf that says 'Extruded Snack'.
If you were to make an assessment of how vegetables came to this, you would have to put pretty well the whole burden on the moms. Well now, don't get all in a huff about it. Facts are facts. You moms out there - you know who you are. You boil the living tar out of vegetables until all they're fit for is extrusion. You leave out the globs of sugar and salt for health reasons and then expect the kids to eat them.
Did you really think gardeners would stop growing vegetables or the snack makers pass up a market opportunity just because you don't know how to prepare them? Oh yeah, right. They know that by the time you're done there isn't a vitamin or mineral that could possibly survive that kind of torture, and kids just won't put up with it. They also figured out that the kids have to fill up on something, so if they can get their little mouths unglued from the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, the snacks are right there handy. In Canada, there's one point one billion dollars worth of snacks consumed every year. Can you get your mind around that? It's staggering, and half of that are potato chips alone.
Well now, to be fair to the present modern day moms, it isn't entirely their fault either. Somewhere in our evolution a tradition has sneaked in to annihilate any goodness in our veggies through relentless boiling. Since then, it’s been passed down from generation to generation. So there you have it. The growers have found a market for their crops in the giant food processing plants for what is laughingly called 'value added' product, which in turn has fuelled the market for all those consultants I was talking about.
Well, there you have the whole sorry state of affairs with vegetables. Now there's a tug of war going on as to what to do about it. The snack makers don't want anything to change. They just want to keep pumping out their MSG and sugar and artificial flavor in this cash and carry business. The growers on the other hand don't care one way or the other, just so long as they can keep selling their crops. The moms are the only ones with frazzled nerves, wondering what to do, wringing their hands with worry, to the point they're not thinking straight. The only guidance available to them is on the bookstore shelves starting at $24.95 US. And the only reason for those books is to sell books.
Well actually there's more help out there than you might imagine, and it's right there under your very nose. Doesn’t cost $24.95 U.S. either. Getting kids to eat fresh vegetables is not only easy, but it’s also a lot of fun so long as you don’t tell them it is. The best part is, you don't have to do anything but keep a sharp eye out, but you do that anyway. The kids do all the rest themselves unless you catch them red handed or let them know you're on to them. It's based on a principle called 'Forbidden Fruit'.
The 'Forbidden Fruit' principle has been around forever. Jeez, even Adam and Eve knew about that one. Well, I don't want to mix apples and potatoes, but the principle is right there. That's how long that law has been around. Mind you, it's evolved somewhat since then to a little more civilized activity. In fact, for all you bible readers out there, I can quote you chapter and verse in the book of Ruth about the self-same thing. Go ahead - look it up for yourself. It’s in chapter two verses two to eighteen.
See, the idea is if you tell a kid to eat the veggies because they're good for him or her, you lose. That's just normal behavior. On the other hand, if you hog them all for yourself and tell the kid he or she is not allowed to have any - well that might have worked if you hadn't gone and boiled the life right out of them. No, no, you have to think a little farther ahead than that. You've got to do things different. You've got to start with the basics - and that's the garden. It won't be the Garden of Eden I know, but a garden none the less, and it’s jam-packed full of forbidden fruit. The young peas, the carrots, radishes, rhubarb are the most delicious when a kid has to swipe them.
Well now, before you start up about stealing and vandalism and all that, let me just point out that swiping veggies out of garden you're not supposed to be in is technically not stealing if the swipe -ee (that’s you) knows what's going on. It just has to look like swiping. You don't want to appear to catch the little buggers at it either. That'd be downright shameful and cause them not to do it. You see, it's not about the vegetables, or about taking them when they don't belong to you. No, proper or successful garden raids aren't worth it for kids unless they can get in there with big pockets, get what they want and get out without anyone being the wiser. That's the mark of a good garden raid. It takes a lot of skill and self control from a bunch of noisy brats who can't usually shut up if their life depends on it. What makes it trickier is that it usually needs to be done after dark. Otherwise, somebody's bound to be watching and you can't just say you were digging for worms to go fishing in the morning when you're right there in the potato patch with your pockets full.
Any gardener worth his salt is going to take these things into account when planning his garden. That is to say, ten percent is for the birds and rabbits that raid his garden regularly, ten percent for the kids who raid it occasionally, and eighty percent is what he planned to keep all along. Then he puts up a scarecrow for the birds and rabbits, and a no trespassing sign for the kids. The gardeners you can trust and respect are the ones that tack on a note to their no trespassing sign that says 'And don't step on the plants Harold'.
You see where this is going yet? This is no criminal activity. This is a finely choreographed dance of life and best of all; everyone is in on it - a full cast of characters. From the kids’ point of view, the play follows, going something like this.
It's important to recognize that any garden raid of consequence must have a purpose, even if it's only to celebrate a successful raid. Some preparation is mandatory. Keep in mind that if your mom catches you with most of the things needed for the celebration, that's a dead giveaway, so any supplies acquired should be pocket sized. Fortunately, most of them are. For example; silver paper - a.k.a. aluminum foil can be folded up neatly enough so you can get an ample supply without anyone noticing the bulge in your pocket. This is a very important thing to have, as you'll see later. Of course there's always the chance that you'll be found out when raiding mom's supply. This is where resourcefulness comes in. If you don't want to risk pinching the foil from the pantry, you can always keep an eye out for every cigarette package dad throws out, or even any empty ones you find in the back alley. These are the best because you never know if you might find a few smokes in them. Look at it this way; you'll be doing the neighborhood a service by cleaning up the trash. Well, to get on with it, you simply take the foil liners out of the package and fold them up neatly, then like a Good Samaritan; you put the box nicely in somebody's garbage bin. You'll have to burn the paper off the liner before it's of any use, but I'm coming to that.
When it comes to matches, you have to be extra careful. I know the wooden ones burn better than the paper book matches, and they even come in little pocket-sized boxes which makes them tempting. But watch out! They're dangerous. If you happen to have them in your front pants pocket when you get hit with a baseball or slide into first base on your belly, those things will rub together and light. What you'll end up with is third degree burns very close to where you never want to get any kind of a burn. Go for the book matches every time. Trust me, any aggravation you might encounter trying to light those suckers is offset by the potential of anything from skin burns to the licking you'll get from setting your pants on fire.
Salt and pepper isn't too hard to squirrel away. All you need to do when nobody is looking is to shake some out onto a little bit of wax paper, then fold it up and stick it in your pocket. That's easy. Butter is a little harder to come by, so you’ll probably have to have everybody bring some. The important thing is to make sure it's in a glass container with a good lid on it. If you don't take care here, it could squeeze out in your pocket and cause a whole different kind of trouble.
Well all right then, the trickiest part of the operation is done now. From here on in its smooth sailing until you get to the actual garden raid. All you need now is some firewood and some newspaper. There's always a heap of wood around somewhere - you know, twigs, broken hockey sticks or the scrap wood from your dad's shed. Newspaper is everywhere. That's a no-brainer.
Oh yeah, you also need a railway trestle, preferably one that goes over a drainage ditch or a little creek. Well that's the ideal, but young people are known to be flexible when it comes right down to location. A big culvert or any other sheltered place will do, so long as it's outside. Outside is the main ingredient, because you don't want to go building a fire anywhere inside. Well of course you're going to build a fire! You saw that coming didn't you? Now don't let me get ahead of myself here. I was just going to mention that wherever your site is going to be, that's where you want to empty you're pockets, because now you're going to need every last pocket you can muster.
So finally you head for the gardens you’ve targeted. You’re suddenly transformed into a shadow - a ghost in the twilight. The hunt is on. First the peas go in your pocket. Radishes go on top of them in the same pocket, then some carrots in another pocket. Make sure to save enough room for potatoes. They take more room than the other veggies, being round and all. If you're wearing a jacket, which you should be, you ought to have just about enough room for a few cobs of corn. Save this for last because you can stand upright to pick it. That way the other stuff won't fall out of your bulging pockets. If you get a chance though, a few sticks of broccoli will come in handy. I'll tell you what for later. Somebody in the group must still have some empty pockets, so you swing by wherever there might be some crab apples. You'll need desert to round out the feast, you know.
All right then, everything’s ready. It's been a big project, but your blood is just pumping. What with all that cloak and dagger sneaking around its got you all fired up for the big celebration. So you head down to your hideout where all the supplies are stashed and take inventory of the food supply. It's handy to have some of those young peas in the shell to chew on, on the way down. Counting up what you’ve managed to cobble together is just a formality because you can't go back for more anyway. Hopefully there's enough matches and firewood because to tell the truth, I haven't seen anybody yet who claims to be able to make a fire that can actually do it. Oh, I almost forgot. Some rocks about the size of a baseball should be thrown into the fire once it gets going good. That helps to hold the heat.
Now is the time to wrap the potatoes in that silver paper and just throw them right into the fire. You have to burn off the liners from the cigarette foils you gathered up, don’t forget. That's kind of a fun project in itself because if you hold the whole thing down to the fire, the paper slowly curls and burns off without singing your fingers.
Potatoes take a while to cook so you can use the time to clean off the carrots and radishes with the tops. Carrots can also go into the fire in silver paper wrapping, by the way. The radishes are just for munching with some salt while you wait for the potatoes to roast. After about fifteen minutes or so, you can throw the corn in. It just goes in husk and all without any wrapping. When the husk turns all charred black and start to smoke, they’re ready. Make sure to get it out of the fire before it bursts into flame, because if it does, it's ruined.
By now you've got the idea that I've been talking about a corn and potato roast all along. What an exciting adventure this always is! The energy that goes into such a project is high end to say the least. There is a spirit of co-operation in getting everything together and making it work, and camaraderie in its execution.
Now all you worried moms, just sit back and think about this a minute. What just happened here? Everybody ate all the veggies. That's what happened! There were no complaints, no bellyaching, and no finicky fussing. Go figure. Oh sure, there was a little bit of dirt left on the carrots and radishes when you wiped them with the greens, and maybe somebody got a mouthful of charred potato peel, but what the heck, you've got to eat a peck of dirt before you die anyway; well that's how the old saying goes. That reminds me - when I was doing my research I came across a reference to Lithium as a treatment for 'Bipolar disorder' or manic depression. It turns out that Lithium is a 'salt found in the earth'. It turns out that there is a good dose of that medicine in every corn and potato roast you don't even need a prescription for. Bonus.
The other thing I want to mention before I forget is the purpose of broccoli in this diet. It's really not for eating, but for protection. You see, in spite of all the teamwork and all that, there's always somebody in the crowd given to a lot of tittering and giggling. It's just downright annoying to say the least. Well, broccoli is a sure cure for that. What you do is offer a piece to the titterer. Some people can be a bit standoffish about broccoli and you might have to dare them, or tell them it's an aphrodisiac - whatever it takes. It's eaten raw, by the way. After he or she has crunched down a good piece, make sure you accidentally drop another piece into a dish of water where everybody can see it. Then you just happen to notice the invisible little green broccoli worms float to the top. That usually cures the giggles. You have to be careful whom you do that to though. One time Shirley Wilson got so grossed out that she threw up right in the fire and we had to roast everything to just about overdone just to burn off the puke.
Now when you're done with this magnificent vegetarian feast, there are a couple of things you've got to take care of. First, you’ve got to burn up all the greens and leftovers to - you know - get rid of the evidence. Then you dowse the fire and camouflage it so nobody knows you've been there. Well, you know you're going to do it again next week and you don't want anyone taking your spot. The silver paper can be a bit of a problem, but you can always dump it in somebody's garbage bin; that, or hide it in a good spot for next time. Also, try to clean your own self off as good as possible. It's easy to get sloppy at these roasts and you don't want to leave too many tell tale signs. As long as you don't overdo it, you can come home smelling like smoke and nobody will say a word - as long as it's wood smoke. One whiff of cigarette smoke though, and you're dead meat. I don't know how moms can tell the difference so easy, but trust me; they all got a smeller on them that can find you out a mile away.
Well now all you worried moms out there, I don't know what all the fuss is about in getting kids to eat their vegetables. This little illustration here is ample proof that not only is it easy to do, but once it's started, it's hard to stop. That's because there's ritual involved, almost like a rite of passage. It puts a certain importance on such matters. Well hello - kids are important too, in case you hadn't noticed! They're the ones going to be pushing your wheelchairs around sooner or later and spoon feeding you in your dotage. Isn't it about time we showed them a little respect? Insurance, I call it. If we insist on deceiving them, isn't it much better to do it by letting them think they're putting one over on us in these kinds of adventures than to be extruding a bunch of stuff through disgusting orifices and telling them it's vegetables? Mind, you have to be sharp about it so they don't hurt themselves or get into too much mischief, but the whole business is kind of exciting even for the adults - lets them kind of relive their youth too, so to speak. And the end result is; the kids get good wholesome, garden grown vegetables in the bargain. Let's see those smarty-pants consultants top that one!
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