Subject: Re: Fermented Cabbages Fail To Prevent Mass Civilian Casualties
Date: Tue, 8 Jan 2002 18:55:53 -0600


From: danceswithcarp <dcombs-AT-bloomington.in.us>
Subject: Fermented Cabbages Fail To Prevent Mass Civilian Casualties

> What?   We invented *hamburgers* AND hot dogs.   Your basic Grrrrmons
can't
> cook something unless it's shoved up in an animal casing.   And I'm not
> sure fermented cabbage qualifies as a gourmet food.   That pickled stuff
> the Koreans eat, kim-chi, is great.  But then again it has chile peppers
> (American food, you know) in it.
>
> True, you folks have a way with beer.  However I gave up beer last June
and
> now I drink wine.  Mostly from bottles that have corks in them.

Fermented cabbages -- sauerkraut, kapusta, kimchee, armi, etc., are, indeed,
the staff of life.  My Gramma Goat had a crock of armi working at all times,
she just kept adding to it as we used it -- sort of perpetual pickled
cabbages, as it were.  Also, my Grampa, Senex III, made some kind of booze
from cabbage juice, fermented of course.  I disremember its name, but it
would burn in a cigarette lighter, and he used it as a gas additive during
the WWII when gas was rationed.  (It kept the gas lines from freezing in the
winter, too.)  I don't know if it was a Roma thing or a Eastern European
thing, but -- unfortunately -- the recipe died with him. Oncle Phillipe who
became Senex IV was not only a teetotaller, but was death on booze, so if it
(the recipe) got passed on to him he either burned it or buried it.  Pity.

One of my favourite meals is spare ribs, kraut, mashed potatoes, and creamed
peas -- with a nice pilsner on the side.  (I like wine, B'r Fish, but am
allergic to it and other grape products.)
Fermented cabbages also make a nice stuffing for roast duck or goose.

 old goat
"When you give food to the poor
 they call you a saint.  When you
 ask why  the poor have no food,
 they call you a communist."
   --- Archbishop Helder Camara