Why you should eat your greens
And so much more, for the wild cabbage – and its many descendants – is associated with health, wealth, romance and more
Martyn Baguley on the evolution of the wild cabbage
Ahundred years ago in the wastes of Labrador, northern Canada, a 30-year-old fur trapper could have been seen during the freezing winter months filling large, wooden barrels with alternating layers of seawater and cabbage leaves. Because his wife desperately missed having fresh vegetables during the winter – and having noticed the native Inuit’s way of fast-freezing fish – he had applied their methods to cabbage and discovered that if fast frozen, when thawed the leaves tasted exactly like fresh cabbage. Freezing food wasn’t new but much frozen food tasted mushy when thawed: the fur trapper had discovered that instant freezing was the answer. I’m sure you will recognise his name: Clarence Birdseye. He went on to make a fortune out of his idea.
The cabbage leaves he used in his early freezing experiments had travelled a long way through history. For thousands of years they had been evolving from the wild cabbage, Brassica oleracea (Brassica, Latin for a cabbage; oleracea, suitable for cooking).
If Darwin’s concept of evolution by natural selection hadn’t produced wild cabbage in the past – or, to be precise, wild cabbages as there are many subspecies – we would never have come to know broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, kale, oilseed rape (you can probably think of many other so-called ‘greens’). Wild cabbage is a polymorphic plant, which means it can evolve into many different forms. Grow any mix of these together and in time they will revert to their wild cabbage ancestor. Although native to Europe and west Asia, no one knows where they first appeared. In Britain, it was first recorded in 1548 growing on the White Cliffs of Dover.
Relatively short-lived (some 20 years) and now classified as a nationally scarce plant, it is mainly found in the south of England and Wales on limestone or chalk maritime cliffs in mixed grassland communities.
There are records of cabbage being cultivated in China since 4000BC. It was probably first domesticated in Europe 3,000 years ago from wild plants that had thick leaves that can retain water and survive in cold regions where water was scarce. Our ancestors would have selected plants with the biggest leaves and used their seeds for the next generation. By 500BC, kale-like plants had been developed. During the first century AD, artificial selection of kale with tightly bunched leaves probably eventually produced plants similar to the ball-headed cabbages we know today.
The Greeks knew cabbage at least as early as the fourth century BC. The Greek philosopher Diogenes (412-323 BC) is said to have lived entirely on cabbage and water (he must have been a very lonely philosopher). Emperor Claudius (AD10-54) asked the Roman Senate to vote on whether there was any dish better than corned beef and cabbage. Unsurprisingly, the senators voted ‘nay’. Pliny the Elder (AD23-79), in his book The Natural History, called it “the most highly esteemed of all the garden vegetables”. The Romans gave us the word ‘vegetable’, derived from the Latin vegere, which means to animate or enliven. Celtic people, who began occupying Britain from Western Europe some 500 years before the Romans invaded in 55BC, may have brought wild cabbage plants with them. The name ‘cabbage’ probably derives from the Celtic name kad or kap via the Middle French word for the vegetable, cabus.
THE CURE-ALL
With such a long relationship with mankind it isn’t surprising that cabbage established a place in medical lore that persists to this day. Scrolls dating back to 1000BC mention white cabbage as a cure for baldness. Pliny claimed that for 600 years his fellow Romans hadn’t needed doctors because they had cured everything with cabbages. For centuries, scurvy was a serious winter illness that our ancestors cured by eating cabbage and ‘sauerkraut’ (pickled cabbage), which contains more vitamin C than oranges. Captain Cook took 60 kegs of sauerkraut on his voyages of exploration: none of his crew members died from scurvy because he flogged anyone who didn’t eat some. That begs the question: would he have reached, charted and claimed the east coast of Australia for Great Britain without cabbages?
With such a reputation it isn’t surprising that cabbage was a popular winter food and an essential part of Christmas and New Year meals for our ancestors. Belief in its benefits has persisted to the present. A heated cabbage leaf placed on a septic wound is believed to be effective in drawing out the infection (Shetland, 1994); a cabbage leaf wrapped round a swollen knee can reduce swelling (Cambridge, 1963); a hangover can be cured by drinking cabbage water (Devon, 1991); a mixture of cabbage water and vinegar is a good treatment for a hangover; fresh cabbage leaves can be used to treat ulcers (Ireland, 1965);
“Pliny claimed that the Romans had cured everything with cabbages”
chewing cabbage leaves can relieve headaches (Devon, 1991).
Many breastfeeding women have called on the ancient tradition of putting cabbage leaves in their bras to get relief from mastitis, which causes breast tissue to become sore and inflamed. Fanciful? Seemingly not. In a paper published as recently as January 2019, Dr Rajni Sharma says, “The current available evidence suggests that cabbage-leaf treatment helps reduce pain in breast engorgement and lengthens breastfeeding duration.” She recommends that it “should be promoted… as a routine care for all postnatal mothers having breast engorgement for reducing pain”. There is a good scientific reason: cabbages contain glucosinolates, chemical actions on which convert them to mustard oil that has long been used as a home remedy for swelling.
COUNTRY LORE
Our innately superstitious ancestors relied heavily on omens to help them with all the uncertainties of life. Love divination was especially important to them and for this purpose cabbages, together with many other objects, played a part. A verse often written on Valentine’s Day cards went:
My love is like a cabbage
Often cut in two
The leaves I give to others
The heart I give to you.
At Halloween, blindfolded girls were sent out in pairs to pull up the first cabbage they could find. If it came up with a lot of soil attached they would become wealthy; if not they would be poor. How the cabbage leaves tasted determined the future spouse’s disposition – sweet or sour. Cabbage stalks determined the characteristics of future spouses, straight, crooked, long or short. A plant with club root foretold potential physical infirmities.
Possibly because it is mentioned in Robert Burn’s 1785 poem Halloween (verse four, if you’re interested), some references to superstitions associated with cabbages suggest that they were exclusively Irish and Scottish, but they also crop up in countyrelated traditions in England. Details vary but practices are essentially similar to one recorded in Hertfordshire in 1912: “If a girl go into the garden and cut a cabbage as the clock strikes 12, the wraith of her future husband will then appear.”
For generations of our ancestors cabbages have been associated with their wellbeing and love lives, so it’s nice that the plant is recognised on World Cabbage Day. It’s on 17 February – appropriately just three days after Valentine’s Day.