The Snack-Lover's Guide to Watching Sports

Okay, okay, I admit it. When it comes to sporting events, I'm just there for the food.

I come from a family of sports enthusiasts, and I'm definitely the odd one out. My mother loved football, especially her Oregon State Beavers. My youngest brother was a Green Bay Packer in scrimmages with his buddies in grade school before he switched to the Blazers' LeRoy Ellis in pick-up games in middle school.

Hummus? Easy peasy.

Me? I imagined beaming up to the Enterprise so I could explore strange new worlds with Mr. Spock.

So now when we're invited over to friends' homes to watch sports on a screen the size of a starship, I tend to ply the circuit around the snack table that's usually groaning under bowls of chips and dips, chili and even the odd pork shoulder.

Hot crab and artichoke dip.

Whether you're a sports fanatic or hoping that Elizabeth in "The Americans" targets you as her next victim…er…informant, here are some of my fave recipes for game day snackage, and a killer chili recipe for the big game or any time.

• Susana's Amazing Asian Chicken Wings (top photo)
• Tim's Spicy Wings
• Sriracha Chicken Wings
• Deviled Eggs Four Ways
• My Mom's Hummus via Africa
• Hot Crab and Artichoke Dip
• Green Olive Tapenade
• Roasted Squash Spread
• Quick White Bean Dip

The following chili recipe makes enough to feed a crowd, so feel free to halve it for smaller gatherings.

Killer Beef Chili

For the sauce:
8 dried ancho chiles, seeded and torn into pieces
3 1/2 c. boiling water
2 bay leaves
1 Tbsp. cumin seeds
2 Tbsp. (6-8) garlic cloves
4 tsp. oregano
3 Tbsp. paprika (I use 1 Tbsp. smoked Spanish pimenton and 2 Tbsp. regular paprika)
1 Tbsp. sugar
1 Tbsp. salt
1 qt. roasted tomatoes

For the chili:
1 lb. dried beans (I used borlotti beans from Ayers Creek Farm)
3 Tbsp. olive oil
1 large onion, chopped in 1/2" dice
2 Tbsp. garlic, minced
1 Tbsp. dried oregano
4-5 lbs. beef chuck
Salt to taste

The day before making the chili, put the dried beans in a medium-sized pot. Cover with water by 2 inches and soak them overnight.

Preheat the oven to 300°.

Make the sauce, place the torn chiles in a heat-proof bowl and pour the boiling water over them. Soak for 30 min. until they are soft and pliable. Drain them, reserving the soaking water, and place them in the bowl of a food processor or blender. Add remaining ingredients and 1/2 c. soaking liquid and process till smooth, gradually adding the rest of the soaking water. If you have a larger processor, add the tomatoes or simply stir them together with the chile sauce in a large mixing bowl.

Heat a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat and add the oil. When it shimmers, add the chopped onions and sauté until tender. While the onions cook, slice the beef chuck into 1-inch pieces. Add the garlic to the onions and sauté briefly. Add the oregano, beef cubes and chile sauce. Stir to combine and place in the oven for 1 1/2 to 2 hrs. until the beans are tender and the meat is almost falling apart. Salt to taste.

Your Food, Your Legislature: 2019 Session Kicks Off with Big Issues on the Docket

On the first day of the 2019 Oregon legislative session, more than 1,500 bills were introduced, and there are likely to be at least twice that many by the time the session ends in five months. Here at Good Stuff NW I'll be reporting on the issues facing our legislators, particularly those bills that could affect our food system here in Oregon. Plans are afoot for monthly installments titled Your Food, Your Legislature, bringing you updates with background on, and the dirt from, the major players.

A bill banning aerial application of pesticides considered.

Among the top issues for our food system so far are bills that could ban or heavily limit aerial spraying of pesticides (HB 2493); a bill that seeks to assign responsibility to the patent-holder of genetically modified seeds for losses to a farmer's income due to contamination from genetically modified crops (SB 434); restrictions on the home use of neonicotinoid pesticides (HB 2619); and the proposed moratorium on current and future mega-dairies—factory farms that typically house thousands of cows in indoor facilities—until legislators establish regulations for these industrial facilities (SB 103 and SB 104).

Another big issue that's being pushed this session is the so-called "Clean Energy Jobs" bill (HB 2020), a cap-and-trade effort that seeks to, in the words of advocates, "put a limit and price on climate pollution from the largest polluters in the state" as well as "secure greenhouse gas reductions and reinvestment into communities across Oregon to create clean energy jobs and a thriving economy, especially in communities that need it most."

Wind turbines in the Columbia River Gorge.

An article in the Oregonian said that Oregon Governor Kate Brown, Senate President Peter Courtney and House Speaker Tina Kotek "are all in on putting a price on greenhouse gas emissions, and Oregon could become the second state after California with an economy-wide cap on such emissions. What remains to be negotiated is how many big emitters qualify for free emissions allowances under the law, and whether the program has any environmental integrity." Another big question is whether the new bill will broadly exempt agricultural sources like factory farms from the cap, as did a similar cap-and-trade bill that failed to pass two years ago.

Ivan Maluski, Policy Director for Friends of Family Farmers (FoFF), which conducted a series of "listening sessions" with farmers across the state, said that farmers expressed the need for legislators to do more to support Oregon's small and mid-size family farmers. "Small and mid-sized family farmers face significant challenges," Maluski said. He outlined the farmers' primary concerns as getting assistance in accessing land and capital, enabling access to small farm meat processing infrastructure, expanding opportunities for agritourism, and aiding farmers in improving water conservation efforts. Follow HB 2020.

On the issue of aerial spraying of pesticides, concerns around this practice—widely used on agricultural and public lands in Oregon—center on the damage cause by "off-target drift," that is, the tendency for these sprays to drift beyond the targeted areas, causing damage to nearby crops, waterways, wildlife and beneficial insects. Several environmental, agricultural and consumer groups can be expected to be involved in this legislation as it develops. Follow HB 2493.

Oregon taxpayers are on the hook for cleaning up escaped GE bentgrass.

The subject of what happens to a farmer who suffers losses when a crop is contaminated by genetically modified crops is an issue that the legislature has wrestled with in past sessions.

"I’ve had a front row seat to the damage caused by Roundup Ready GE bentgrass, which spreads easily on the wind and through water, infesting irrigation ditches and cross-pollinating with wild relatives," wrote Vale farmer Jerry Erstrom in an op-ed when a similar bill was before the 2017 legislature. "I am not opposed to genetically engineered crops, but as a farmer of some non-GE varieties, and after my experience with GE contamination in my alfalfa seed production, and with the GE creeping bentgrass escape, I am a supporter of making the right people accountable if crops are damaged."

 "The legislature tends to be crisis-oriented," said Maluski, indicating that FoFF will be actively involved with the Center for Food Safety and Our Family Farms Coalition as the bill moves through the legislative process.

"We shouldn't have to wait for a contamination incident before we put rules in place," he said, citing the appearance of an experimental variety of Monsanto's genetically modified wheat that appeared in an Oregon field in 2013. Follow SB 434.

Toxic emissions are just one problem with factory farm dairies.

Two bills, SB103 and SB104, are an effort to establish regulations governing factory farm dairies that are already located, or that may want to locate, in Oregon. Both bills apply to mega-dairies, that is, facilities with more than 700 cows that are confined without seasonal access to pasture, or 2,500 cows. The legislation would regulate these dairies as the industrial factories they are rather than treating them as traditional agricultural farms, and would require limits on toxic emissions to air and water, including groundwater. These bills would require studies on the impacts to Oregon's small and mid-size dairies and on animal welfare. They would also close existing loopholes that allow excessive use of scarce groundwater, and establish a course of action if a facility fails to meet state standards, as happened with Lost Valley Farm, a mega-dairy that piled up more than 200 violations in less than two years of operation and yet was still allowed to keep operating.

“Lost Valley showed us how horribly wrong things can go given our current laws,” said Amy van Saun, staff attorney at the Center for Food Safety in Portland, in an article in the Salem Statesman-Journal. If these bills pass, according to the article, factory farms "wouldn’t qualify for regulatory exemptions available to farmers under the state’s right-to-farm and other laws. That would allow local communities to have input into siting decisions and enact health and safety ordinances restricting or prohibiting air and water emissions," a problem that's occurred with other industrial agricultural operations looking to locate in Oregon.

Since it's still early days in this session, there will be more to come, and you can count on reading about the legislative sausage-making in future updates. Stay tuned!

Read more about the ongoing problems at Lost Valley Farm.

The Revolutionary Art of Home Economics

"If home is where the heart is and if we’re all drawn to home, why do we feel so unrooted? Tell me what your notion of home is. Tell me what it feels like. And tell me who’s there, how many times you’ve moved. Because there’s this vision, this heart movement, but what are our true stories?"

When Harriet Fasenfest discusses the art of radical homemaking, she's not talking about taking your macaroni and cheese to the next level with sphericalized balls of sriracha—though feel free to steal that idea for the next edition of Modernist Cuisine, Max—or starting your next dinner party with readings from Marie Kondo's latest tome.

No, Harriet is talking about, oh, upending the myth of capitalism as necessary for a democracy to function and exposing the patriarchal system that set it up and perpetuates it.

So, not what you'd call cocktail party chatter.

She's offering a series of five intriguing monthly classes titled The Revolutionary Art of Home Economics starting on Saturday, February 2, and continuing through Saturday, June 1, from 11 am to 1 pm at Leven Community Center in Northeast Portland. In the class description, Fasenfest describes the sessions as investigating the transfiguration of land and labor from resources within the home economy into services and products within the capitalized market economy. She said this hands-on, participatory experience "will range from the historical to the personal, from budget making, pie charts, essay assignments, and food storage systems, to a bit of jam making in the garden, with the aim of elevating not only our understanding of the revolutionary art of home economics but it’s capacity to restore our lives and the life of the planet to sanity, joy and repair."

I first met Harriet when we lived in Sellwood and she had leased the Bertie Lou Café in 1982, a neighborhood joint that had been in operation since the 1940s. A single mom with a two-year-old son and no restaurant experience on her resumé, she walked in and started making blintzes along with other breakfast favorites in the diminuitive space. Discovered by restaurant reviewer Karen Brooks soon after it opened, and whose rave about the tiny gem drew crowds—a virtually unknown phenomenon at the time—and garnered Fasenfest ardent fans who followed her when she opened Harriet's Eat Now Café in a different location in Sellwood, then to Harriet's café in Old Town's Skidmore Building.

A marriage and a move to Georgia introduced her to Habitat for Humanity's founders Millard and Linda Fuller, where Fasenfest became Millard's travel coordinator as well as the couple's neighbor.

"We’d go to hear Jimmy [Carter], and I gave Rosalyn Carter my tomato chutney," she said of the period. "[The Fullers] really inspired me in terms of their heart. I was much taken by this thing called the Christian witness, although I know it’s not reserved [just for] Christians."

The sudden death of her husband from mad cow disease upended her life and resulted in a move back to Portland to regroup. She connected with Christy Eugenis, who at the time was creating an event space called the North Star Ballroom in an Italian Renaissance-style Odd Fellows lodge in North Portland. Fasenfest became director of its Performance Salon Series, organizing events combining art and performance with social activism.

That focus on activism led Fasenfest to contemplate starting her own salon series when, by chance, she ran across a corner space in what was then the nascent Alberta Arts District.

"As an old restaurateur I thought, oh man, that spot’s so freaking cute," she said of the space that would house Groundswell Productions. Fasenfest's son, who at the time was going to PNCA, thought it would be a great place for student art shows. "I thought well, maybe I could have my office and they could do some art shows and I can continue mounting my salon series."

The last thing on her mind was starting another café, but at the time the street only had a couple of coffee shops, and offering coffee and pastries would supplement the income from the events. So she reluctantly jumped back into the food business.

"But I didn’t want to cook, I was done with it. I just wanted to address social issues," she said. "People would come and say, 'Oh, these are really great!' and I’d go, 'This is a think tank, not a coffee shop!' People were, like, 'What’s up with her?'"

Selling the café pushed her to start Preserve, teaching classes focused on reviving the lost art of home preservation in a storefront on Alberta, then in Fasenfest's Northeast Portland home. In 2010  Fasenfest published a book on what she had begun calling "householding," preferring that term to "homemaking" or "home economics." Titled "A Householder's Guide to the Universe," it took up the banner of progressive homemaking and urban farming as a way to confront the political, social and environmental issues facing the world.

The book precipitated a deep dive into the history of home economics and Fasenfest began the daunting task of unraveling the strands that she felt had led to the global problems caused by our current capitalist economy.

"What happened to us as a people?" she remembers asking herself. "What happened to our relationships? Why do we make choices? What about the system makes it harder for us to be connected to each other? How were all my skills  and knowledge replaced by industry?

"I could teach till the cows come home, but people are busy or they think it’s kind of a hobby," she said. "They really don’t have the fire in the belly to shift from their lives of consumers in the market economy and shift to the home economy."

Seeking answers to those questions led her to begin a second book, one which she describes as a curriculum for understanding how we got here, and how to work our way out of it. "One part is history, then there are skills, then there are essays," she said. "I’m wanting all of us together to slowly deconstruct what the tethers are, where our home is."

Using the new book as a guide, the new class series will cost $150 for the five sessions. Contact Fasenfest via e-mail for more information or to sign up, or go to the School of Home Economics page on Facebook.

All photos courtesy Harriet Fasenfest.

Game-Day Comfort: Beer Cheese Soup!

When I heard that a couple we know have an annual party on Super Bowl Sunday, I was shocked. You see, if there are any of our friends who seem completely unlikely to be putting on giant foam hats or wearing team scarves or jumping around pumping their fists in the air (covered or not in outsized foam rubber pointy fingers) shouting at the television, it's these two.

Pimento cheese on a Ritz.

So I was relieved when they admitted, after witnessing our shocked countenances (mouths agape), that it was really all about the food for the event. It conjured images of miniature hot dogs swimming in mahogany barbecue sauce, overflowing bowls of salt-encrusted potato chips with virtual vats of onion and clam dips at the ready, as well as the requisite pimento cheese dip to slather on crackers—Ritz, Triscuits or Wheat Thins, depending on your inclination.

All that salt was, of course, as anyone knows who has succumbed to the siren song of free pretzels at their neighborhood watering hole, intended to encourage the consumption of any liquid within reach, normally beer, for purposes of hydration. Naturally I volunteered to bring any and all of the consumables mentioned above to the festivities, since, being a person of dodgy acquaintance with sporting endeavors yet always johnny-on-the-spot for anything involving chips and dips, I was, as they say, all up-ons.

The recipe file reveals all.

The conversation happened to coincide with running across a recipe from my college days when I managed a soup kitchen—we called it a "coffeehouse" at the time—at the U of O that served a soup and bread lunch for a nominal sum five days a week, relying on a haphazard yet dogged cadre of volunteer cooks to prepare several gallons of the potage of their choice for the day's service. Most were a simple combination of stock, vegetables and protein, like Robert's French Onion Soup l'Abbe or Jane's Potage Parmentier—but one in particular stood out for its inclusion of beer.

Mike, the ostensible manager of the campus Koinonia House, had a family recipe for a beer cheese soup that her family was  crazy about and that she volunteered to make on a weekly basis, a guaranteed winner in my book. It also became a viral hit in those pre-viral days, and I commend it to you for any and all of your game-day gatherings. Rich, creamy, with that certain beer-y je ne sais quoi, it's best made a few hours or even a day ahead to allow the flavors to meld and the beer to mellow. Or heck, if you want, just whip it up a few minutes before guests arrive and let the li'l smokies flow.

Mike's Beer Cheese Soup

3/4 c. butter  (one and one-half sticks)
1/2 c. diced onions
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 c. diced celery
1/2 c. diced carrots
1/2 c. flour
5 c. chicken stock
1/4 c. parmesan cheese
1/2 tsp. dry mustard
6 oz. cheddar
1 12-oz. bottle (or can) of beer, preferably a lager or pilsner
Salt and pepper to taste

Melt butter in large saucepan or Dutch oven over medium heat. Sauté  onions until tender. Add garlic, celery and carrots and sauté until tender. Add flour and dry mustard, stirring to combine. Stir for two minutes to prevent sticking, then stir in stock and cook for five minutes. Blend in cheeses and beer, combining well, and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent scorching. Using a stick blender or working in batches with a blender, purée the soup. Season to taste with salt.

This is best made a few hours or, better yet, a day ahead and reheated, which allows the flavors to mellow. Serve with salad and a good artisan loaf.

Farm Bill 2018: Two Views

Months of "jockeying, hand wringing, and horse trading, largely behind closed doors" according to Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer, came to a close recently as the Farm Bill, the sweeping agriculture and nutrition legislation that comes up for renewal every five years, passed the House by a vote of 369 to 47. It was largely stripped of Republican demands for work requirements for people receiving food assistance through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly food stamps), which had stalled the bill for months.

Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer.

The bill that was passed largely continues the agricultural subsidies of previous bills, which are predominantly claimed by large corporate farms, and added a provision that said any member of an extended family who runs a "family farm" can annually receive $125,000 in subsidies ($250,000 if they are married) if they provide “active personal management only,” even from afar, according to an article from Taxpayers for Common Sense. This basically redefines a family farm as a managed operation where the manager doesn't even have to set foot on the farm in order to collect government subsidies, a clear boon to corporate-owned and industrial operations.

Blumenauer was one of three Democrats to oppose the bill, stating in a press release that it "pays too much to the wrong people to grow the wrong foods in the wrong places." He called it "a missed opportunity to make real improvements for farmers, the climate, and the food we eat every single day." The Oregon congressman has instead been pushing for what he calls the "Food and Farm Act," an alternative bill that comprehensively advances reforms on four principles: (1) focusing resources on those who need it most; (2) fostering innovation; (3) encouraging investments in people and the planet; and (4) ensuring access to healthy foods.

Clif Bar's Matthew Dillon.

A different view of the revised Farm Bill was presented by Matthew Dillon, senior director of agricultural policy and programs for Clif Bar & Company, in an op-ed he wrote for The Hill, a Washington, DC-based news outlet. Declaring that the bill as passed is a victory for the future of organic agriculture in the U.S., Dillon pointed to the fact that the bill "for the first time establishes permanent funding for organic research by authorizing $50 million in annual funding for the Organic Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative by the year 2023." The $50 million figure makes the program “baseline” or mandatory in the United States Department of Agriculture budget, creating more stability for organic researchers and farmers, he wrote.

"Demand for organic agriculture far outstrips supply, causing our country to import many organic crops that could be produced domestically," Dillon stated. "Capturing the more profitable value of organic production for American farmers is particularly important at a time when net farm incomes across the country have fallen down to the lowest level in 12 years, declining more than 14 percent this year, and showing little sign of turnaround."

Believing that support for organic research is critical in helping farmers transitioning to organic production, Dillon wrote that the guarantee of funding will aid farmers in keeping up with the most effective techniques for soil fertility and pest management. While he admitted that the farm bill will always have room for improvement, "this landmark new gain of stable funding for organic research is critical to the survival of organic farms and the expansion of organic acreage. It is good for rural communities, good for farmers, and good for the planet."

Blumenauer, for his part, takes both political parties and the Congress to task for its business-as-usual approach to the Farm Bill. "Every day that we continue the status quo, we delay improving and enriching communities, and helping families live healthier lives," he stated. "We can and must do better to help increase access to healthy food for all families.  This final bill fundamentally misses the mark on addressing critical reforms that communities across the country desperately need. Americans deserve a Farm Bill that works for them and their families—not corporate mega-farms. I will continue to lead the opposition to the current Farm Bill structure, fighting instead for a better outcome for all Americans."

Guest Essay: Ode to a Cabbage

I can't think of anyone I know who adores cabbage more than contributor Jim Dixon of Real Good Food, as evidenced by this essay, an updated version of one first published here in 2015. Whether fresh, sautéed, braised, pickled, fermented or fried, you'll still find it making an appearance on his table. Here he shares some history, as well as his favorite ways to prepare it. 

I love cabbage.

And I’m not talking about Savoy cabbage, the frilly version that’s been tarted up with a first name hinting of royalty. Or the other members of the Brassica oleracea family, including the various kales and collards, broccoli, kohlrabi, cauliflower, and Brussels sprouts, deliciously gorgeous as they are. Or the strangely compelling relatives from central Asia, original home of turnips, broccoli rabe, bok choy, tatsoi, and mizuna, all part of the Brassica rapa clan.

No, my heart belongs to the ordinary, everyday cabbage, its pale green leaves tightly bound into a waxy ball, the humble heads tucked coyly away in the corner of the produce section. It’s cheap, reliable, and flexible; who wouldn’t fall in love?

It doesn’t hurt that cabbage is good for me, lends itself to last-minute cooking, doesn’t cost much and grows, relatively speaking, in my own backyard.

Humankind’s relationship with Brassica started early. In his encyclopedic work Food: An Authoritative and Visual History and Dictionary of the Foods of the World, Waverley Root relates one ancient Greek belief of its origins: Dionysus, the god of wine, caught Lycurgus, the Edonian king, pulling up grapevines. While awaiting punishment, the king wept, and from his tears sprang cabbages.

An alternate myth has Jupiter sweating as he tries to explain contradictory oracles, and the cabbages sprout from his perspiration.

Those ancient Greeks might’ve been on to something. But given my devotion it seems more likely that Eros, the god of love, was involved.

Wild cabbages, resembling kale more than my beloved green globes, grew along the Mediterranean coast, and according to Harold McGee, in his book On Food and Cooking, the “salty, sunny habitat accounts for the thick, succulent, waxy leaves” that make cabbages so hardy. Domesticated about 2,500 years ago, cabbage spread across Europe.

Because it tolerates cold weather, cabbage became an important staple farther north, and we typically associate it with the hearty cuisines of climes damp and gray.

But the Romans, like me, loved cabbage, and they’re probably responsible for the selective cultivation that resulted in so many disparate variations. By encouraging an existing tendency for the curling leaves to form more tightly packed bunches, those early Italian farmers created today’s well-known “heading cabbages.”

Our name for these derives from the colloquial French word for head, caboche. Vegetable lore tells us that the Italian Catherine de’ Medici brought cabbage to France when she married fellow 14-year-old Henri de Valois, the Duke of Orleans and, eventually, King Henry II. History is silent as to whether she called him mon petit chou, or “my little cabbage.” But the endearment reflects the continuing French love of cabbage, from the choucroute of Alsace to the thick stew called gabure in the south.

Early cabbage fanciers also associated it with good health. Egyptians ate it with vinegar to prevent hangovers, Greeks dribbled cabbage juice into sore eyes, and Romans packed aching muscles with cabbage poultices. Herbalists today recommend cabbage for its anti-inflammatory effects, telling breastfeeding mothers to tuck a few bruised leaves into their bras for relief. It’s got lots of vitamins A, B, C, and E, and a study at Georgetown University showed how phytochemicals in cabbage might reduce cancer risks.

However, those same phytochemicals provide the frequently noted boardinghouse smell of overcooked cabbage, something that bothers others much more than it bothers me. Maybe I’m blinded, in an olfactory sense, by love, suffering from a cabbage-passion-induced anosmia. Or perhaps my approach to cooking mon petit chou reduces the breakdown of glucosinolates, the sulfur-containing compounds released when cabbage is boiled too long.

More likely, it’s the variety of cabbage. Brussels sprouts contain more of the healthful and stinky compounds than any of the other Brassicas. Heading cabbages, with their residual sugars, offer a sweeter love.

Farmers here in the Pacific Northwest harvest cabbage from mid-July through the end of December. Properly stored, it keeps for up to six months, so it’s theoretically possible to eat local cabbage all year. Prices vary, with conventionally grown cabbage usually less than a dollar per pound, organic about half again as much. Just before Christmas I bought an enormous head at a farmers’ market for only two dollars.

So, how do I love cabbage? Let me count the ways.

1. I love it cooked in a little olive oil with onion. There’s a head of cabbage in the refrigerator and onions in the pantry most of the time, so I make this almost every week. But cabbage loves pork, and I love them together. So start with a little diced bacon, then sauté the onions and cabbage in the smoky fat. A dollop of crème fraîche makes both of these simple dishes unctuous and rich.
2. A bed of shredded cabbage roasted under a chicken steals my heart.
3. I love how the cabbage I add to my feeling-a-cold-coming chicken soup gives it enough substance to fill me up.
4. I’m crazy for coleslaw, the green salad I turn to when winter’s lettuce comes wilted from a long truck ride north and again when the hot summer sun makes my garden’s leaves bolt and turn bitter.
5. Je t’aime, choucroute braisée à l’Alsacienne: Julia Child kindled new passion for sauerkraut by teaching me to simmer it slowly for hours in crisp white wine.
6. Marcella Hazan makes me cry, “cavolo sofegao, come sei bella,” with her Venetian-style smothered cabbage, another slow-cooked dish transformed with a splash of vinegar.
7. Te amo cocido, tambien. While these one-pot Spanish stews often call for whole chickens, pigs’ trotters, veal shanks and a garden’s worth of vegetables, I make a simple version with just garbanzos, potatoes and cabbage.
8. Louisiana-style smothered cabbage makes me ask, "how's ya mama and dem?"

Cabbage love comes in many other forms, and though the steady routine of our long-term relationship provides familiar comfort, I don’t want it to get stale. So I keep searching for new outlets for my passion, different ways to express my feelings, unexplored culinary territory where I can say, again and again, I love cabbage.