1. "Judith Hiatt likes to think of herself as a cabbage head. It's
an insult in English, but in French to 'have something in your cabbage' means
you're intelligent. The French, she believes, know about cabbages. After
all, it was in France that she was healed by the lowly vegetable.
"Hiatt recently authored a book called Cabbage: Cures to Cuisine. The title doesn't mean the recipes are a cure to the uninspired ways in which cabbage is often served, although there are plenty of recipes. The book is also packed with cabbage lore and medicinal cures using cabbage.
"Hiatt's cabbage conversion began when she was working in Europe. The Colorado State University graduate set out to visit friends in southern France and promptly missed her train connections. So she decided to hitchhike. Hours in the rain and a night on a train-station floor left her with a head cold and a case of bronchitis. When she finally got to her friends' home, they prescribed fresh cabbage juice for her sore throat and a poultice of cabbage leaves on her chest and throat as a decongestant and to absorb toxins through the skin. She might have thought it wacky if her rational mind had been working, she says. But she was too sick to care. And by the end of the week, her illness was cured.
" 'Thus began my adoration of cabbage,' she writes, 'not unlike the zealous ardor of a religious fanatic for a new found faith.' She discovered that relatives of cabbage, such as kale, were sacred in ancient Egypt and Greece. Wild cabbage, which is native to western France and southwestern England, was first domesticated about 4,000 years ago. It traveled farther afield when the Celts sacked the city-state of Rome 300 years before the Roman Empire. Cabbage quickly made its way into Greek and Roman herbal medicine books, where it surpassed garlic as a favorite remedy. Roman statesman Cato the Elder claimed it was the only definite cure for cancer, she writes.
"Though modern scientists aren't making such definite claims, Hiatt quotes a 1982 study by the National Academy of Sciences, 'Diet, Nutrition and Cancer,' suggesting that carotene-rich (dark green and deep yellow) vegetables and cruciferous vegetables (the cabbage family) are associated with a reduction of gastric, colon, and rectal cancers.
"The book includes a number of suggestions for herbal cures to heal problems from acne to varicose veins. There are also recipes to encourage the cabbage to once again take center stage on American tables. Before 1940, cabbage was a major source of vitamin C, with Americans consuming 15 to 20 pounds of cabbage per year. But cabbage has slipped. 'Let's face it,' Hiatt writes, 'compared to such exotics as mangos, papayas, pineapples or kiwi fruit, cabbage may seem plain and uninspiring, especially after years of the same dull recipes.'
"Some of Hiatt's recipes may sound eccentric...but they're not dull. Here is a recipe:
Sweet and Sour Cole Slaw
vinegar
1 head cabbage
1 cup raisins
½ cup whiskey
½ cup fresh cream or yogurt
juice of 1 lemon or 3 tablespoons vinegar
4 or 5 drops Tabasco sauce
½ teaspoon salt
1 can pineapple chunks, drained
½ cup pecans (optional)
'Three or four hours before serving, peel off cabbage leaves, cut out the thick veins and soak for about 20 minutes in a bowl of vinegar water. Wrap in towel to dry. Spread another dry towel beside working surface. Take two or three leaves and roll tightly lengthwise like a cigar. Cut in fine slices and place on towel, continuing until all leaves are sliced. Roll towel tightly to absorb moisture and set aside. Put raisins in small bowl and cover with whiskey. In larger salad bowl, mix cream or yogurt, lemon juice, Tabasco, and salt. Add sliced cabbage, stir to coat and refrigerate until ready to serve. Add whiskey-soaked raisins, pineapple, and pecans just before serving.' " (Sally Norman, Fort Collins Coloradoan, March 7, 1990)
2. "The French have always had a thing about cabbage. 'Oh thrice and four times happy those who plant cabbages,' wrote Francois Rabelais in one of my favorite books, Gargantua and Pantagruel. His cry was taken up by another of my favorites, Michel Eyquem de Montaigne, who in one of his essays wrote, 'I would let death seize upon me whilst I am setting my cabbages.' I am fond of cabbage and plant it every year in the garden....Consequently, I have always felt that I know a great deal about cabbage. But this past year, joined with a group of journalists in the phenomenal city of Pittsburgh, I met the ultimate cabbagehead. (In this country it means a goofball, but in France it signifies a person of great intelligence, one who has something in his cabbage.) This cabbagehead is named Judith Hiatt, and she is the author of Cabbage: Cures to Cuisine....
"The talk at the sumptuous dinner table had to do with cholesterol, and when Judith remarked that her cholesterol count was 114 (the American norm is between 200 and 250), we all put down our forks and looked at her. 'Cabbage,' she said. 'Cabbage.' The intriguing thing about cabbage, aside from its food values, is that in Europe it is also used as a cure for various ailments, and in France it is called the 'poor man's medicine.' Judith first encountered cabbage's medicinal properties when she visited French friends at the height of an attack of bronchitis brought on by a heavy cold. Her friends gave her fresh cabbage juice to gargle and swallow....In a few days she was cured, and became a completely convinced cabbagehead, which resulted in this book. She started studying the history of cabbage back to ancient times and has become an authority on its health benefits and how to grow it. But to me the most interesting chapters were 'Cabbage as Medicine,' 'Cabbage Cures for the Rat Race' and 'Ailments and Cabbage Remedies.'
"After spending five days in her company, I know that this woman is no kook. She makes no grand claims for cabbage as a wonder cure for everything, but cites specific ailments that have been helped by various forms of cabbage. Alphabetically, the afflictions range from abscesses through gastritis, and end with wounds. On page 103 is a suggestion for hemorrhoids, but I will let you discuss the application with your own proctologist. Joking aside, Judith has no pretensions of cabbage taking the place of formal medical care. What she tells you is how cabbage has been used medicinally for hundreds of years, as has garlic, and what you might do yourself to remedy a situation simply and inexpensively. There is an added bonus in that the writing is bright and funny as well as factual, and the dozens of things she has dredged up about cabbage are almost as good as my wife's cole slaw." (Milton Bass, "Even Kings Shouldn't Snort at Cabbages," The Berkshire Eagle (Pittsburgh, MA), October 1991)
Additional informative reviews occurred in Westword, Denver's News & Arts Weekly, May 1-7, 1991; Evansville Courier, October 1989; and The Confederate, April 28, 1994.