Lee Wrote:
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> kenuchelover,
>
> Thanks for the great information. I had no idea
> the hideous squash was reintroduced. I like some
> squashes, but the zucchini I get always seems to
> be overcooked and slimy -- sorta like okra (a word
> I can barely bring myself to type). And there's
> the fact that everyone grows it and then wants to
> get rid of it. I have to admit I like the blossoms
> -- they're nice stuffed with a forcemeat or
> cheese, but nobody ever brings them as extras. Why
> don't they grow something tasty like kohlrabi?

Uh, no offense, but..... shudder! (tastebuds of the beholder and all that).

It's a funny thing, but many years ago I was making up a list of veggies I liked eating... or not.... and I realized that something like 99% of the ones I liked were New World domesticates. I can only tolerate a very few of the Old World vegetables (stuff like celery, or lettuce if that counts).

BTW, I'm not fond of zucchini myself, but have learned to live with it since my wife DOES like it. Have you tried it cooked in a red sauce heavy on chile peppers? The tomato & peppers mask the flavor entirely, and by dicing it small & cooking a while, it falls into mush at a bite, with nary a trace of slimy texture.

> Italian cooking is so regional, it's hard to say
> that the cuisine as a whole "relies" on much.
> Even the ubiquitous tomato isn't that common in
> cuisines of the north, and anyone who thinks he’s
> going to get a plate of pasta swimmmmmming in
> sauce in, say, Milan, is in for a surprise. Chili
> peppers are more important in the south, I think;
> they figure prominently in Neapolitan and Sicilian
> cooking (the Italian side of the ancestry is from
> Sicily), as do beans in things like pasta fazool
> ("proper" Italian = fagioli). My understanding is
> that while most beans, legumes are New World, fava
> beans lentils and chickpeas (which get a lot of
> use in Sicilian households) were used by the
> Romans.

Yes, "real" beans (Phaseolus ssp) like common beans & lima beans are all New World, as are tepary beans & runner beans. The Old World has fava beans, lentils, chickpeas, assorted other peas, mung beans, soybeans, and so on.

> Good points on corn. I had forgotten the one
> about corn grown for livestock. Years before the
> Berlin debacle, when were living in Austria, my
> blissfully ignorant parents stopped by a farm
> growing corn and bought some. It was, of course,
> horrible – tough and rather bitter. Ignorance
> exists on both sides of this divide, however; my
> mother knew a German war bride who tried to please
> her husband by cooking corn, but despaired because
> the cob just wouldn’t get tender.

Yep, I've heard plenty of stories of this sort, involving hapless Americans who'd buy corn they saw being delivered on a cart or truck (in Russia, or Germany, etc) expecting to have a taste of home, or to fill a culinary gap in their hosts education.... only to be mortified & bewildered when the result turned out tough & tasteless.

And we've had some real problems getting foreign interns (french, hungarian) to try corn on the cob here.... although they always liked it ONCE they'd tried it.

Kenuchelover.

> Interesting stuff on the wool. I think I’m with
> Hermione on sheep raised indoors. It’s a creepy
> image – like a sheep mental hospital with padded
> cells.
>
> Best,
>
> Lee