Cabbage is cool!

"Cabbage: A vegetable about as large and wise as a man's head."
Ambrose Bierce
Cabbage is cool! Isn’t it amazing how many great foods come from the cabbage? There are many wonderful varieties of cabbage: green, red, Savoy, nappa, bok choy, kales and collards.
Cabbage has been known for 4 millennia in the Orient, some of the earliest pickling recipes come from the nomadic horsemen of the Asian steppes: it was used to feed the throngs needed to build the Great Wall, because it retained freshness long enough to transport it across the barren expanse and feed the construction workers. Later, the invading Mongols and Huns spread it throughout Europe inspiring talk of cabbages and kings; Louis XIV asked his master gardener what he would like on his coat of arms, to which he replied “Sire, three snails topped by a cabbage stalk would be enough for me."
There are also many interesting vegetables that have come from developing characteristics of the stages of cabbage growth: early cabbages were leafy, possibly from the mustard and kales; bulbous roots were developed into kohlrabies; as a shaft grew up from the base, the small heads of Brussels sprouts were coaxed into being; as the plant went to seed we got the cauliflower and broccoli school kids love to hate; and as if this weren’t enough breeders came up with broccoflower, broccolini, and rapini. If this seems a bit windy, when preparing these veggies, some say: boil, toss the water, proceed with cooking as usual, and your company will be more pleasant.
"The time has come," the walrus said, "to talk of many things: Of shoes and ships - and sealing wax - of cabbages and kings” Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll