Wisconsin Is A Separate Planet

(and how Romanesco is proof of alien life in Oregon)

All the time I was growing up in California my cousins in Wisconsin would make fun of our state saying hilarious things like "California is where all the fruits and nuts are! hahahahahahah!" Meanwhile, my view of Wisconsin was that it wasn't all that different. The way I figured it, there were just as many fruits and nuts, it's just that a lot more of them were wearing double-knit polyester.

As an adult I have listened to my Aunt make statements about her planet state with great curiosity. When my mom was helping her to paint a hallway wall a kind of Mediterranean yellow color my Aunt kept muttering things like "Oh, I wonder what so-and-so will think of this! People around here just don't use colors like these." As though she was painting her hallway glossy ebony or metallic gold. My main thought was "Why would you care what anyone will think?" But she did. She cared quite a bit and gave all the appearance of a kid defiantly chugging a vodka tonic in front of shocked parents.

Later she was talking about my cousin Nick's interest in heirloom vegetables. The way my aunt tells it, she seems to have never even heard of heirlooms before and was certain you couldn't get any in Wisconsin.

Now this I couldn't be silent on. Seriously, half the heirloom vegetables I read about originated from places like Wisconsin and Illinois and Michigan. How is it possible that I can only get them in California because we're into fads and everything super new and that in fuddy-duddy old states like Wisconsin they don't go in for these new-fangled crazes?

I didn't believe her. Just like I didn't believe her when she said you couldn't get fancy olives like Kalamatas at her little ol' plain grocery store. Not true. I had to go there myself when I was seven months pregnant to show her that the truth is, they're right there, she's just never looked for them.

The other day I was looking for some local produce at the health food store. I was eyeing the mutant Romanesco cauliflowers that are twice the size of my head. They are an old variety of cauliflower that the Romans supposedly grew back in the good old days when they were still throwing people to the lions for fun. It is admittedly one of the strangest vegetables around. It's incredibly architectural and seems to illustrate the concept of worlds within worlds. Each big angular sharp knob is made up of smaller precise replicas of itself, and each of those is made up of even smaller precise replicas of itself. I wouldn't be surprised to find that they look exactly the same on a molecular level.

Another older woman was also gazing at the Romanescos in wonder and awe.

"What IS that thing?" she asks me.
"It's a Romanesco type cauliflower." I say.
"Uh huh." she says uncertainly, like I might be baldly lying to her.

That's when I become the produce salesman. It happens all the time. I can't help it.

"It's really great roasted with some salt and pepper and olive oil." she still looks unconvinced and is circling the stand of Romanescos like they might draw weapons on her at any moment. I have detected a slight twang and drawl that is very unique to people in Wisconsin (and Canada).

"They don't have this kind of thing where I come from." just like a line out of a book.
"Where do you come from?" I chirp up. Because I'm affable.
"Wisconsin." she tells me gruffly.
"Ah," I say with total comprehension "I have cousins who are from there." you know that it explains everything when you say you're from Wisconsin.

"We don't grow weird stuff like this in Wisconsin." she repeats.

So it becomes apparent that people in Wisconsin all think of themselves as simple people from a simple state where weird things don't grow and exotic things don't flourish. They want to believe that anyway. It must give some kind of comfort to think that the best cheese available to them is fried curds.

This lady decided it would be a hoot to grow one of these things (interesting how she seemed reluctant to call it a vegetable) and asks if one can find seeds for it. I suggest a seed company and she repeats it several times before decisively announcing that she'll forget it before she gets outside. So I decide to leave her to her strange adventure in the bizarre land of alien food and pick out the largest of the mutant Romanescos.

I roasted a quarter of mine with some "non-weird" cauliflower and it was superb! Some seed catalogs refer to it as a broccoli and some as a cauliflower. In either case it is gorgeous, green, tastes a lot like a "regular" cauliflower, but perhaps with a slight semblance to broccoli. It would be awesome in soup (especially a cream soup), perfect for a stir fry, and what I really want to do with the rest of my ten pounds of it is to make a sharp Cheddar gratin.

If you would like to grow some (Allison) here are some places that you can get the seeds:

Seeds of Italy
Park Seeds
Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds