What If? Vital Vegetables
By Jackie Money
@olliesmum (828)
Norwich, England
October 7, 2018 5:16am CST
This morning, after breakfast, my partner Adam and I discussed what we'd be eating for dinner tonight. As he's a meat eater and I'm not it's easier to discuss it early in the day so that we can coordinate our vegetables.
Tonight he's opted for steak so I'll probably have either vegetarian gammon steak, sausages or burgers. So veg for tonight is easy; chips, fried onions and mushrooms, grilled tomatoes and peas.
From this innocent discussion came one of our somewhat profound 'What If' moments. Adam asked 'what if we were forced to pack up and move to a desert island for a few months. What five veg would we take?'
The first four were easy - potatoes, onions, tomatoes, carrots. The last one was a bit more of a challenge. I love green beans, sweet peppers, cauliflower and broccoli; Adam likes mushrooms, green beans and peas. After some debate we decided that green beans would be the best option as you can do so much with them but if we were able to sneak in a sixth it would be sweet peppers.
The majority of my vegetarian curries, pasta dishes, stir fries, casseroles, etc involve these five vegetables as do Adam's meaty varieties.
So, if you were forced to choose five vegetables, what would you choose?
8 people like this
11 responses
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
7 Oct 18
It's hard to know where we'd be without onions and tomatoes. I sometimes wonder what Italian and Indian cuisine would be like today without tomatoes! I think that, instead of potatoes, I'd take rice (but perhaps you don't consider that a 'vegetable') and then mushrooms (which have protein, vitamin D and also the difference in texture) and then a green vegetable such as spinach or cabbage.
It would be difficult for me to cook without some herbs and spices. I presume that I'd be able to get salt from the sea. so I'd want to take black pepper, cumin, mustard, bay leaves and thyme (if I were restricted to five only).
4 people like this
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
7 Oct 18
@olliesmum I considered parsley and fennel for inclusion in my list but parsley has to be fresh, not dried, and fennel (or caraway) I feel are too specific a flavour to be used all the time (as is tarragon), however, as you only specified a week on the desert island, perhaps one would need that variety in each of the seven meals. My list of 'essential' herbs and spices is probably more like fifty than five, even though I might use some of them quite rarely!
2 people like this
@olliesmum (828)
• Norwich, England
7 Oct 18
@owlwings My sister in law from Essex called a short while ago so I asked her what vegetables she'd take. She immediately said onions and tomatoes and then suggested she'd probably take mushrooms, peas and carrots. On the herb front she thought she'd take thyme and rosemary. My partner, on the other hand, would put garlic at the top of his list of herbs/spices together with paprika or cayenne pepper.
3 people like this
@olliesmum (828)
• Norwich, England
7 Oct 18
I don't think I could survive without basil or black pepper but I would probably also go with your mustard idea and as I'd probably be eating fish, maybe some dill or tarragon for my fourth and either parsley or lemon thyme for my fifth.
3 people like this
@Hannihar (129379)
• Israel
7 Oct 18
@olliesmum
Interesting question. I would choose, tomatoes, green beans, onions, potatoes and carrotts.
3 people like this
@olliesmum (828)
• Norwich, England
7 Oct 18
Seems we have similar tastes. I think you can make just about anything with those five ingredients.
1 person likes this
@Hannihar (129379)
• Israel
7 Oct 18
@olliesmum
You are right Jackie. I love those 5 that I chose.
1 person likes this
@olliesmum (828)
• Norwich, England
7 Oct 18
Do you have one particular one that you'd hate to be without?
@mesbakh (2284)
• Indonesia
7 Oct 18
@olliesmum no, i was raised in agriculture area. even some raw vegetable are not alien for me
1 person likes this
@Fleura (29097)
• United Kingdom
1 Feb 19
That's tricky because of course if you were going to be on the island for more than a week the vegetables wouldn't store so you'd have to grow more, and what you could grow would depend on the climate. If it was a genuine desert you'd be a bit stuck!
1 person likes this
@Friendlypink (3805)
•
8 Oct 18
garlic, onions, carrots, potatoes and pizza. oops, pizza is not a veggie ha ha. Let's change it to corn.
1 person likes this
@olliesmum (828)
• Norwich, England
8 Oct 18
If only pizza could be one of your five a day fruit and veg!!
@moffittjc (118365)
• Gainesville, Florida
7 Oct 18
I think you would be safe with your six choices, because technically a tomato is a fruit, so it wouldn't count!
My five vegetables would be corn, carrots, potatoes, zucchini, and squash.
1 person likes this
