Its botanical name is Abelmoschus manihot and it sure is slippery. When you cut the leaves a clear slime oozes out. Some people find the texture revolting but you get used to it, especially if there is no other green veg about. The amazing thing about it is that it has so many names throughout the Pacific: bele, pele, aibika, island cabbage, hibiscus cabbage and slippery cabbage. No wonder it's a good candidate for a classification exercise.
Celebrating literature from the Pacific Islands. Introducing world stories with mana. Reviewing stories related to all things "island", including village life, colonialism, sea-faring, myths and legends.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Island cabbage
I've recently been drafting a science worksheet to do with classification. Having a background in horticulture my mind always thinks of plant examples for these types of things. So what did I think of? Different types of cabbage.
My husband calls silverbeet 'cabbage'. I've just been out to the garden to harvest some silverbeet for dinner. Whilst there I weeded some 'love-lies-bleeding'. It grows like a weed in our yard. We also eat the leaves occassionally and my husband also calls it cabbage. These 'pseudo cabbages' are very different to the cabbage he yearns for: which is 'slippery cabbage'. Unfortunately it doesn't grow in the cold down here at the bottom of Australia.
Its botanical name is Abelmoschus manihot and it sure is slippery. When you cut the leaves a clear slime oozes out. Some people find the texture revolting but you get used to it, especially if there is no other green veg about. The amazing thing about it is that it has so many names throughout the Pacific: bele, pele, aibika, island cabbage, hibiscus cabbage and slippery cabbage. No wonder it's a good candidate for a classification exercise.
Its botanical name is Abelmoschus manihot and it sure is slippery. When you cut the leaves a clear slime oozes out. Some people find the texture revolting but you get used to it, especially if there is no other green veg about. The amazing thing about it is that it has so many names throughout the Pacific: bele, pele, aibika, island cabbage, hibiscus cabbage and slippery cabbage. No wonder it's a good candidate for a classification exercise.
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