Mom was right; A Kohlrabi conversation story

Back in April I wrote about my dislike for exotic vegetables, specifically, kohlrabi. I wrote how my mom liked to grow various odd vegetables, which she included on everyone’s plate in the month of July without asking the kids’ opinions.

To quote myself, "Kohlrabi was another bizarre cruciferous root vegetable that appeared in various forms at breakfast, lunch, and dinner year after year. Mostly raw and crunchy, and might I add, weird-tasting. The rare times I see kohlrabi today I run. Does anyone actually like kohlrabi?  Other than my mother?"

Apparently I need to rethink my position.

Last week my sister Sandy visited from Texas and we visited a roadside stand in Ogemaw County.

Kohlrabi was available for the bargain price of just 60 cents per bulb. For reasons I cannot fully explain, I bought one.

Maybe it was nostalgia or maybe I wanted to reaffirm my hate for this vegetable. Whatever the reason, this green bulbous object came home with me.

That evening I cut it up and put it in a bowl. In addition to my sister Sandy, my niece and her husband were also visiting, and they had never seen nor heard of it.

They looked appropriately horrified as they glanced awkwardly at each other. 

After reminiscing with Sandy about Mom's exotic vegetables craze, we bit in. Oh. My. Gosh.

It wasn’t actually bad. It certainly wasn’t the awful thing I remember having to eat for breakfast.

Why should this matter? Because it got me thinking about a book I recently read, Think Again by Adam Grant.  In this book, Grant discusses why we so often cling to outdated opinions, which we may not even realize are outdated because they have become part of our worldview. 

Grant argues that one of the most important skills we can develop is the ability to rethink - to be willing to question what we believe, admit when we are wrong, and be humble enough to change our minds.

In an interesting example, Grant tells of Wagner Dodge and how he survived the Mann Gulch Fire in a remote area of Montana in 1949. Dodge was the foreman of a crew of fifteen firefighters who were fighting a rapidly advancing wildfire.

As the flames grew closer and escape routes disappeared, Dodge realized they could not outrun the fire.

So he did something that seemed completely irrational. He started another fire.

He burned a small area of grass and then lay down, yelling at his crew to come into the area with him.

But they thought he was crazy and kept running.  Only two made it to safety at the top of the mountain; the rest died.   

Wagner Dodge was willing to rethink the situation in the middle of a life-or-death race, and he came up with this novel idea of burning an area for safety, a tactic that has been used extensively since.

Furthermore, the entire incident caused the Forest Service to rethink their policy on fighting wildfires. They came to change their practice of fighting every single wildfire out there.

They realized that some wildfires caused by natural phenomena should be allowed to burn.

Grant's point in the book is that rethinking things is something we need to do constantly.

This is especially true when we cling to ideas that we had earlier in life, when things were different.

We often don't even notice how things may change, but we remain entrenched in our original way of thinking. This is true for politics, beliefs, and relationships. Grant encourages humility as a pathway to thinking again, being humble enough to rethink and change our minds.

Maybe the idea we first refused to consider is worth rethinking. So there you have it folks. After decades of certainty, I have changed my mind. Kohlrabi is not that bad.

In fact, it might even be good. I might even plant some next summer.

I can’t believe I just wrote that.

About the Author: Rev. Sharon Smith is a pastor at St. Paul's Lutheran Church, professor, writer, and lifelong vegetable critic. She has spent decades defending her position that kohlrabi was an unnecessary addition to anyone's diet, only to discover she may have been wrong all along. Contact Sharon at dave@tri-citytimes.com