There are dilettantes who dine on snails, caviar and champagne who will contend that eating a scallion is beneath their stature in life. They will contend that it is nothing other than a peasant food. Your old essayist holds a contrary view. In his estimation, the enjoyment of any meal except breakfast is increased by at least 75% to 100% by the consumption of scallions. A meal served without scallions is similar to one served without pepper or salt. Scallions may well be a peasant accompaniment to any meal, but is there anyone who says that eating peasant food is deplorable?
My love affair with scallions goes back to the beginning of my life in the mid 1920s. When the Lilac Roost Dairy Farm closed down, my father built a house on Francis Place in Richmond Heights, Missouri. The back yard had plenty of room in which to plant a garden. My mother was an avid gardener who planted all kinds of vegetables which were then canned. The produce from that garden did much to sustain us during the dark days of the Hoover depression in 1929.
All my life I have enjoyed tending to a garden of the sort that my mother first raised in the mid 1920s. After World War II, I was transferred to Kansas City, and established a small residence in a town called Prairie Village, Kansas. After the storm windows were fashioned to fit the windows, my next job was to plant a garden. That garden was followed by other gardens in Chicago, which was my next station. When I came to New York, I rented a small farm of five acres, known as the Rickenbacher Property. Again, I planted a garden. When I was sent to Washington to work there as a lobbyist, my residence was in Bethesda, Maryland and my neighbors were in awe of the fact that the soil there could produce a bountiful harvest of produce. When I returned to New York some 40 years ago to live in Short Hills, New Jersey, there was a garden in the ample rear of this property that was most fertile. I planted gardens in that spot for many years, until the trees began to shade the garden and I could no longer see. So you see, gardening has been in my blood for all these years.
In every garden that I was associated with, the first items planted were scallions and radishes. Scallions are related to onions but they are a distinct crop of their own. One of the virtues of scallions is that the deer will not eat them. That is a major plus. Scallions are not difficult to raise at all. They require a little bit of sunshine, some water and a smidgen of fertilizer. The effort that goes into raising scallions is amply rewarded by the pleasure in their consumption.
For many years, it was difficult to find scallions in the winter months in our local markets in New Jersey. However, in recent years, it appears that scallion growers have begun to produce that wonderful vegetable all year long. At the moment, the Chicka/Carr family is able to buy perhaps six bunches of scallions on Tuesday followed by four bunches of scallions on Friday, which is our next shopping day. The fact that I can no longer see does not bar me from tending to the scallions. My wife places two large plates in front of me. On the right side are the untreated scallions. The left side is for the finished product. To my right, on the floor, there is a waste basket in which the roots and the tops are discarded. Preparing the scallions for the table is a labor of love. I enjoy doing that work because I know that, come the next meal, the scallions will enhance it greatly. The cost/benefit allowance is much in favor of the scallions because of their low cost. In my own case, I would eat scallions regardless of the cost/benefit relationship.
I am told that scallions are very beneficial to the health of their consumers. I am told that scallions provide us with benefits ranging from vitamin A through vitamin S. People who eat scallions have twinkly eyes, and curly hair. Now who could debate about a vegetable that provides all of these wonderful benefits including the twinkly eyes etc. They may be a food for peasants, but if that is the case, I say only that we should have more peasant food.
I have been writing essays at this desk for 11 years now, and I regret the fact that I have failed to pay tribute to scallions before this date. As we go forward, I hope that this failing will not occur again. Nonetheless, I am pleased by my ability to heap lavish praise on a lowly vegetable called scallions. They deserve every accolade that the dictionary can define. And as for the dilettantes, they can go on eating their snails and caviar, but they do so at the expense of missing the consumption of scallions.
There is one other thought that occurs to me in these troubled times. As our economy is in fritters, the caviar eaters will become fewer and fewer. But those of us who love and revere scallions can go on chomping away until full employment reoccurs. Any food that provides all these benefits is entitled to praise of the most lavish sort.
E. E. CARR
February 15, 2009
Essay 366
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Kevin’s commentary: I think I remember reading another essay on this particular subject published in 2011. So it’s safe to say that Ezra’s love for scallions has not diminished in the slightest. For my part, I’m happy to eat them when I run into them but make no particular effort to seek them out.
I remember eating vegetables from Pop’s garden when I was a kid. I always wondered why that stopped being a thing that existed, but now I know it was due to the trees blocking sunshine. The question that I’m sure is now on everyone’s mind is simple: why not just trim the trees?