Rutabagas: Surely you're joking

Rutabagas: Surely you’re joking

Rutabagas, you are another one of those vegetables that if I hadn’t seen you myself, I would insist didn’t actually exist. I mean, really: you’re a root vegetable that looks like a clod of dirt, are almost impossible to wash yet have one of those shapes that makes a person almost guaranteed to slice themself when peeling, and at best tastes like a mushy turnip? I don’t see the point. Then there’s your name, which is at best a great punchline, and at worst the Plains Indian word for “manioc, but suckier”.

The nice thing about the name “rutabaga,” though, is that you really do roll off the tongue, making it easy to toss off poetry such as

There once was a young rutabaga,

Who looked like Manuel Noriega

But its taste was so vile

People ran for a mile

For the chance to burn down the bodega

* and *

An heiress in Balenciaga

In cafés would seek Rutabahhgas

Until one day she tried

Them, and afterwards died

And that is the end of her saga.