The Catskill Chronicle

By Bill Duncan – Catskill Chronicle Special Correspondent 

 *Editor’s note: Bill Duncan – writer, playwright extraordinaire and retired teacher – offers Catskill Chronicle readers his biting parody of a common and much-maligned cruciferous vegetable.

A three year study by Pursue University indicates a significant break in the medical community’s understanding of a previously accepted cancer-fighting agent found in a commonly used vegetable. Results of the study, sponsored by the American Institutes of Health, are to be published tomorrow in the prestigious Journal of the American Medicinal Association. It details an important change in medical findings attributed to brassica oleracea, more commonly referred to as broccoli.

“The good news is that this vegetable is as formidable as ever in its perceived positive anti-carcinogenic properties,” said Dr. Milton Healthaur, who headed the Pursue study team. “It’s just that its disease-fighting properties seem to be concentrated not in the soft upper sprouts of the vegetable, as was originally assumed, but rather in the harder woody stalks.” Most consumers of the vegetable are said to prefer the soft buds and to eschew to chew the long stringy stems as inferior.

“It’s a bit worse than that,” offered Tessie Monaghan, a Pursue researcher, who commented on the team’s findings. “Actually, the anti-cancer advantage diminishes as one gets closer to the tasty part,” she said. “The best disease fighting properties are found nearer the root, “at ground-zero,” so to speak.

“Isn’t it always the way,” commented Irving Jessup, of Roscoe, when informed of the study results. “Here we were, taking our medicine, cooked with maybe a little cheese sauce on top, or raw, dipped in a dip … but then I guess no medicine is supposed to taste good,” he sighed, “so at least the most basic law of good health has been preserved.”

Walmark supermarkets immediately announced plans to separate broccoli into two parts, and, according to informed sources, to package the lopped stalks separately, charging more in an attempt to attract those seeking a healthier diet for their families. It is accepted market belief that nutritious food costs more.

Under past practice, the stems were left on in order to produce a higher non-edible weight, and thus maintain a higher price. Most consumers discarded stems in preparation for cooking. The price hike is referred to in the trade as collateral pricing. “But we think we can make more money by dividing the vegetable,” said Jon Norton, a Walmark pricing specialist.

A more innovative response to the nutritive switch in broccoli was suggested by Kurt Schlosser of Rite-Shop, a leading grocery-chain in several mid-Atlantic states. “We plan to make the stalks more palatable by dipping them in oil and bread crumbs and salting them,” he said, “in order to improve taste.” When a reporter suggested that that approach traded the anti-cancer benefits of broccoli for an increased risk of heart disease, Mr. Schlosser dismissed the objection. “Our job is selling, not curing,” he said, adding that such product packaging is known in the trade as collateral glossing. “We’ve been destroying potatoes this way for eons,” he said.

Buried toward the end of the report was a finding on the gaseous properties of broccoli, long a subject of informal comment among researchers and families of regular broccoli eaters. Results, yet to be rigorously tested in double-nose studies, indicate that incidences of broccoli in the gaseous state recede in direct proportion to consumption of the stalks. “Of itself, this is not considered medically significant,” noted Dr. Wellhaur, “though aesthetic considerations will challenge the more nasally attentive.” Mr. Norton, the Walmark manager, upon hearing yet more talk of stalk benefits, added another twenty-five percent to the store’s proposed stalk-package price. The manager denied that this practice was referred to as collateral charging. “We’re thinking of it as a pre-emptive strike,” he said.