Dec 11th, 2008 at 3:08 am
The Cucumber Factor
Ta-Nehisi Coates is getting ready to foreswear the smear against white people that we eat cucumber. And yet just yesterday here in Finland where the white people are twice as white as back home (Nordic ancestry + subarctic winter = pale), I was in fact served a sandwich of cucumbers and cheese on a croissant.
56 Responses to “The Cucumber Factor”
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December 11th, 2008 at 4:23 am
“In as much as it dismisses the lighter races as Coldplay-listening, cucumber sandwich-eating dilettantes, this blog has been grossly unfair.”
Meh, I don’t care about the cucumber sandwich thing (it’s tasty!), but to blame us for Coldplay is just mean, dude. No race or ethinicity deserves the blame for that.
December 11th, 2008 at 4:26 am
JACK – And there you sit, calmly eating cucumber sandwiches!
ALGERNON – Well, one can’t eat cucumber sandwiches in an agitated manner.
December 11th, 2008 at 4:53 am
A cheese sandwich or croissant with cucumber is NOT a cucumber sandwich. A cucumber sandwich is two slices of bread and butter with a few slices of fresh cucumber between them and the crusts cut off.
In India, the affluent (those you can pay air fares) seem to eat a fair number of cucumber sandwiches, the state-owned domestic airline seemed to serve nothing else but they were accompanied by a sponge bun and a cup of tea.
December 11th, 2008 at 6:30 am
Toast with cheese and cucumber slices is standard breakfast at our house. But we live in Iceland. Perhaps the cucumber consumption here has something to do with the fact that they are domestically grown – in hothouses.
I guess part of the cucumber outrage stems from the fact that you Americans don’t have proper cucumbers. Only “english” cucumbers can be cut for toast or sandwiches.
December 11th, 2008 at 6:52 am
Cucumber salads are perfectly fine things.
December 11th, 2008 at 6:55 am
Cucumbers grow pretty well in my back yard (even though the soil is blackish rather than whitish), and I eat them whole and freshly picked, like apples from the tree of life! Far too tasty to waste in a samwich
December 11th, 2008 at 7:08 am
White people eat cucumbers? Huh. The best fast Mexican food place in town has a buffet with salsas, grilled peppers and onions, and cucumbers, many many cucumbers. They’re good dipped in salsa.
December 11th, 2008 at 7:21 am
Magnus – are Icelanders going to rename “English Cucumbers something insulting?
December 11th, 2008 at 7:48 am
Hey Matt,
You should compile all of your non conclusion driven pieces about your time in Finland and put ‘em into on big post. They’re excellent.
Cavs and LeBron rule!
December 11th, 2008 at 7:54 am
I’ll vouch for cucumbers and Mexican food. A lime-cucumber salsa is unreal good.
December 11th, 2008 at 8:00 am
Blowback, Freedomcumbers perhaps?
No – since as far as we are concerned there is only one type of cucumber, and those are 100% Icelandic! It was only after I moved to the US I discovered what Americans refer to as “cucumbers”.
But I guess I will make a point of asking for “European” cucumbers from now on, instead!
December 11th, 2008 at 8:51 am
You can find English cucumbers in America, too, but they’re not very common.
December 11th, 2008 at 8:52 am
here in singapore we favor “japanese cucumbers”, which are like the english ones in being thin-skinned and virtually seedless. they make excellent sandwiches. we eat them frequently, in a celebration of our white heritage, just like steve sailer would have wanted.
December 11th, 2008 at 8:57 am
In the American South where I grew up, cucumbers were one of the crops that often overproduced anyone’s possible need for cucumbers. They’re good and grow cheaply, and unlike many squashes can be eaten just fine raw — and cucumber preserves are generally ‘pickles’. When you have an oversupply of a fresh food like that, you end up figuring out how to eat it, not wondering whether or not you need a food made out of cucumbers.
December 11th, 2008 at 9:00 am
Cucumbers in vinegar (with some sugar added) is a southern staple. Very refreshing with barbecue. And they grow like weeds.
As a caterer, I only had one request for cuke sandwiches. It was for a Junior League-type event. The group also requested what I heard as ‘black waders”. Why on earth would they want fishing gear at a tea party? Turned out they were requesting black WAITERS. I thought I was in a time warp. I bowed out.
December 11th, 2008 at 9:05 am
Cucumbers have their place but it’s not on bread. What next — celery sandwiches?
December 11th, 2008 at 9:26 am
Cucumber sandwiches are quite popular in India, at least among middle class people of my parents’ generation. Of course they probably picked up the habit from the English.
Cucumbers are popular in some African countries, too, since they grow well in warm climates (and get to quite prodigious sizes). I don’t know if they’re really eaten on bread though.
December 11th, 2008 at 10:18 am
The problem in the US is you have this generation of kids who see the cucumber as something you practice putting condoms on. You’d eat a cucumber sandwich after that?
December 11th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Isn’t there near zero nutrition in cucumbers?
December 11th, 2008 at 10:43 am
Ronnie P, I’ve had worse in my mouth. Over half the population has, I’d bet. Just sayin’.
December 11th, 2008 at 10:49 am
its ok, you can admit it, it was probably a decent sandwich…
December 11th, 2008 at 10:49 am
Finns aren’t nordic.
December 11th, 2008 at 10:50 am
Nordic ancestry? Not so much, I suspect, at least not as we usually mean by Nordic. Their language is Finno-Ugaric, from the Turkic language group. The other Nordic people speak Germanic languages in the Indo-European group.
December 11th, 2008 at 10:57 am
Kholoud and Mark,
Er, what language one speaks isn’t necessarily related at all to one’s actual ancestry. Turks and Hungarians are mostly European in terms of genetic ancestry but they speak languages of central Asian origin because they were overcome during their history by central Asian invaders. The people of Turkey today speak a language that comes from the Turkic Central Asian tribes, but I don’t think most of them are the _genetic_ descendants of the Turkic tribes. Similarly, it’s possible for Finns to be ethnically “Nordic” (whatever that means) but to speak an Uralic -Altaic language.
December 11th, 2008 at 10:57 am
This falls under what’s known as WPF… White People Food.
Generally it means any food that has very little seasoning. Or uses expensive cuts of meat to make a boring dish (see: boneless skinless chicken breast) or uses some pre-fab product like enriched white bread or food-in-a-box (a la hamburger helper).
I think chicken breast is pretty much the epitome of WPF. But there’s also “nouveau” WPF dishes, like bad, under-spiced hummus or the cheapo salsa that comes in a glass jar. Cucumber sandwiches definitely qualify for WPF, but pickled cucumbers tend to be vinegary and spicey and more rustic, therefore not too WPF.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Cucumber sandwiches are featured in Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Ernest”, where Algernon eats the cucumber sandwiches prepared for his aunt Augusta but refuses to share them with his friend Jack. Most of analytical philosophy’s discussion of ethics can be traced back to the dilemma Wilde portrayed here.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:14 am
Finns aren’t Nordic. They’re Uralic. Their language isn’t Indo-European.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:25 am
You can find English cucumbers in America, too, but they’re not very common.
Oh, they’re common enough in grocery stores, even in the south where the seed-ridden ones are plentiful. Not cheap, though. And all apparently grown in Canada.
The best use of the cuke, though, is in tzatziki. Or Pimms.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:26 am
Finns are most certainly Nordic. Nordic means belonging to Norden, and nothing else.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:29 am
Culturally the Finns are Nordic and Lutheran. They’ve been affiliated with the Swedes (one way or another) for over a thousand years. Genetically they have some differences from most other Europeans (whereas the Hungarians are hardly different at all) but they’re still more like Europeans than anything else.
Their Finno-Ugric language is very difficult, which is why they’re so taciturn and stubborn, and why they drink so much.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:37 am
Swedes are taciturn, stubborn, and drunken for entirely different reasons.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:40 am
Here in Mexico we eat lots of cucumbers (and most of us aren’t white!)
My personal favorite is cucumber with salt, lime juice, and “salsa en polvo.”
December 11th, 2008 at 11:57 am
Anyone ever had cucumber ice cream? They serve it at the JP Licks ice cream chain in Boston. Damn good, although no one ever believes me when I tell them.
As Mique points out, and I can attest for Africa as well, cucumber is a popular vegetable in tropical countries because they do quite well in the heat.
December 11th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
i’m brown, and i eat a lot of cucumber. so does my (brown) family. have you looked at a lot of chutney’s? cucumbers on the brain! it ain’t just white thing.
December 11th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
Isn’t there near zero nutrition in cucumbers?
That couldn’t possibly be true. Any edible green plant will at least give you antioxidants and fiber.
IIRC cucumbers were something of a staple crop in lots of ancient civilizations. I’m making a mental note to start eating them more often.
December 11th, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Yes, my (South Asian) family eats a lot of cucumber salad, too….chopped up and mixed with diced carrots, tomatoes, etc. and sprinkled with salt and lime juice.
Jasper, I think that cucumbers were a staple crop for ancient civilizations (and a lot of cultures today) because they’re easy to grow and quickly outcompete weeds (in fact relatives of the cucumber will grow wild) rather than because of their stellar nutrition. they are quite tasty though, and a good source of water on a hot day.
December 11th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
Jasper, I think that cucumbers were a staple crop for ancient civilizations (and a lot of cultures today) because they’re easy to grow and quickly outcompete weeds…
Well, yes, Hector, I would be surprised if such factors do not at least partially explain the ubiquity of the humble (and yes, not wildly nutritious) cucumber. I’d also say, though, that “nutritious” means something different to fat modern people than what it would have meant to someone living in a culture where getting enough calories was a real challenge.
December 11th, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Jasper,
They also tend to grow well in _dry_ climates, I wouldn’t underestimate how they might be appreciated as a source of
water. In the age of treatment plants and water bottles it’s easy to forget that prior to the last 150 or so it wasn’t always easy to get a clean source of water if you were out working in the field. Cucumbers (and watermelons) provide that, and biting into a cucumber might be safer than getting water from a river if you didn’t have anything to treat it with.
December 11th, 2008 at 4:51 pm
cucumbers AND CHEESE, all on a CROISSANT? that’s a lethal cocktail of anti-American signifiers, my friend….
December 11th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Greeks eat cucumbers.
Just saying.
December 12th, 2008 at 2:19 am
I got to know North Carolina cucumbers while in the vicinity of Mount Olive, home of a busy pickle company. I’ve respected cucumbers, squashes, and watermelons ever since.
December 12th, 2008 at 10:52 am
Hector:
I understand that language is not necessarily (not usually, perhaps) related to genetics but it was my understanding that the original Finns were descended from nomadic Lapps who moved from the Arctic and settled down to farm and fish around the Baltic (Esthonia as well as Suomi). Certainly there must have been–and still be–mingling with the Germanic Scandinavians, particularly Swedes but it’s interesting that they didn’t adopt their language, or that of the Russians for that matter.
December 12th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
My only encounter with a cucumber sandwich was on the pages of Edward Gorey’s The Other Statue.
December 13th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Your next topic, both alphabetically and culturally, should surely be the cummerbund.
December 21st, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Khuloud, while the lack of historical records complicate matters there are still indirect clues to be gleaned from language analysis, genetic tests and archaeological finds. These point at the Finns and Lapps being related but distinctly different people. The Finns were an agricultural people that moved in from central Russia (exact location impossible to pinpoint). An agricultural society can sustain a far larger population than a nomadic one and so the Lapps were gradually displaced. Some interbreeding took place but not enough to achieve a genetic melting pot. The mechanism is no different than from how Swedes and Norwegians displaced the Lapps in their respective areas.
In terms of genetic makeup Finns are clearly European, carrying the same genes that you can find in any European population. However, the Finnish genome shows its isolation (ancient and geographically isolated) by not having some genes that are found in other parts of Europe. Or put more simply, Finns carry genes ABC, while an Italian might carry genes ABCD. The main outside influence on the Finnish gene pool comes from Germanic neighbors, who were also rather isolated from the rest of Europe.
And to return to the main topic. The reason (no doubt) why cucumber sandwiches were served is that up in Ostrobothnia (Pohjanmaa in Finnish) the industrious Swedish-speaking descendants of medieval settlers have created a minor industry based on hothouse agriculture. The region is famed (in Finland at least) for its tomatoes and, you guessed it, cucumbers.
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