"Kail" is a generic name for the family of generally dark green above-ground vegetables rich both in nutrients, medicinal value, and the ability to express/produce fumes from the digestive system. Kail is also known as "Cabbagewort", "Kaleflower", "Brockkaile", and "Curlykail" are the most common types of Kail. However, note that there are many variants of kail types and many variants of the spelling of their names – and, not to discourage you, gentle reader, there are as many more local names and spellings as there are regions in which the plant grows!

Kail leaves may range from a curved, dome-like dark green tinted with purple, through frilled extravagances of petticoat pink, to modestly greenish-white crisply folded sheets. The texture and flavour are equally varied, depending upon the type of Kail and its preparation. While some Kail is best cooked, others should be eaten raw. Most benefit from some preparation and almost all set off meat admirably well. However, the one thing that every member of the Kail family has in common is a carminative tendency - that is, they encourage the expulsion of flatus from the body. While this is considered beneficial by our chirogeons, leeches, and herbalists, the common folk have traditionally perceived Kail as being the cause of the excess gas rather than its relief - thus the vulgate name, 'fartwort'...

Appearance. There exist several different kinds of Kail, which we will describe in detail below. The varying usages of the all these kinds of Kail can be found in the Usages section:

• Cabbage (Cabbagewort, Head Cabbage, Hebkail, Purple Cabbage, Baverkail, Bokkale, Snowkail, Peasant’s Kail)
  The common Tharian name is "Cabbagewort" – a cultivated version of our Swamp Cabbage, and somewhat resembling the expensive but inedible Nybelmarian "Tooth Cabbage". It may shortly be described as a tight bunch of furled, crinkling, deep-coloured leaves massed together at the base into an almost non-existent thick stem, and crumpled together at the top so that the entire plant forms a heavy sphere when harvested. There are many varieties of Cabbage, but the ones which have proven most popular to cultivate and consume are the following: Head Cabbage (the leaves form a tight green ball the size of a man’s head), Purple Cabbage (reddish-purple leaves that are both edible and a good dye if ‘fixed’ correctly), Baveras’kail or Baverkail (beautiful blue-green wavy leaves), Bokkale (a miniature cabbage with an elongated shape like clasped hands), and Snow Cabbage (a particularly hardy white variety which actually softens and sweetens after the first frost).

• Image description. A selection of kaleflowers at an abundant banquet. Picture drawn by Seeker.

  Kaleflower
  This lovely vegetable resembles Head Cabbage in its early stages of development; however, within a month or so a whitish mass begins to form in the centre of the leaves which quickly swells into a tightly compacted ‘flower’. Thousands of tiny, crisp yet swollen florets bunch together to create a solid vegetable which can range from the size of an orc’s fist to a man’s head. The exterior leaves are removed and left to be turned back into the soil (being inedible or at the least not nutritious), and the white kaleflower, tinged with a faint purple blush, is then harvested for use.

• Brockkaile (Broccaile, Brokkaile, Broccole, Brok’s Kail)
  Brockkaile is a close brother to Kaleflower; their shapes are the same, though Brockkaile is more loosely bunched and a deep green hue. The tiny florets keep branching and rebranching, like a lushly-foliaged tree, until the topmost buds are packed snugly together. However, they do not ‘fuse’ or grow together as Kaleflower does…
  
  The outer leaves are long and ragged, rather than the curved ovals of Cabbage. The interior ‘head’ of Brockkaile can grow to the size of a man’s skull, like its Kaleflower sister, but it usually becomes tough and yellowish at that point and is best harvested when about fist-size. Fortunately, the stalk can bear more than one head in a season, so a cottage plot will easily support a family’s consumption.

• Curlykail (Curlykail, Farmer’s Kail, Boerskoal, Bear’skole)
  This plant more closely resembles sallat/lettuce than any others in its family, having as it does a loose cluster of non-heading leaves rising from a soil-level base. However, the leaves are thicker and coarser than sallat, and generally a darker green. The most sure distinction, of course, is what gives the plant its common name; each leaf is heavily ruffled and furled like a village lass’s skirt, so that the edges are many times longer than the centre stem of the leaf.

• Other Kails
  - Kailsprouts (Brownies’ Heads, Kailbabes)
  A thick stalk about the length of a woman’s arm bears many small scalloped leaves on heavy, fingerlength stems which radiate outwards in a climbing spiral around the stalk. None of these, though, are edible; rather, the tiny yellowish buds which form just under each stem, resembling miniature cabbageworts, are what is prized.
  
  - Kollards (Collards, Coloured Kail, Petticoats, Rissa’s Skirts)
  A coarsely-textured, beautifully-hued variant of Kail. It resembles Curlykail in most respects, though it is less ruffled and comes in variegations of almost every shade except plain green. Kollards can be found in deep turquoise speckled with lavender, vivid pink dappled with violet, emeraud streaked with crimson, blackish-purple lined with gold…
  
  - Kinekail (Cattle Cabbage, Marshkail)
  This is easy to confuse with Swamp Cabbage, particularly since it frequents the same areas – rough or damp ground – and is generally considered a weed rather than a cultivated plant.

Territory. Most Kails are hardy vegetables which favour moderate to cold climates, and do fairly well in cool, moist soil. As such, they grow best from about Elsreth in central Sarvonia up through the Celeste Mountains and all the way to the Heath of Wilderon. Some Kails can be grown around New-Santhala, but the leaves tend to be stunted, so the capital generally imports its Kail from the Heath of Cijur and the small Seanian farms along the east coast.

Usages. The various kinds of Kail have also different usages. Here the details regarding the most important ones:

• Cabbage (Cabbagewort, Head Cabbage, Hebkail, Purple Cabbage, Baverkail, Bokkale, Snowkail, Peasant’s Kail)
  The plant is cut away from its stem at ground level, the outer leaves are stripped and discarded, and the tender inner leaves washed and cooked. See the receipts in Dame Sausade's Cookery Book, category "Vegetables", for cooking details. For other usages we can do no better than refer you to our gnomish apothek, Maryllan Orinth the III., who claims the following virtues for cabbage:
  
  “It is well-nown that hot (cabbage) leafs plac’d in the busom of a nursing mother will draw the milch and bryng releif from engorjement. Farmers have for centurys prepar’d cabbaj poultices for their kine, placing the compress on the uddurs of the cattle, for the same resons… We have extrakt’d the sulfydes from the leafs of the cabbajwort for our various alkemical purposes… and the fermentation produc’d from cabbaj and grape ‘must’ can be us’d as a treatment for sertain types of tumorous masses. We have had sucksess in the past with cabbaj concentraits to treat other ailments, as describ’d in my mother’s last publyshed scroll, “On Nersing the Gravely Debilitaited” …which see….”
  
  It is also popularly believed that cabbage leaves placed on the belly of a labouring woman will help the delivery, again, parboiled and made into a warm poultice. Both peasants and noblewomen have known for some time that boiled cabbage leaves, cooled and placed upon the face and neck, may be efficacious in removing disfiguring blemishes of the skin. The beauty shop and perfumery in New-Santhala, known as "Red Lysh Lovescents", sells an ointment known as Kale cream, which is quite popular. And finally, some peasant villages still tell their curious children who enquire as to where they came from: "We found you in the kailyard under a cabbagewort…"

• Kaleflower
  Generally the central ‘flower’ is boiled and eaten. It has a bland, slightly earthy taste with a faint undertone of kale, but is considered a neutral taste which can either be given a sweet or a salty flavouring. See Dame Sausade's Cookery Book, category "Vegetables". Babes enjoy this mashed to a smooth puree and sweetened with malisehoney and cinnaspice, but older children prefer it broken into little florets with a cheese sauce. Both this and its ‘sibling’ Brockkaile are also excellent raw, either plain, with a sprinkle of salt, or dipped into soft cheese or soured cream as the nobles in New-Santhala are wont to do these days.

• Brockkaile (Broccaile, Brokkaile, Broccole, Brok’s Kail)
  The central ‘flower’ head is cut away from the stalk, boiled, and eaten. If the stalks are not required to bear more heads, they can be cut about a handspan from the earth, then peeled to the central light green core, boiled and sliced like a carroot.
  
  Physicians claim the entire plant is beneficial to the health of the body, particularly the developing child, so mothers have devised a broad range of receipts to tempt their infants into consuming the ‘wee trees’ of Brockkaile. Often this vegetable and Kaleflower are mixed together, the green and white making a pleasing contrast, and served with a sauce of yet another colour. The very tips of the buds can be sliced away to make a garnish which can be sprinkled over mashed tuberroots, the stalks make a pleasant light dish as mentioned before, and the whole plant boils down nicely with milch to make a creamy green-flecked soup.

• Curlykail (Curlykail, Farmer’s Kail, Boerskoal, Bear’skole)
  This kail must be washed thoroughly to remove any dirt or small insects that may be hiding in its curls, but it is worth it, being a hearty plant which makes a healthy dish. It has a strong flavour when cooked down as a plain boiled vegetable, so it is almost always mixed into mashed tuberroots, boiled pompion, or other neutral-tasting bases.
  
  As it is one of the kails which most resembles its wild form still, it is worth the traveller knowing how to identify and prepare; even wild Curlykail (or, as it is usually known then, Bear’skole) is of an excellent flavour and lends stamina to the wanderer’s feet. The Thergerim also know and grow this plant in their above-ground gardens.

• Other Kails
  - Kailsprouts (Brownies’ Heads, Kailbabes)
  The leaves can be broken away when they range in size from a child’s marble to a chestnut conker – above that size they lose tenderness. Boiled and served with a sprinkle of seasalt and milchbutter, they are mellow and earthy, more of a delicacy than any of their brethren.
  
  - Kollards (Collards, Coloured Kail, Petticoats, Rissa’s Skirts)
  A few hobbit farmers have devoted themselves entirely to breeding Kollards in decorative variants for flower gardens, and the results are selling well to noble and commoner alike. Kollards are as edible as every other Kail, but are rarely used as a cooked vegetable these days; more often their leaves are employed as a garnish upon which to serve other foods, or to decorate the table.
  
  - Kinekail (Cattle Cabbage, Marshkail)
  Kinekail, grows liberally and makes excellent grazing for beef cattle. Kinekail should be avoided as a feed for milch cows as it flavours the milk rather too strongly, but can be given in early spring as a tonic change from the winter’s dried hay. It is one of the few vegetables which the orcs of the Tandalas are known to gather and consume.

Reproduction. Kails if left past their harvesting season will ‘bolt’, or put up thick seed stalks from the centre of their leaf cluster. These seeds are inedible but serve as the germ of life for the next year’s planting. Farmers usually harvest six in seven Kail plants, leaving the seventh to go to seed in the field, then passing down the rows they strike about them with their walking sticks or a hoe, scattering the seeds to lie dormant through the fall.

1st Burning Heavens 1667 a.S. Information provided by Bard Judith