As the state legislature heads for the finish line, one thing still left on the plate is the vegetable.
House Bill 5 proposes that the sugar beet be designated as the official Utah state vegetable. The bill is sponsored by a Salt Lake representative, Jackie Biskupski, and generated at the bequest of students from Realms of Inquiry, a private school located in, appropriately enough, Sugar House.I think it's great that schoolkids are getting involved in the legislative process -- just so they don't take it too far and aspire to become politicians -- and I also think it's great that states have official flowers, trees, rocks, fruits, insects, mammals, songs, poems, minerals, basketball teams, etc.
So I hesitate bringing this up. But feel it is my duty.
Uh . . . guys . . . this ain't a vegetable.
While it's true that the sugar beet is in fact a derivative of the basic table-variety red beet -- a derivative produced in 1786 by a German chemist named Achard -- it is also true that its only reason for being is because of the high percentage of sucrose, or sugar, that is contained in its large fleshy root.
About a third of the world's supply of sugar comes from sugar beets. The other two-thirds comes from sugar cane.
Calling the sugar beet a vegetable is like calling a Snickers bar a vegetable.
If this bill passes, kids the world over are going to be ecstatic.
Finish our vegetables? Sure!
Utah will become an international cussword. The state that made sugar a vegetable. Parents from all time zones will take our name in vain. The Olympic scandal will fade into insignificance. Only dentists will like us.
There is also the small problem that you could search high and low from one end of the state to the other, from Blanding to Bear River, and be hard-pressed to find a sugar beet.
We grow more legumes than we grow sugar beets. We probably grow more marijuana.
The last official count from the government was 600 acres of sugar beets in the entire state.
We used to grow millions of sugar beets on thousands and thousands of acres, it's true, but that was before we turned our Wasatch Front farmland into condo developments and sent the sugar beet business to its present hotbed of Minnesota and North Dakota.
All we have left are memories of the sugar heyday and the Jordan High School nickname "Beetdiggers."
My only personal experience with sugar beets was not particularly pleasant.
When I was growing up on a small farm in pre-condo Sandy, one year we planted several acres of sugar beets.
A large band of migrant Indian farm workers was brought in to "thin" the beets, which meant walking down the rows with a hoe and making sure there was 12 inches between each plant.
It is the kind of job that is fun for about, oh, 16 seconds.
It is precisely the kind of job that turned me toward journalism.
Anyway, my genius brother and I needed money and asked my father if we could "do a few rows." He said to plant a wooden stake in the field to section off our area. We did that. Then we thinned exactly one row of beets. Then we found the stake and threw it in the canal.
The problem was, when those migrant workers got to where the stake had been, they packed up and moved on. As if the stake were still there.
It was obvious, they hated the job as much as we did.
I think I've been holding a grudge ever since.
Lee Benson's column runs Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Send e-mail to benson@desnews.com, fax 801-237-2527.