很多年前，一到入冬，大街小巷的家门口都堆满了大白菜，这是东北的冬天里最常见的蔬菜了，在“大棚蔬菜”和空运蔬菜发展之前，不知道大白菜垄断了多少个冬天的市场，所以如果非要讲a vegetable or plant in China，肯定要聊聊我们的大白菜情结了…

I’d like to talk about Chinese cabbage, which plays an important role in our daily diet, especially for people in the northeast of China.

In the past, I mean, before the advent of greenhouse technique, there were only a few vegetables available during winter, and the Chinese cabbage was the most common one in the market. Every year, before winter came, every family would buy a truckload of them and store them in the basement. They could keep for a long time, I mean, for the whole winter.

And we invented several cooking methods to make Chinese cabbage into various dishes, like fried cabbage, dumplings with cabbage fillings, and things like that, among which, the most famous one is the pickled cabbage. I’m pretty sure that the Korean Kimchi was derived from our pickled cabbage.

Oh, and in China, this vegetable has a special meaning because of its pronunciation. In Chinese, it’s called ‘Baicai’, and it sounds similar to ‘Baicai’ which means wealth and fortune. So there are plenty of artworks in the shape of cabbage displayed in stores or those businessmen’s house. It’s a little bit superstitious, but Chinese people tend to believe in such stuff.  

So you see, Chinese cabbage really means a lot to us.

the advent of something / somebody the coming of an important event, person, invention, etc. 例如：

the advent of new technology

greenhouse = a building with glass sides and a glass roof for growing plants in

a truckload of = the amount of somebody / something that fills a truck (often used to express the fact that an amount is large) 例如：

a truckload of soldiers

The first truckloads of food arrived at the refugee camp today.

Their new album is selling by the truckload.

The company is making truckloads (= a lot) of money.

keep = to remain in good condition 例如：

Finish off the pie—it won't keep.    

‘I'd love to hear about it, but I'm late already.’ ‘That's OK—it'll keep (= I can tell you about it later).’

filling= food put inside a sandwich, cake, pie, etc. 例如：

a sponge cake with cream and jam filling

a wide range of sandwich fillings

　　>>点击查看：吉林新东方雅思课程网上报名（jl.xdf.cn）