"You don't cook cabbage twice".

[Harrison Hill]

I have never before heard the proverb "You don't cook
cabbage twice". It elicited the response:

"What's that got to do with the price of fish?"

British women in their 90s and 60s respectively :)

[Tony Cooper]

I have never seen/heard the expression using "cook". What I've
seen/heard is "I don't chew my cabbage twice. It's usually a response
to someone asking for something to said again.



--
Tony Cooper - Orlando, Florida

[Whiskers]

The cabbage one is new to me, but the other has crossed my ears before.

In days of yore, it was customary to cook cabbage and other greens by
boiling in water with cooking soda for ages, until the leaves were
reduced to a nasty green pulp of no nutritious value whatever and
tasting somewhat putrid - but still nicely bright green, thanks to the
soda. So you wouldn't even think of cooking it again (although the
school dinners service might keep it in an aluminium container for hours
and then re-heat it before threatening the kids with dire consequences
for not eating it all up).

--
-- ^^^^^^^^^^
-- Whiskers
-- ~~~~~~~~~~

[Peter T. Daniels]

+1

Is it, then, a Pondian thing?

My father (b. 1917) said that a lot.

"What's that got to do with the price of ..." rings a bell -- might've been "tea
in China" -- but I don't see a connection with the cabbage saying.

[occam]

It was put more succinctly by a stand-up comedian recently:
"If you could count the [Brussels] sprouts, you had not boiled them enough."

[GordonD]

My dad used to say, "What's that got to do with cars going up The
Mound?" (The Mound is a steep hill that connects Princes Street with the
Old Town here in Edinburgh.)
--
Gordon Davie
Edinburgh, Scotland

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

The "tea in China" phrase that I know is:
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/not-for-all-the-tea-in-china.html

Not for all the tea in China

Meaning
Not at any price.

Origin
This phrase originated around the late 19th/early 20th century and
derives from the fact that China was well-known to produce tea in
huge quantities.

It is thought that the phrase originated in Australia.

(How much tea does it take to fill a billabong, I wonder.)

--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)

[BCD]

On 6/14/2017 11:07 AM, Peter Duncanson [BrE] wrote:
>
> The "tea in China" phrase that I know is:
> http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/not-for-all-the-tea-in-china.html
>
> Not for all the tea in China
>
> Meaning
> Not at any price.
>
> Origin
> This phrase originated around the late 19th/early 20th century and
> derives from the fact that China was well-known to produce tea in
> huge quantities.
>
> It is thought that the phrase originated in Australia.
>
> (How much tea does it take to fill a billabong, I wonder.)

***“Not for all the butter in Småland” is an equivalent in Sweden (well,
if it were in Swedish) to the "tea in China" one.

Best Wishes,

--BCD