Just a heads-up before we get started: I go really deep into slapstick humor and the art of recurring jokes in this article. It would almost be a side tangent if it wasn’t such an integral part of the story that I’m trying to tell here. Make sure to stick with me until the end because I have a flavorful surprise in store. You won’t want to miss it!

How do we even talk about Avatar: The Last Airbender in a way that hasn’t already been done to death in 2025? I feel like everyone in my age group has seen this show [Editor’s note: I haven’t seen it, so this is very interesting to me.], but maybe I’m wrong. This franchise is fundamental to many people my age. Avatar has had its story picked apart in thousands of hours of long-format video essays. It’s a monolith. There are almost entire genres of fan art related to the characters. It’s one of the definitive pieces of animated media in millennial culture, which is why it’s no surprise to see it crossing over with Magic in Universes Beyond in a set that’s all but guaranteed to resonate with fans. Magic: The Gathering is dead, long live Magic: The Gathering!

I know that I’ve gone on about how Universes Beyond is actually good for Magic a lot, and I’m not going to stop doing it as long as they keep delivering these labor of love passion projects such as Doctor Who, Final Fantasy, and this new set. Avatar: The Last Airbender is an integral piece of the cultural zeitgeist of my generation, and many of the people working at Wizards of the Coast to create these products happen to be around the same age as me, designers such as Carmen Klomparens and Chris Mooney. There are many others, but these are two of the people that I’ve personally been talking to about this set.

I was fortunate enough to be there at MagicCon Chicago earlier this year when Avatar: The Last Airbender was announced. Ever since then, I’ve been greatly looking forward to this release. I caught up with Chris Mooney when meet-ups and hangouts were happening and told them that I was looking forward to seeing my favorite character, Toph Beifong. We’ve now seen her card, and I’d love to follow up this article by talking about her importance as a fantastic representation of a person with a disability in media. I might be imprinting on her, but I also see her as an unmasked autistic person in addition to her being blind. This makes her extremely interesting to me, and a lot of other fans have expressed similar feelings about her as a character. Let me know if you’re interested in reading that article.

Although the set isn’t out until November 11th, we’ve already seen a handful of previews that include fan favorite characters and moments from the series. You can tell that a lot of love and hard work has gone into making these cards, as the design team clearly knows that people care about these characters and want to see the flavor of the characters that they adore translate seamlessly into the game mechanics. If you’ve been following me for a while, you probably already know that I’m incredibly passionate about the ludonarrative intersection between game design and the flavor of the story and its characters. This brings me to another one of my favorite characters from this series, a side character that primarily functions as a form of ongoing comic relief with a surprising amount of relevance to the story: The Cabbage Merchant.

So, who exactly is this guy? Well, he’s just a simple cabbage merchant. He exists as a background character in Avatar, helping show that the world is inhabited by people who aren’t part of the main cast of characters. He’s a typical bystander just trying to go about his day and sell his cabbages in various towns and cities throughout the Avatar universe. Unfortunately for him, he always seems to cross paths with our heroes, which inevitably leads to the destruction of his beloved cabbages. This exists as a recurring comedic payoff throughout the series, but it always appears in ways that subvert your expectations.

Once you understand the joke, you always know that the Cabbage Merchant is going to be in the show somewhere. You just never know exactly when or how he’ll show up. The gag is almost used like a reward. He’s always there, but the way that they continuously drop it on you as a surprise makes it incredibly rewarding as a piece of slapstick humor that calls back to earlier episodes in a self-referential fashion. I’m autistic and I used to study jokes and humor to try to learn how to be funny because I know that people like funny people and I wanted people to like me too. The Cabbage Merchant is such a perfect joke. I’m trying not to geek out too much about it, but the writers were really locked in with this character and his appearances throughout the series.

I just can’t say enough about how good of a joke this is. Each new iteration of the joke calls back to the previous one, making it a funny and layered meta-reference that provokes laughter by doing the same joke in new ways. The Cabbage Merchant is a side character that only appears in four episodes of the show, but he straddles a unique line as someone who is simultaneously unimportant to the overarching storyline while being incredibly integral to the overall success of the narrative.

The artwork by Patrick Gañas even shows the main characters in the background as they’re about to inadvertently destroy his cabbages once again. Voiced by James Sie, the Cabbage Merchant has become known for the two-word catchphrase that he exasperatedly utters each time that his wares are destroyed: “My cabbages!” Of course, there was no choice but to include this as flavor text!

There’s no complexity to the Cabbage Merchant. As a recurring character, his appearance and animations are distinctive from the rest of the main cast. He has his own instantly recognizable look and set of mannerisms. You can tell that he’s a side character, but his unique style almost makes him feel like a main character. The execution of the joke is done in a way where you can never predict its arrival despite it always having a predictable outcome. The combination of slapstick humor and meta-references in his appearances, in addition to his extremely believable frustration that the same thing happens again and again, makes him an extremely memorable character despite him only having a few lines across the entire show. A joke can still be funny if you know the punchline is coming, in fact it becomes about more of the delivery of the punchline in a way that leaves the audience shivering with antici…

Now that we understand who the Cabbage Merchant is, I want to talk about the ludonarrative elements of the card, or the way the character from the series is translated into the rules text of the card.

Whenever an opponent casts a noncreature spell, create a Food token.

This is phenomenal. This represents the character always showing up to sell his cabbages. This has Mystic Remora text, doing something every time an opponent casts a noncreature spell. In a Commander game, you’re going to be making a lot of cabbages. Creating these Food tokens is great. On its own, Food isn’t that exciting but it’s never going to be just a Food token with the Cabbage Merchant around. Think about how many opponents are going to be casting two or more spells per turn, especially once people have played their commanders and are starting to be more aggressive.

Tap two untapped Foods you control: Add one mana of any color.

I told you that it wasn’t just going to be a Food token. Being able to tap two Foods to create one mana is great, because you’re probably going to be playing lots of other cards that create Food too. This gives you a nice way to convert Food into something more aggressive by casting those big spells that will let you try to win the game. Or, maybe less exciting, you can use the mana to sacrifice Food if you need to do that to gain some life or use some other payoff for the tokens leaving the battlefield.

Whenever a creature deals combat damage to you, sacrifice a Food token.

I intentionally saved this hilarious line of text until the end for comedic effect. Remember what I told you earlier? It’s a callback or a meta-reference. To illustrate the ongoing gag of the Cabbage Merchant’s wares being destroyed every time that he shows up somewhere, you’ll need to sacrifice a Food every time a creature deals combat damage to you. This actually makes a ton of sense, as the Cabbage Merchant is never the actual target and his cabbages are merely collateral damage throughout the series.

I was brainstorming commanders that would love to play The Cabbage Merchant in the deck, and I think that Frodo, Adventurous Hobbit and Sam, Loyal Attendant would be a great fit. There’s actually a ton of other cards from The Lord of the Rings that also have synergy with him, especially if you look at the Halflings. Here are a few more cards that I think he would play really well with as a commander or a card in the deck.

With cards like these, you’ll be able to make a ton of tokens and always have a ton of mana. People talk about artifacts not feeling very green, but an artifact can be almost anything and green is the color that fits the best alongside Food tokens because almost all food comes directly from nature. We’ll talk more about where Food and where it comes from in a moment…

Playing The Cabbage Merchant as your commander also lets you play Peregrin Took and Nuka-Cola Vending Machine. Alongside your commander, these cards create a combo lets three different crossovers work together to draw your entire deck and create tons of mana to win the game. I’m sure that Universes Beyond haters are covering their eyes right about now.

Fire Nation Cabbage

As a chef, I know that a lot of work goes into things that we enjoy such as cabbages, cartoons, card games, and even cooking. This is why I was inspired by the series to create something of my own in celebration of the release of this set. I decided to create something heavily influenced by the Fire Nation from Avatar: The Last Airbender. I love doing stuff like this, so I hope that you enjoy this recipe and I can do more in the future.

I call this dish Fire Nation Cabbage. Charred, smoky and sweet cabbage served with a buttery sesame sauce, topped with heaping mounds of numbingly hot Sichuanese chili oil and fresh mint to burn your palate two ways. The iconic mala flavor is synonymous with the Sichuan region of China that was a key influence on the style and civilization in Avatar. This dish is something that I would expect to see on the table of any Fire Nation inhabitant that happened to run into our beloved Cabbage Merchant.

(If you don’t like cabbage, you’ve probably just never had it when it was prepared properly.)

Chili oil filling:
- Red/green chili 750 g
- Chopped minced onions 45 g
- Minced ginger 45 g
- Salt 1 tsp
- Sugar 1 tsp
- Toasted sesame seeds 60 g
- Raw peanuts 60 g
- Chili flakes 30 g
- Soaked fermented black beans 60 g
Oil seasoning:
- Vegetable oil 1 l
- Sliced onions 30-60 g
- Sliced ginger 40 g
- Green onion 30 g
- Cilantro 30 g
- Star anise 5 pcs
- Cinnamon 2 pcs
- Bay leaf 2 pcs
- Pink peppercorn 2 tsp
- Fennel seed 2 tsp
Sesame sauce:
- Sesame paste/tahini
- Lemon 1 whole
- Salt
- Water
Cabbage preparation:
- Cabbage 1 head
- Vegetable oil
- Salt
- Shaoxing wine
1. Soak the spices in ¼ cup of hot water for 10 minutes to create spice soaking water.
  Strain and reserve the water.
2. Stir the chilis, garlic, ginger, salt, sugar, and chili flakes together with a few tbsp of spice soaking water.
3. Fry the peanuts on medium-low heat until golden.
  Repeat with fermented black beans.
4. Fry the oil seasoning aromatics and spices on medium-low heat until browned and crispy.
  Remove the aromatics and spices from the oil and turn the oil to high heat.
5. Once the oil is scalding hot, use a ladle to pour ⅓ of the hot oil over the chilis and stir.  
  Add the peanuts, black beans, and sesame seeds and stir in before adding another ⅓ of the hot oil and stirring together.
  Add the final ⅓ of the hot oil and stir.
  Allow this to cool and jar it up.
6. Cut the cabbage into 6ths or 8ths, depending on size of cabbage.
7. Rub the cabbage wedges with kosher salt and set them aside for 15 minuntes to allow for the salt to dissolve and begin to absorb into the cabbage.
8. Heat a dry pan to very hot.
  Remove the pan from heat and add enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan
  Add the cabbage wedges, making sure not to overcrowd the pan, as this will result in steaming rather than charring.
9. Return the pan to medium-high heat and continue to cook, adding oil to the pan as needed if the cabbage starts to absorb it.
  Oil is an important medium for the charring process, as a dry pan which will lead to scorching rather than the intended charring.
10. Continue to cook the cabbage until charred and golden on one side.
  Flip the and repeat this process for the other side.
11. When both sides of the cabbage are nicely charred, add about 1/4 cup of Shaoxing wine to the pan and cover to finish cooking through with the steam from the cooking wine.
12. After about 5 minutes, or if the wine has started to fully evaporate, uncover and take off the heat and get ready to plate.
13. Zest and juice lemon.
14. Mix 3-4 tbsp of tahini with lemon zest, lemon juice, and a pinch of salt.
15. Slowly stir in water until the thick paste begins to achieve a more saucy consistency.
  You want a sauce consistency that can properly cling to food without being overly thick and clumpy.
16. Plate the cabbage, adding the jarred chili oil and sesame sauce as desired.
  Garnish with green onions and serve.

If you’ve enjoyed this recipe and would like me to keep doing more content like this, make sure to subscribe to PlayEDH on Patreon so that we can keep publishing this content. If you’d like to join my cooking class and support me and my work directly, you can also join me on my personal Patreon. Thank you so much to everyone for their support and a big thanks to Chief for editing the things that I say into something coherent and enjoyable for readers.

Avatar: The Last Airbender is a set that I’m truly looking forward to and I hope to do even more great content that celebrates the series and this Magic set. Until next time, peace!

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“This article is unofficial Fan Content permitted under the Fan Content Policy. Not approved/endorsed by Wizards.
Portions of the materials used are property of Wizards of the Coast. ©Wizards of the Coast LLC.”

…pation! Now that’s how you do a payoff!

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