Eating. Literally.

"And Your Bodies Become What Your Foods Are, Even As Your Spirits, Likewise Become What Your Thoughts Are" - The Essene Gospel Of Peace

In the mid eighteenth century, a man was lucky to be 24, of a 5'3" height, or to have three of his wife's five pregnancies actually result in live children. 

These days, there is a 113-year-old man living in Japan, who might have been 5'9" in his adolescence and could have had 993 children before losing any of them. 

No question that the men of the world have gotten healthier, smarter and taller (with more potent sperm). The women of the world haven't been shirking either...We've hit record-breaking heights in intelligence, opportunity and social participation (as well, as you know, literal heights, ages and the like). 

On the other hand, with each passing inch and year, North American society has become weaker and more pathetic. Anaphylactic allergies come to one in every two Americans now and Type II diabetes, relatively unheard of 30 years ago (and then, only in those over 30 years old), has reached epidemic proportions in the U.S. teenage population. 

If we're so strong, at least in comparison to those who came before us, 

how is it that, all of a sudden, we're so weak? 

The answer has been whispered around the internet, across classrooms and behind doctor-doors for years now: We're living longer, and taller, because we're 'doing it' sterile (hah! You get it?). 

Anti-bacterial soap, vaccinations, chemically-processed multivitamins for children, 140 SPF and nuclear-powered mosquito repellant. All familiar products 'round the homestead, these days. 

The human immune system is centered around a "recognition and repulse" system. Something invades, our previously-built antibodies recognize it as negative, and skewers the the virus before it incapacitates us. Unfortunately, the more we protect our children (and ourselves) from the potentially harmful raw-milks, vitamin D-heavy sunburns, bacteria cultures, and mud-smeared cuts (god-forbid they should ever eat that dirt or, horrors, pick their noses), the more we restrict opportunities for the immune system to develop a defensive game-plan. We've turned their bodies into tiny Dubya's: With nothing actually frightening to attack, they're going after peanuts. 

And it just gets worse, year after year. Nothing is allowed to get you sick anymore. Nobody is willing to risk a little stomach upset, or even a hangover*. Cheese as we know it is going to eventually become synonymous with antiseptically packaged bright yellow wax. Deli meat will be unheard of (as will Delis, for that matter, especially Canadian ones!),while oranges will heat within their skins to come pasteurized, right off the tree! So, finally, we can all climb into our Tod Lubitch bubble-suits and watch a sunset reenactment...which, as a pathetic anachronistic 5'5"er, I'll never be able to see, behind all those glorious six-foot tall heads...

*Claims about lack of morning-after-regrets abound with Cusqueña, a Peruvian beer that two UK hooligans have been importing since sampling it and its effects on a trip to Macchu Picchu. 

P.S. No advocacy of any religion intended - Even if I were religious, the one I am subtly referencing here would make all my Jewish Grandmothers 'oh vay' with great sincerity....To each his own. 

"Too much of a good thing, can be wonderful" - Mae West

Nutritionally speaking, you are what you eat.

Our bodies are made up of the water, the oils, the sugars, the proteins, the so on and the so forth and the etc. etc. that we ingest with every passing day. Many people have expanded on this concept: Describing how we're sickening and dying because the world is sickening and dying. There are many who explain that we cannot wander through a world filled with gasoline fumes, partially hydrogenated oils, daffodil-rice and the like without absorbing some portion of the wretchedness.

But I'm curious if it goes any more than simply skin-deep...If our personalities come from the electric synapse relays that run amok in our cranial muscle (apologies to the religious types for leaving god out of the equation), may we infer that what we eat becomes who we are? Do we absorb some of the moral turpitude of Monsanto when we ingest BGH-flavored milk? More inertly, are we sweeter for having eaten cherry-pie?

If mutton makes us tough, while lambchops make us docile, could that be the explanation behind years of generational differences? The Baby Boomers rose to power under the auspices of pork, pork, pork, tart tomatoes, liver, pickled veggies and deviled eggs...is it any shock that this group grew up to be a prickly argumentative bunch with a yearning to bring down "the piggies"? And Generation Y, with Soda Fountains o'er flowing...well, are we surprised at our own, dare-I-say, 'soft' malleability? I mean... it's been under the guidance of the chromosome generations that we've really allowed all that artificial genetic engineering (I mean, come-on, I get the whole donkey+horse = ass thing...but how exactly were tomatoes and fish planning to mate in real-life?*)

It would be nice to think that having a Lil' Debbie might make me suddenly more adorable or that eating a May West (spelling changed to protect the not-very-innocent) might make me a tiny bit more coy...but the proof is in the puddin', as they say...
When it comes to putting things in our mouths, we never really do know what we're getting into.

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*Most activists usually refer to the dreaded "FishBerry"; But I am an equal-opportunity slanderer, so I wouldn't ever refer to an urban myth, if I can help it...destroys my credibility, you know? But here's a great explanation of the genus behind strawberry-fish, if you're interested (bonus: a photograph of the feared straw-beast!)

"When I write of hunger, I am really writing about love and the hunger for it, and warmth and the love of it, and it is all one" - M.F.K. Fisher

I want to talk about passion.

Although there are many people who pooh-pooh the English language (often for the use of words such as pooh-pooh) because of its confusing grammatical rules, because of its ambiguity and indecision, personally, I love that aspect. A word like passion has a multitude of definitions and implications. Okay, so not exactly a literal multitude. But in usage, in the passionate description of desire, of resilience, of pushing for a goal, there passion finds its fervor. Having lived in the United States for the past year, I can tell you that here, utility is a more popular explanation than that declared by Noah Webster's ink strokes. We even have a word for it: Colloquialism.

So...with that in mind, I want to talk about 'passion' and its representations.
And since we eat literally on this blog: I want to talk about passionate cooking.

If you read Escoffier, Carême, Ruhlman, Bourdain, (and more obviously Chelminski), passion in food is about creativity and experimentation. While many of that list preached exclusive obedience to their personal vision (Escoffier, the 'father of food', was the disciplinarian type of pater), that vision was more often than not a piece-meal tapestry of different influences and experiences. New sauces, new platings and new combinations.

That much is obvious. You didn't need me to explain to you that these types have passion.

So what about someone like M.F.K. Fisher? Fisher was not a cook. She didn't create anything...Okay, well; she created some books, but let's ignore that for the sake of this point, shall we? SO, Fisher had passion, had drive, without being new. She considered eating as much of an art as cooking, but I don't know how many people agree with her. In culinary school, you sit alongside a number of young'ns who all want to be the next Thomas Keller or Ferran Adrià. And they don't keep these goals to themselves. I actually heard one of my classmates declare to a professor "I want to be on T.V.".

I think I actually vomited into my mouth a little bit when that hit my ears.
Am I the only one who thinks that goals like that (as well as my reaction) are the opposite of good cooking/eating?

Anyways...these fledglings all have gimmicks and ideas at hand, ready for the opportunity to release the gooey chunks of their passion on the world.

I don't.

For years, I have struggled with the knowledge that I don't see food in a new way, that my suggestions are mostly reenactments of previously experienced plates, that given a cucumber my first thought is not to pair it with Pimm's #1 in a sorbet, but to throw it in a salad. Boring, I know.
I'll never be Keller, but, maybe, perhaps, someday, I might be Fisher.

Despite my monotony in cooking, I love food. Eating it, working with it, seeing how it grows and develops, how it can evoke memories, laughter, lovemaking. I just finished an incredibly challenging internship with one the highest ranked restaurants in the East...*coughs*...that might explain all my 'radio silence' by the way...And I had my exit interview today. My Chef at this restaurant, while good at many things, lacks a certain finesse when it comes to feedback. Essentially, he's only good at the bad stuff. I can't really say I have ever heard him give a direct compliment in six months.
I had to push him to tell me anything nice. Finally, in response to a very direct, frankly worded: "WHAT ARE MY STRENGTHS???” He snorted, as if to say don't you know? and said "Your passion, of course".

He couldn't tell me that I had any skills at tasting or plating, or banging pans...but he knew I loved it. He knew that I pushed myself to be better, that for all my clumsiness and lack of grace, I cared.

But is that going to be enough?
How far can passion take you, if it isn't also paired with passionate skill? I don't know.

But I'll keep you posted.

"They Eat, They Drink, and in Communion Sweet, Quaff Immortality and Joy" - John Milton

After the first few weeks without a post, I figured I would simply give a slight nod to the time past at the beginning of a new post and then continue.

When a few more weeks past (actually, added together, the finicky might label them months), I decided that I would, perhaps, write an entire paragraph at the beginning of a new post explaining my current situation (a.k.a. busy) and then continue.

But after even more weeks past, and this time, I must admit they figure into months and, dare I say, half a year more, that I would have to do something drastic.

When you stop writing in your blog, you begin to question whether you are truly sure that you even enjoy the act of putting thought to keyboard. But I do! I do! Simply crafting this excuse-laden micro-blurb has excited me.

Of course, not enough to create a whole new post.

(Honestly, I am already late for work...I'm not even sure why I suddenly felt this post was necessary now of all times)

Though I will promise, without exaggeration, that one will be forthcoming. I have been doing nothing but working in food, eating good food, reading about food, drinking and communing (as Milton would have it) for all these absent months. The epiphanies came to me, despite the lack of keyboard; I will pass them on to you as soon as...well...when it happens.

"If anybody said that I should die if I did not take beef-tea or mutton, even under medical advice, I would prefer death" - Mahatma Gandhi

There are many people out there that will tell you that eating meat is wrong. They have Meetings, Magazines and Motions named after them. Obviously, they have disagreements from M- to M-, but one letter, no matter what, stays the same. Vee. For vegetables, of course.
And despite some evidence, such as the posture pictured next-door, that I am a carnivore, I actually whole-heartedly support the eating of vegetables. Delicious things really, with a whole variety of colors, flavors, and textures to tickle the senses. Eating vegetables I understand. What I don’t understand is the close-minded-capital-M-Mentality of the Vee-person. In a world full of republicans and other types of extremists, how can a Vee actually see themselves as progressive?
We are not going to talk about cruelty here; I’ve seen the de-beaked chicken videos, and I know all about BGH. The meat industry needs reform, no question, but when I hear “Cruelty”, I just think “Free-Range”. And I would get the activist-chickenbra-burnin’-Vee, of which some M-s are peopled, but I’m sorry, there are many more tofu-burger-eating-Vees out there than activists.
What I really want to talk about is nature. All the Vees I know, including some neurotic ones that I keep close to my heart, all seem to want to get back to nature, get back to tradition, get back to working with their hands. Vees are the ones buying organic, hand-dyed, authentic, fair-trade automobiles, trying to find ways to commune with the earth rather than just drive all over it. The thing that gets me is that the most primal, getting back to our roots, activities are the hunting-and-gathering of dead animal carcass!
Once upon a time, there was a vaguely homo-like primate who ate nothing but plants, Homo Robustus, who was completely, and utterly, annihilated by our more powerful, intelligent, non-anemic, ancestors Homo Erectus.
Obviously this was before the big M-Morality was invented. But, personally, I think that particular M- has screwed up more for us than eating meat ever did. The Vees are right about getting back to the Earth, they are just facing the wrong direction. The sign should read neon-Open, and the door should lead back to when no one wondered whether eating meat was wrong, when some people still worshiped the omnivorous Boar*. It was the invention of M-s that started our downwards spiral. If a Vee really wanted to make a natural difference, they should be supporting Heirloom Beef Farming**. Because it has been moving away from that feasting with the earth, rather than the eating of animal flesh, that has truly poisoned us.

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*As mentioned in the previous post.
Our domestic pig was years ago breeded out of the wild Boar. The wild Boar is the king (and queen) of the omnivores: Nuts, berries, other pigs, birds, tree bark, waste-products, human children and grass, are all amongst a pig’s natural diet. Just as we once stuffed and hung the head of a feisty kill, so were many a Boar’s halls hung with the heads of would-be hunters.

**Take a look at what these guys are up to: http://azulunabrands.com/index.htm

"Food for thought is no substitute for the real thing" - Walt Kelly

I feel rather caught up in the blog bog at the moment. Who knew that dissecting bovine, ovine, oh my, could take up so much time and energy?

You can start to look forwards to a number of upcoming insights into the omnivore's dilemma; Did you know that a pig would absolutely eat you, given half a chance?

Upcoming anyways.

But not now.

Check back next week, please and thank you.

"Cooking is the transformation of Nature into Culture" - Claude Lévi-Strauss

While lamentably late to work yesterday, I ran into an interesting tableau.

Crossing my path on the way into the library was a young girl, about 12 or 13, mildly pot-bellied, her nose stuck to the inner pages of Taste Magazine . Clearly absorbed, she had gained distance on her mother who lumbered behind, painfully dragging her large bulk up the short flight of stairs leading to the doors.
I was immediately struck by the garish juxtaposition; how much more poignantly can you illustrate the bulk-foods culture of McU.S.A.? The unfortunate byproduct of our gimme-food-fast mentality has elephant-sized people lamely chasing after even the skimpiest of tastes and flavors. And taste itself has become something we read about, rather than experience.
The word obesity, defined here as an excess in body weight, comes from the latin adjective obēsus; Ob meaning “for the sake of”, and ēsus meaning “eating”. For the sake of eating. No mention there of finding joy in anything besides the swallow. And even when you read about corpulent issues, in supposedly scholarly papers, the stress is always on the need to consume. You don’t often read about the fat guy who just couldn’t resist another taste of caviar.
Widely accepted as the top of the food chain, humans, with all their superior force and might, have 10,000 taste buds. That’s a decent night’s attendance at Madison Square Garden. Imagine all those roaring Knicks fans in your mouth. Or, if you’re a more sedate type, try imagining two sold-out evenings at the Met watching Faust on your tongue. Ger Den Bosen sind sie los, die bosen sind geblieben
Rabbits, on the other hand, have close to double that number of taste buds; more like an evening at Yankee Stadium. Bugs Bunny, even when domesticated, eats mostly hay, bark and grass.
So if he’s using that many taste buds for grass, don’t you sort of wonder what we’re missing?

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Notes:
Taste Magazine is a fairly skimpy magazine put out by the local culinary school. High literature it is not.
German Quote: “The Evil One has left, the evil ones remain” Faust (I, 6, 174)

"The primary requisite for writing well about food is a good appetite." - A. J. Liebling.

I adore noticing the tiny places where restaurants have decided to save money...

Walking into a beautifully appointed new southern italian joint in my neighborhood, I noticed the artfully 'unfinished' brick walls, decidedly antique mahogany bar, exceptionally expensive wine list....and the paper napkins.

Why would you splurge on faux-tin ceilings, embroidered tableclothes, and monogrammed uniforms, yet not think to spend money on the one thing each and every customer is most assured of touching. It's a crude analogy, but it's sort of like walking into a solid gold bathroom and discovering that they neglected to include a toilet seat.

Perhaps it's a relic of years of family picnics, but paper napkins say unfinished to me. Especially when everything else looks so, well, designed. Please note that I'm not talking here about Ma and Pa's fireside pork-grill, but the über trendy bistros that afflict the face of our fair city like a particularly bad case of acne.

Every good restaurant should think their way through a typical meal, plan for contingencies, and just generally try to anticipate what a customer, though maybe not one as picky as me, might want and/or do. But a restuarant that uses paper napkins didn't think past getting them in, getting them down, and getting them ordering. So why does a meal in a resto that didn't get to thinking about the eating part of their service just sort of give me pre-heartburn?
You tell me.