Channeling Julia Child

Thought: Why does man kill? He kills for food. And not only food: frequently there must be a beverage.
Woody Allen (1935 - )

I have an interesting relationship with food. Even as a kid I never quite ate what normal kids ate. It would not have occurred to me to describe it as ‘unusual’. Like most kids I was a picky eater, with phases where I refused pizza, sausage, hamburger-based dishes, tacos, and grilled chicken, all framed within a constant dislike of spaghetti sauce, frosting on cake, peanut butter, salad of any persuasion, or any dish in which the vegetables were mixed together. I have no memory of particular culinary terrors (lima beans, brussels sprouts, etc) filling me with dread, just a long list of stuff I didn’t like.

Food is the most primitive form of comfort.
Sheila Graham

As we age our tastes change, either as a result of social and emotional development (in the scheme of things, eating vegetables is not as terrible as when younger) or because of biological change. I no longer particularly care for sweet or oily foods; I prefer salty, sour, and bitter. I prefer vinegar to oil, drink unsweetened tea and coffee, and repeatedly bake my cakes with half the required sugar and usually a dose of lemon juice. Hot sauce, mustard, chilis, jalapenos, curries, and other such foods have become favorites of mine, and I often eat them plain.

Most vegetarians look so much like the food they eat that they can be classified as cannibals.
Finley Peter Dunne (1867 - 1936)

Usually I would not associate the term “picky eater” with myself; my single ground rule for what I will and won’t eat excludes anything with eyes and anything that can move of its own volition (a corollary added to exclude slugs and snails, which apparently do not have eyes). Yet in many senses, I am quite choosy about what I eat. I have the delightful reputation of being the only person to pack her own lunch at the university cafeteria, for reasons of economy and taste. I don’t like mass-produced food, sauces or meals from a box or package, and often am convinced I could do better myself—and am usually willing to spend the extra time to try.

The trouble with eating Italian food is that five or six days later you're hungry again.
George Miller

I would also describe myself as a wannabe gourmand. I enjoy good food, and because the Mr. Scrooge part of me refuses to eat out, I am led to put particular effort and time into cooking. When a group of people come to my house to cook it tends to be complicated, and particularly designed such that everyone (or most everyone) has a job to do, allowing us to make and eat things I personally would never have had the energy to make alone. Of course, not everyone necessarily wanted a job to do, but I figure it’s more fun if two people aren’t cooking alone while 8 people sit around.

We are indeed much more than what we eat, but what we eat can nevertheless help us to be much more than what we are.
Adelle Davis

So my consolation, as I sit today in the cafeteria with my broccoli curry, leftover from yesterday and lovingly packed in a tupperware container, enduring the bemused looks of my compatriots, is that at least I don’t have to ponder the deeper meaning behind “parts is parts”, contemplate the gelatinous-looking attempt at a sauce, or slurp down mushy french fries.

Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.
Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955)
(and apparently, becoming vegetarian does more to reduce CO2 output than switching to a hybrid car. End of commercial)