LesGensFaims

A Good Appetite Is Hard to Find?

 

 

AJ Liebling said, "The primary requisite for writing well about food is a good appetite. Without this, it is impossible to accumulate, within the allotted span, enough experience of eating to have anything worth setting down. Each day brings only two opportunities for field work, and they are not to be wasted minimizing the intake of cholesterol. They are indispensable, like a prizefighter's hours on the road. "

I think Liebling was correct in his assertion - an insatiable appetite and curiosity lends an interesting start. Writing about food is a task of creative replication: the voice must redesign the tactile experience and sensation for the reader to experience on her own. The closer one brings her audience to a story which can be enjoyed, but also felt in a personal way, the more successful she becomes in communicating what Liebling was able to do so well - to value food as a means, not an end to story-telling. 

Cheers Liebling.  

 

A Wise Man Always Eats Well

The Chinese sage and philosopher, Confucius once said, "A wise man always eats well." Fast forward a few hundred centuries to a dining room table in Free Union, Virginia where my Grandfather, a philosopher in his own right said,"Never eat anything that goes splat." He was not referring to the Zhou Dynasty's digestive tract, but rather his former days of perfect posture and pressed uniforms at West Point Military Academy. He, like Confucius had a point and I remember my own cousin, Michael, a picky and interesting eater, who I once observed pick out all of the peas from his paella referred to my Grandfather's creed, when he was stationed in Iraq. He returned six months later alive and very well. 

 

How we eat and how we approach it demands a little foresight and well, honesty. Confucius knew this ( as did my Grandfather who played polo until his 70s and lived to be 91, in part because he did not eat anything that went "splat") and I assume that he was not flattering his brainy ego when he first said this over a cup a steamy green tea. Brillat Savarin, that notorious gastronome and king of bon vivants had a similar dictum, "Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are." This was not some irrelevant gastronomical quibble "after a few too many" aimed at gluttons, who had "gone too far." Instead, it was a nod to the virtues of gastronomy, reflecting this Dijon native lawyer's (and lover of food) own wisdom. Savarin understood the true merits of gastronomy and knew it had its own natural circadian rhythm and therefore lived his life according to it - eating only the best and relishing each season and in some sense, paying it homage to it with his plate and refined palate. There was no gastronomical dictatorship, but rather a democracy - where you could choose, or in this case eat what you want - but it did require some thought. 

 

The timeline, although spread out, reveals one truth: that wisdom not only lies tucked in Athena's helmet protected head, but in the stomach, if you allow it. Honesty, like one of the seven virtues is a necessity for a good life and one that includes, eating wisely, even if it is from the trough, on the side of the road, or at the office. Just make sure it does not go splat.