The Midnight Diaries of Catty Wampus

Note: The Food Rules are constant, unquestionable, and unimpeachable. As with any rules, The Food Rules may be broken–often to pleasurable sensations. But one must always acknowledge that The Food Rules exist and one must recognize them as true and fast.

#6
CAKE AND PIE

There’s a tradition that needs to come to an end, folks.

For centuries now, we’ve been defining our food by the shapes they take and the pans we bake them in. It has to stop because we are allowing some foods to masquerade as other foods, and I’m certain you’ll agree that there’s something deeply wrong with that.

I’m talking about two foods in particular. I’m talking about cake and pie.

Yes, I know: you like your cake and you like your pie. They’re good and wholesome desserts and you’d think nothing could be simpler, but I promise that if you look closely you’ll find that there are “cakes” which are not cakes and there are “pies” which are not pies.

Let us start by defining what a cake is. A cake is a moist and flour-based treat, often times baked in layers and then stacked and frosted. Other cakes are more rectangular, served in a large slab or sheet. Occasionally someone will even make a bundt cake if they have one of those fancy-schmancy pans with a hole in the middle. But the main thing is that it’s filled with all kinds of miniature air-holes, which is what makes it fluffy and have some spring and give to it when you sink your teeth in.

You know what I’m talking about. A chocolate cake. A birthday cake. Hell, I’ll even let a densely packed Black Forest cake slip under the radar because at its core, it’s still got those little mini-pockets of air that let the cake breathe. Yum, yum, yum.

Do you know what doesn’t have those air pockets? Cheesecake! Ice Cream Cake! They’re simply solid walls of food in the shape of a cake. (more on walls of food in a moment) They are not cakes, and in my opinion, they should leave the rest of the law-abiding cakes on their own. Cheesecake–how dare you even, you know?

Now let’s look at pies. What is a pie? A pie is a delicious treat, surrounded by a crust (which may be open, closed, or latticed on top), and filled with a gelatanous mixture of solids and a soft, gooey medium which compliments said solids. A perfect example would be a cherry pie. Not only are there cherries inside (solid), but they swim in a wonderful cherry-flavored filling (the gooey medium). All sorts of pies fit within this rubric: apple pie, pecan pie, peach pie, blueberry pie, and I’ll even accept shepherd’s pie and chicken pot pie as part of the pie family. (even though, technically, those last two break food rule number 2: pies should be served cold)

With that standard in mind, let’s have a look at the chocolate cream pie. Or the key lime pie. Or (wait for it….) the pumpkin pie. Once again, what we see before us are not pies: they are walls of food baked in the shape of a pie! You heard me: pumpkin pie is not a pie!! I’m not quite sure what it is–though it is tasty–it is not, I repeat: not! not! not! a pie!

Listen, you can’t just go around baking foods in different shapes and naming them after the shapes you bake them in. There are rules, folks. Let me put it this way: if I set a wine glass in front of you, and then dropped in a heaping spoonful of mashed potatoes, could I say “Here, have some potato wine?” Surely you would say “That’s not wine.” That’s logical. I might try to respond “But it’s in a wine glass. That’s what makes it wine.” You’d have me thrown out the door.

Well, that’s exactly the kind of non-logic that cheesecakes and pumpkin pies across the world are trying to get away with.

If I choose to cook rice and vegetables in a casserole dish, that doesn’t make my dinner a casserole.

If I fill those little egg-cups in my refrigerator with strawberries, that doesn’t magically turn the strawberries into eggs.

My mashed potatoes in your wine glass is not wine…

Making a layered dessert that looks like a cake doesn’t necessarily make it a cake!

And for the last time, just because you put something in a pie tin and bake it, that doesn’t make it a pie!

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go see if I can get drunk off of water by sipping it out of a beer stein.

Note: The Food Rules are constant, unquestionable, and unimpeachable. As with any rules, The Food Rules may be broken–often to pleasurable sensations. But one must always acknowledge that The Food Rules exist and one must recognize them as true and fast.

#5
INGREDIENTS ARE NOT FOOD, AND FOOD IS NOT INGREDIENTS

This is a two-parter.

The first part, Ingredients are not food, is pretty simple to understand and recognize. Nobody but nobody opens up their kitchen cupboard to dash a bit of coriander into their mouths, just as nobody swallows down a half cup of lard, just as nobody but nobody but nobody chows down on a heaping bowl of baker’s flour.

If you want to argue with me, then I’m going to call you a liar or a freak. (in violation of Food Rule #3, I’m willing to concede that some people do enjoy cake sans frosting or pasta sans sauce—but even those people would never stoop to sipping on a snifter of olive oil, let’s get real)

Now, the second part of the rule, Food is not ingredients, is a bit more complex and has been being broken with more and more abandon over the past few years. The most common example of this rule being broken can be described as “piles.”

The first pile I really noticed was in a local convenience store in the candy aisle. It was the Overload from Nestle. The Overload is, essentially, a Reese Peanut Butter Cup, topped with any of a number of Nestle favorites: skittles, Crunch Bar pieces, an Oreo, etc.

 

 

Now, listen.

After a savory meal, you might want something sugary to sweeten your palate. A Reese Peanut Butter Cup is a fine choice for such a mission. Or, you might prefer a Butterfinger. M&Ms are fun and colorful, and they make a fine choice as well. But you simply cannot (and you can’t simply) lump them all together and decide that it’s a new food! This is like shoving a hamburger and a hotdog in your mouth at the same time! I mean, criminy, for some of us it’s enough of a struggle not to be gluttonous about food in the first place–we don’t need candy manufacturers greasing the way by putting everything in one bite! Seriously!

Which brings me to the next big offender: Fast food joints.

 

I couldn’t even believe my ears when I heard about the Kentucky Fried Chicken Bowl. Check this out:

 

 

Look at it. This is a bowl of mashed potatoes. The mashed potatoes are covered in gravy. So far, so good, right? (incidentally, this is another example of an “excuse food”–see The Food Rules - Part 3) But then the mashed potatoes and gravy are covered with little niblets of corn! And does KFC stop there? Oh, no, no, no, no, no! They add chicken on top of it all! Crispy fried chicken! A whole other food!! And then they add cheese on top of the chicken, corn, gravy, and potatoes, and serve it to you!!!And if you think that KFC is the lone culprit on the Confused About What Is A Food And What Is An Ingredient Prairie, you’d better think again, mister.

Have a look at this offering, from Hardees:

 

That’s right. The Country Breakfast Burrito. Like the caption says: Two loaded omelets (an omelet is a food, folks! all by itself, it’s a food! not to mention that, as several of my friends have pointed out… if you put two omelets together, it’s simply one big omelet! you can’t have two omelets in a burrito! it’s like having two glasses of milk in one glass… it’s just a bigger friggin’ glass of milk! arrgh!); and then five hashrounds (which is their clever marketing way of renaming hashbrowns… hashbrowns, which are–say it with me–food! not ingredients!); and then cheddar cheese and sausage gravy. In a tortilla. They wrap it up and you suck it on down.*sigh*Now, I’m going to try to calm down a bit. But this is a serious violation, and it’s happening more and more, everywhere you look. Food is food and ingredients are ingredients. You can mix ingredients together all you want, and if you’re good at it, you’re gonna come up with food. But you can’t mix food together and come up with anything worthwhile. 

These examples have all fit into the “pile” category that I set out earlier. But there’s another category of violators that is very relevant at this moment: The “Stuffed-Withs”. Food that has been shoved into other food.

See, here in the United States, Thanksgiving is approaching. And while Thanksgiving used to mean a big turkey dinner for all of the family, there is a new tradition cropping up all over the place. I don’t know how it happened. Maybe people thought that turkey wasn’t exciting enough by itself. Maybe someone somewhere thought “why eat one bird, when you could eat more?” Whatever the reason was, there’s a fair chance that you’ll be dining at a Thanksgiving table, about to chow down on a turducken:

 

 

This is a turkey, stuffed with a duck, stuffed with a chicken. It almost makes me want to cry.

Friends: Let’s make a stand. Let’s tell the Frankensteins of this world that we don’t need any more food that isn’t food. There was nothing wrong with turkey, and there was nothing wrong with Butterfingers and omelets. Why do we allow people to parade food around like some kind of sideshow freak, forcing it to perform indecent acts for a cheering and hungry public?? Let’s stop the madness.I’ll be the first to draw a line. I’m standing up and telling you that you can add as many ingredients to food as you’d like. I’m always up for something new and exciting. But I swear to Odin, Zeus, Ra, and Baal, that there will be hell to pay if I catch even a morsel of food in my food!

Who’s with me!?!

Note: This installment of The Food Rules will be more of a philosophical gallivant than a dogmatic tellin’-it-like-it-is session.

Question: WHAT IS FAST FOOD?

On January 1, 2000 I gave up fast food.

You have to understand, I used to love fast food. I didn’t care if it was McDonald’s, Burger King, Taco Bell, my local favorite Mighty Taco, Arby’s, or (when I was travelling) Taco Time, Hardee’s, A&W, or Jack in the Box. They were all wonderful, cheap, and on-the-go. And, oh my were they Tasty. Grease and salt, num num num. Cheese! Milkshakes, aaahhhhhh.

If I saw a television commercial saying that there was a new burger coming out of one of these chains, or a new chicken blue-cheese sandwich, especially if it was for a limited time, I had to try it. If I was in a different part of the country where McDonald’s served pizza, or poutin (in Montreal once), I had to try it. There’s a new section of the menu introduced with three new meat, cheese, and bread options–bring it on!

Then, in December of 1999 I had a particularly violent night of uber-sickness thanks to a nearby Taco Bell. I was brought face to face with a decision I didn’t want to make. But I had to make that decision. I saw that clearly. I had to give up fast food.

In 2000, I stayed off of fast food almost entirely. (I cheated a little when I absentmindedly took some of my friend’s Wendy’s french fries–I regretted it later when I realized what I’d done)

Now it’s 6 years later. Earlier this week some friends invited me to Burgerville for lunch. Burgerville is a local chain of burger joints that prides itself on its quality beef and fresh ingredients. I’ve ridden my bike past them every once in a while–they look like a fast food place. So I told my friends that I probably couldn’t eat there.

“Why not?” they asked.

“I gave up fast food.”

“When?”

“About six years ago,” I said.

Rob said “Just yesterday I saw you eating Subway.”

“Subway’s not fast food,” I counter-argued.

“How do you figure?”

So I had to lay out my “Subway is not fast food” theory. To wit:

* FAST FOOD IS FOOD THAT IS PREPARED SIGNIFICANTLY FASTER THAN I COULD PREPARE IT FOR MYSELF AT HOME.
There’s no way I could ever make a burger as fast as McDonald’s. I could make myself a quesadilla, but not in the scant minutes it takes a Taco Bell employee to build one and stuff it into a cardboard box. I believe I could, however, make myself a sandwich with cold cuts and cheese relatively as fast as the good men and women of Subway do. Subway isn’t a fast food chain as much as it’s a chain of delicatessens. Delicatessens without that delicatessen feel, yes, but delis nonetheless.

* FAST FOOD MAY BE SERVED FROM A DRIVE-THROUGH WINDOW
If your restaurant has a sign in the parking lot pointing your car towards the drive-through (or, really, drive-thru… because that’s how fast it is–they don’t have time to spell out the whole word), chances are you’re serving fast food. Especially if your drive-thru window stays open later than the rest of your restaurant does. With the exception of one tiny town in North Dakota, I have never seen a Subway with a drive-thru window. And even that one I don’t really count, because it was in a red brick building that had been converted to a Subway, not a free-standing location built to the corporate Subway-look.

My fast food celibacy had become more of a tradition than anything else these days. I’m sure it wouldn’t have killed me to have a little Kentucky Fried Chicken every now and again. But there’s something about having a record that’s lasted several years. I likened it to quitting smoking. If I hadn’t had a cigarette in 10 years, I’m sure that one cigarette wouldn’t throw me back off the wagon. But then I wouldn’t be able to say “I haven’t had a cigarette in ten years” anymore. Same with the fast food. I wanted to be able to say “Not since 1999.”

But then I decided that I live my life by too many rules and structures. It would be good for me to break out of them every once in a while.

So we went to Burgerville. I had a cheeseburger. I was hoping that it wouldn’t be a fast-food cheeseburger, but it was. The french fries were fast food french fries. The grease was fast food grease, and the prices were fast food cheap.

But you know what? It’s okay. I didn’t go on a spree of Burger King menu raiding. I don’t crave any Taco Bell. Everything’s a-okay; I feel fine.

And I haven’t eaten anything from a fast food restaurant in five days.

Note: The Food Rules are constant, unquestionable, and unimpeachable. As with any rules, The Food Rules may be broken–often to pleasurable sensations. But one must always acknowledge that The Food Rules exist and recognize them as true and fast.

#3
SOME FOODS ARE MERELY EXCUSES TO EAT OTHER FOODS. NO ONE REALLY ENJOYS THE EXCUSE FOODS–THEY’RE SIMPLY A VESSEL FOR THEIR TASTY PASSENGERS

* Example A: Cake - Cake is there just so you can eat frosting. You know that everyone would think you were a disgusting pig if you just sat down with a bowl of frosting and a spoon, right? That’s where cake comes along to make you seem more civilized. Even though we know you’re not. Because you and I both completely understand that if it were socially acceptable to dip your barenaked fingers into a freshly opened tub of Betty Crocker double fudge, you’d be licking your chocolate hand until the cows came home. You probably wouldn’t even share any with the cows after they came home, that’s how much you love the frosting. And face it, nobody really likes cake by itself. There’s people who will tell you they do, but let’s get real here, huh? Let’s please? Cake alone is about as fun as a sandwich with nothing inside of it. Yum yum yum, right?

* Example B: Pasta. In addition to falling under the jurisdiction of Food Rule # 2, pasta also fits in with its Excuse Food brethren and sistren. Everyone knows that pasta is there for the sauce–which, again, you don’t want anyone to catch you eating by itself. There’s all kinds of wonderful tomato sauces, cheese sauces, butter sauces, and wine sauces, all of which would sit uselessly congealing if it weren’t for pasta. There should be some kind of food medal, because I would pin it on pasta’s starchy chest. Especially when it comes bearing Classico’s wonderfully rich Sun-Dried Tomato Alfredo sauce, which you can find at your local grocer’s in the pasta aisle. Try some today!

* Example C: Flat bread, specifically as it pertains to hummus. I don’t really remember when hummus became a big thing, but here it is, and it doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere. And that’s fine, because I enjoy it. I’d eat it by itself except, of course, that’s simply unheard of. You need the flat bread. Or you can use pita bread if you haven’t got any real flat bread around. In fact, just about any type of bread will do–there’s no reason to be authentic about everything. Be wild! Experiment! In a pinch, tortilla chips will serve just fine for getting that wonderful bean dip to the tippy-tip-tip of your tonguey-tongue-tongue.

All excuse food deserve recognition. They are the blue collar worker of the mealtime tables. Think of all the vegetable dip, salsa, guacamole, hummus, salad dressing, tomato meat sauce, and chocolate icing you never would have tasted if not for the Excuse Foods. Let’s all rise now and salute them with a hearty cheer, shall we?

Hip hip! (HOORAY!)

Hip hip! (HOORAY!)

Hip hip! (HOORAY!)

More food rules to come. Stay tuned.

I swear, there has got to be an easier way to order sushi. I feel so dumb.

This past Wednesday, I ordered food from the Japanese restaurant across the street like I usually do. I placed the order by phone. One order of yaki soba noodles, and for a change of pace I decided to get some sushi to go with some sushi as well. Four little bits of sushi would hit the spot perfectly.

“Two California rolls, and two shrimp rolls,” I said.

Some of you can already see where this is going.

When I went to pick up my meal, I was told that the total came to $24.95. I was shocked. Usually the noodles alone just cost $7.95. There was no way I had asked for seventeen dollars worth of sushi. Was there?

Of course there was. And the Japanese woman, who is very kind to me every time I order lunch, explained to my flabbergasted face that a “roll” is six pieces of sushi. Because they roll it and chop it up–that’s why it’s called a roll. I had, apparently, meant to ask for four pieces of sushi. I had actually asked for twenty-four pieces.

I’m not new to sushi. I’ve been eating it for years. It’s just that I usually get the kind that’s prepared daily in the supermarket, ready to pick up and bring to the cashier. (I’ve had the fancy “real” kind in a restaurant, but usually when someone else orders for me)

I know I like California rolls. I just assumed that each little package came with a bunch of California rolls. I mean, on some level I knew that a “roll” was chopped up into bits. I suppose I simply thought that both the full thing as well as all the individual pieces could be called a roll. Just like “pizza” could either be the whole pie or just a slice.

So this ever-patient woman in the Japanese restaurant showed me the sushi menu and tried to explain how to order sushi properly. I can’t remember the last time I was so confused.

When I was in 10th grade economics class, we were taught the proper way to fill out a check. We were supposed to fill out the date, the amount of money in numbers and then in letters, the person/company to whom the payment was due, the “memo” section, and finally sign our names. There was a test at the end of the week.

I think I got a 60%. I had filled the written-out number part incorrectly. I had written actual numbers for the cents part of the amount, and the teacher marked me down for it.

But you know, you’re an adult, right? You’ve probably dealt with checks as much as anyone. Anything goes! I do a lot of freelance work, so I get to see other peoples’ checks a lot. No one fills out a check the same way, and sometimes it’s hardly legible. People use numbers and words wherever they feel like it. Some people include the year on the check, some do not. In the memo section, someone once thought it would be funny to write “For: Crack Cocaine.” The bank cashed it. A friend of mine was given a check that was supposedly “For: Oral.” The bank cashed it.

But I’m getting away from my point. My point is: there should be high school classes that focus on ordering sushi. Seriously. Not a whole class, certainly. Not even a full unit. But something. Jeez! If it’s going to turn out to be a serious life skill, I would have liked to have been prepared.

Of course, when I was in high school, most people didn’t know what sushi was. I certainly didn’t. It hadn’t hit the United States in a big mainstream way yet. But I fully support any curriculums which include proper food technique, etiquette, and identification.

I was at a film festival opening once. Following the evening’s movies, a giant reception was held in a nearby ballroom. A swing band was playing “Sing, Sing Sing,” and people were dancing. In the center of the room was a long table with vegetable plates on it. Alongside the platters of broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, and cucumbers, there were big bowls of snap peas still in their pods. I love peas in the pod. I made my way to the table to grab a handful.

While I was at the table, I made the acquaintance of a young woman who started chatting me up about the movies she’d seen at the festival already. I told her what movies I had seen so far, all the while taking the occasional bite of peas in the pod. These were good and fully rounded peas, too–not those baby ones, which are for the birds lemme tellya.

But the more I ate, the more I realized that part of the pods just weren’t going down my throat. More precisely, they weren’t even making it to my throat. Something in my brain was saying “I’m not swallowing that.” I didn’t know what the problem was–I’d eaten peas in the pod plenty of times before. But here I was, chewing harder and harder, and still my gag reflex would not accept what I was trying to get down.

Eventually, I had to apologize to the woman I was talking to. I picked up a cocktail napkin, discreetly spit the pod into it, and placed the napkin in my pocket for later disposal. “I’m sorry,” I said to the woman, “but for some crazy reason I just couldn’t swallow those pea pods.”

She looked at me with a look that said she couldn’t tell if I was joking or not. When she was certain that I was absolutely serious, she said to me “Those are soybeans. You’re not supposed to eat the pods.”

It’s inevitable that new foods will continue to enter the American culture. Thai’s getting pretty big now, but I’m sure the thought of peanut sauce a decade ago would have confused me. I’m sure there are new food phenomena from all over the place that are just starting to take hold in the fancier bourgeois restaurants before being passed down to the proletariat. And I’m sure that many of these food have their own unique customs for preparation, ordering, serving, and consuming.

All I ask is that before these new delicacies make it to our dinner plates, we are somehow informed (e-mail? television commercials? big public notice boards nailed to telephone polls? leaflets dropped from hot air balloons over major metropolitan areas) about all the proper procedure regarding said delicacies. Something, I hope, to make me less dumb.

Note: The Food Rules are constant, unquestionable, and unimpeachable. As with any rules, The Food Rules may be broken–often to pleasurable sensations. But one must always acknowledge that The Food Rules exist and recognize them as true and fast.

#2
FOODS BELONG TO CATEGORIES OF COLD AND HOT. COLD FOODS SHOULD NOT BE SERVED HOT. HOT FOODS SHOULD NOT BE SERVED COLD.

This rule was discovered when your humble gourmand was served a dish of couscous. Though I had never seen or heard of couscous before, I could tell just by looking at it that it would be deliciously hot when I placed it in my mouth. Imagine my surprise, then, when it turned out to be fresh from the refrigerator. This was obviously an error. Couscous should be hot.

* Example A: Potatoes - This one is nearly indisputable. Whether it’s hash browns, french fried, twice-baked, scalloped, skinned, dripping with cheese and sour cream, mashed, or what have you, potatoes are a hot food. Oh, we’ll reluctantly eat the scraps of some leftover steak fries that have been in the fridge for two days, but we know that’s not the real deal. And we can lounge in front of the television stuffing our face with chips, but no one pretends they’re enjoying rich and fulfilling potatoes when they do that. The only snagging point people seem to get hung up on here is potato salad, which is clearly against the rules. It looks pretty enough, sure, with its mix of big ol’ Idahos, and quarter wedges of red-skinned Russetts, swimming about in a sea of mayonnaise and vinegar. Potato salad even hits the spot quite nicely on a picnic alongside burgers and hot dogs–but make no mistake: it’s a rule-breaker, plain and clear.

* Example B: Pasta. Think about it. When was the last time you went to your favorite Italian restaurant and ordered up a plate of chilled noodles? Never, right? Right! Pasta is a Hot food, through and through. Do you ever mix up a pot of mac and cheese, only to wait for it to get below room temperature before diving in? No! Of course not! And yet, like its starchy sibling, the potato, pasta seems to think it can dodge the rules if it coats itself in mayonnaise and spices, and masquerades as a salad. But we’ve got its number, don’t we, friends? Pasta Salad is a renegade food, trying to escape its heated destiny.
In fact, it seems there are a lot of foods who think they can affix “salad” onto the ends of themselves and alchemize into a naturally Cold food–but it just doesn’t work that way. Pasta Salad. Potato Salad. Chicken Salad. Nonsense. These foods need to learn their place and learn it well. Salad, indeed!

* Example C: Any liquids. Cold. Cold. Cold. The colder the better. This is, admittedly, the hot/cold rule that is the most egregiously ignored by the general public. While they’ll deign to drink their water (the goody-two-shoeses always know to add ice), fruit juices, alcohol, and soda pop at the low temperatures, as intended, their hedonism can’t be kept at bay. Coffee, they’ll order! Tea, they’ll brew! Hot cocoa they’ll sip by the fireside on a cool winter’s eve! I myself have reveled in the blissful transgression of warm apple cider, complete with cinnamon stick! But it’s wrong, so wrong. Liquid food was never meant to be served hot. I know it’s nearly a foreign concept these days. Here’s an indication of how far we’ve strayed: Soup. Soup, as a liquid food and therefore bound by the Food Rules, should be served cold. And yet, so few cold soups ever grace our menus–and when they do, there’s always a surprised hesitation: “Really? Gazpacho is… cold soup??” We need to get back to traditional values, people!!

Ah, but who am I kidding? The hot/cold cold/hot rule is cast aside anywhere you care to look. We delight so much in the pleasures of rule-breaking that we may as well be living in Sodom. Or Gomorrah. I’m sure they enjoyed their coffees and teas in those wonderfully sinful cities before they were brimstoned. And if you’re comfortable with that future ahead of you, then brew yourself another cuppa joe. Drink up.

I’m gonna go finish some left-over french fries.

More food rules to come. Stay tuned.

When I was 16, I spent the summer at a school program in Boston. I’m not from Boston, so I was on my own most of the time. I lived in the dorms of the school, and was left to fend for myself regarding food and laundry and the like.

I mostly ate at Burger King (love them chicken parmesan sandwiches), or the Taco Bell down the street. They had just added their version of “Mexican pizza” to their menu, and I was hooked. I have this bad habit of needing to try any new item added to a fast-food menu. Or any new candy bar, too. It’s a weakness I’ve since overcome, but it lurks just below the surface, beckoning me to try these new Overload bars… have you seen ‘em? They’re ridiculous. And I want ‘em.

Back to Boston.

Even though I was surrounded by fast food restaurants, and the memorable Au Bon Pain, with their lovely turkey and cheese melts, I found my wallet asking if I couldn’t ease the burden just a little bit.

The school was located near three big hotels a few blocks away: The Sheraton, the Hilton, and the Marriott. When I was littler, my father used to travel with us, and we’d always stay in a nice hotel. And as any kid in a hotel knows, there’s nothing more decadent than Room Service. Room Service not only has the lazy quality of picking up the phone and having it BROUGHT TO YOU (wow!), but also mixes in the forbidden luxury of EATING IN YOUR BEDROOM!! WHILE WATCHING TELEVISION!!

Plus, your food is served under metal covers, which make it almost like a birthday surprise when the hamburger, or fish, or soup, or whatever is finally revealed. Plus, you get those tiny little Heinz ketchup and mustard bottles, or sometimes little jars of jam. You get fancy dinner rolls, and flower-shaped pats of butter to spread on them… And besides all of this, when you’re done with your meal, there’s no dishes to do; you simply place the tray or cart in the hall, and wait for the hotel workers to take it away!!

In fact, if you ever check in to a hotel in the evening, you can often see the halls lined with the trays and carts, lined with half-eaten meals. It’s easy to walk right by them without paying much attention.

But there I am, 16 years old and on my own. I haven’t got a lot of money, but I’ve got a big hunger for food–and maybe even a little hunger for adventure.

Just for fun, I walk into the Marriott and take the elevator up to the 20th floor. It’s the middle of the day and no one is there, no one is in the halls, and to the side of an occasional doorway is a tray, complete with dishes, silverware, and a bread basket.

You already know where this is going.

There’s some mighty fine dinner rolls wrapped up in room service napkins and placed in bread baskets. Sometimes there’s even those wonderful crackers with seeds on them that make you think “These are the kinds of crackers I’ll eat when I own a mansion. I’ll have my butler feed them to me.”

And it’s surprising how few people actually touch their complimentary bread. They go straight for the main course and leave the bread to be thrown away afterwards. Which I think is ridiculous. And by way of protest, I take my fill of bread. (while no one is watching, of course) If there’s too much to fit in my mouth, or hands–that’s what pockets are for.

Of course, you can’t survive on bread alone. Which is why it’s nice that people who order hamburgers hardly ever eat all of their french fries. A lot of times, they don’t even finish their burgers–and with a quick wrist-flick of the knife and fork, the burger is mine.

In the mornings, people will eat their cereal and milk, but leave the apple, banana, and orange untouched.

That particular summer, Pizza Hut had begun to deliver its personal pan-style pizzas to the Marriott guests, and many times the guests would only eat two or three slices before deciding they were full. Score!

You might not be surprised that some people are appalled at this behavior. Some find it disgusting. Some people even suggest outrageous scenarios to make the whole thing seem dangerous: “What if they licked their food??” To which I can only reply, “Seriously: how many people have you ever seen lick their food?”

And you know what? Even if they had licked their food, it’s not like it’s a huge deal. Haven’t you ever shared a fork with a friend? To say nothing of whatever saliva exchange might be happening when you kiss someone. Do you wanna stop kissing people?

I’m not even ashamed to admit that I still go on the hunt when I’m out of town. It’s fun, like a game. Get into the elevator and go floor to floor, just peek around the corner to see if there are any stray carts or trays. If not, then back onto the elevator you go and head down one more story.

Of course, it works best when you’re quick and stealthy. There’s a certain delicateness to lifting up the metal covers so as not to make any noise at all–even more difficult when the good folks have left their used silverware on the plates beneath the lid. It’s practice that I’m sure would come in handy for pick-up-sticks, or jenga.

And there’s a limit to the types of food you can take. Food that can be eaten with your hands, while walking away are the best candidates. I never stand over a tray eating–it’s best to keep moving. So this keeps me from enjoying any number of soups, salads, or ice cream. I also won’t touch a half-eaten steak (which I don’t like anyway), or a chicken/pasta dinner (which I do), because it would require a fork and time that isn’t available.

Just about everything else is fair game.

I should check my calendar to see the next time I might be in a hotel out of town…. hm….

Note: The Food Rules are constant, unquestionable, and unimpeachable. As with any rules, The Food Rules may be broken–often to pleasurable sensations. But one must always acknowledge that The Food Rules exist and recognize them as true and fast.

#1
YOU DO NOT MIX SWEET AND SAVORY/Non-SWEET FOODS

Mixing sweet and savory has got to be the most egregious trespass of them all. Your taste buds become confused, and suddenly up is down, black is white, and your meal has changed from a tasteful delicacy to a whimsical farce.

* Example A: Pineapple on Pizza - Why would you do this in the first place? Pineapples don’t belong on pizza any more than motor oil belongs in a drinking glass. Besides the sweet tartness of the pineapple doing its best to make friends with the spiced harmony of tomato sauce, cheese, and oregano, the texture is all wrong. Pineapples have that ridgey, stringy, juicy thing going on, and if there’s ever been a food less suited to the doughy crunch and velvet sauce and cheese cushion of pizza, I’d be very much amazed.

* Example B: Apple + Swiss Cheese Sandwiches - This is so silly as to not even merit further discussion.

* Example C: Raisin Bagels - Seriously: you don’t put raisins in a bagel. Bagels have a fine tradition of being plain, or onion-covered, or smothered in sesame seeds, garlic, among other wonderfully salty, tasty accessories. Raisins stand as a mockery of bagel history. Not only that, but raisins are a gateway fruit. Having migrated from raisin bread (well on its way to rule breakage of its own), the raisin found its way into the bagel and once firmly planted there, decided to invite its whole raucous family: cinnamon, cranberries, strawberries, and blueberries. There is no reason for this kind of nonsense. Ira Glass noted that “In this country, as time moves forward, all food approaches a muffin.” This is a sad time for bagels, and I hate to think where the trend is heading.

* Example D: Strawberry Cream Cheese - This is where the trend lands next. Strawberries couldn’t leave well enough alone, being sliced up and set on top of our breakfast cereals. It had to march into our cream cheese, formerly the occasional home of the chive if anything at all. But no, no, no–along comes the strawberries, and then the blueberries again; do these guys go ANYWHERE alone??? If I walk into my local bagel shop and ask for a bagel with cream cheese, I’m likely to be asked what kind. “What kind of cream cheese?” is a question that shouldn’t even be conceptually possible. There should just be Cream Cheese, and that’s that. And that would be that, if it weren’t for those meddling fruits.

More food rules to come. Stay tuned.