Sandwich Semantics W10

What makes a sandwich? The Earl of Sandwich, for whom the food is named, first made a sandwich with two pieces of bread and filling to keep his hands clean while playing cards. This is the standard definition; it's the essence and Platonic form of the food.

Yet there seems to be debate surrounding the topic. A post from the blog Panini Happy questions whether such items as a hamburger, hot dog, quesadilla or crepe could be considered sandwiches. I would argue that this question could be clarified with a more nuanced consideration of the definition.

Sandwich has both etymological and cultural roots in England where John Montagu, the 4^th Earl of Sandwich, first ordered his meat served between two slices of bread. Here we must note that this was English bread, not flat-bread or tortilla, and the arrangement of fillings is stacked between their layers, which fits the definition of the verb to sandwich. Yet a much earlier incarnation of the dish from Medieval times used only one piece of bread: the open-faced sandwich. It is by this distinction that the sandwich transcends forms, and maybe here is the source of our present confusion.

So what is and is not a sandwich? It should follow that a hamburger is, in essence, a sandwich; it is simply meat and vegetables between two slices of bread. But what about the hot dog? Hot dog buns are long rolls sliced partially down the middle, and they don't look much like a sandwich. But in comparing this bun shape to other split-open sandwich buns like submarines and hoagies, it's clear they also fit the definition.

Quesadillas and other Mexican tortilla recipes fit the form of filling between bread, but tortillas themselves are a far cry from the soft, fat, squishy English bread and must therefore be excluded. Wraps are likewise excluded for the same reason. Crepes are made from folding toppings into thin pancakes of wheat flour, the farthest from our definition yet. (You wouldn't call an egg roll a sandwich, would you?)

There are other arguable foods: piroshki, felafel, gyro, etc, but these food items shouldn't be so disserviced by lumping them into the category of sandwich. Out of respect for their separate origins, I say let them have their own Platonic forms.

A Fine Food Memory W9

For this week's post, I've decided to share a memory of a meal, one I'd forgotten until only recently. This past weekend, my bandmates and I played a show in Columbus, and we decided to grab a bite at Buca di Beppo's, a massive restaurant adorned with colorful Italian memorabilia and photos. The restaurant was downtown in an alcove below street level, and the three of us were the only late afternoon diners in the whole place.

We ordered cheese manicotti and spicy calamari and stuffed ourselves with Italian loaves of bread with olive oil and red wine vinaigrette. Italian jazz played softly in the quiet restaurant, and we talked about our favorite restaurant experiences. The warm, secluded atmosphere of our booth reminded me of a memory from my early teens, when my whole dad's side of family came together to celebrate my grandfather's birthday at a wonderful old Italian restaurant in downtown Cleveland.

My family is not rich, but this was a special occasion, a time not to worry about money. It was a warm, mid-summer day and the men of the family wore their nicest suits and ties, the women did their hair and wore dresses and pearls. Everyone was talking and laughing excitedly as we drove into downtown Cleveland at sunset, the red sun was beautiful off the tall, glimmering buildings. The valet took our keys as we stepped out under the restaurant's gilded veranda and entered the soft, elegant glow of the foyer.

Inside the posh dining room, we had a long table to ourselves at the front of the restaurant with a view of the statues and classic architecture of Cleveland's old downtown structures. I was just 15 years old and delighted by the unassuming elegance of this place; around us were families large and small, couples young and old, their laughter and bantering intertwined with the lively jazz musicians playing in the next room. It felt like a movie, it was beautiful.

As night fell and the lights of the city glowed, we ate courses and courses of salad, calamari, eggplant and chicken parmesan, spaghetti and lasagna and a handful of other delicious dishes, exotic Italian things I haven't had since. We drank wine (only a few sips for me) and ate and laughed for hours, till the candlesticks on the table burned away and we were one of last of a few big family tables still there.

It was a wonderful, romantic experience as a teenager to be allowed in such a setting, to get a taste of the joy of fine dining, to dress up and stay out late and revel downtown, to be swept away in sights and sounds and tastes of the city. I wish now I remembered the name of the restaurant, but regardless, the food and the memories even now impress themselves upon me.

Haters Gonna Hate W8

B. R. Myers' “The Moral Crusade Against Foodies” attempts to argue that foodies are heinous gluttons, but he never explains himself more than sounding like a sour apple, tearing down popular food writers and chefs for simply lavishing upon strange foods. Myers' article is nonsensicle and bitter, and one gets the impression he's simply venting about the excesses of those he perceives as food elitists. Reading the comments on The Atlantic's web page shows readers also struggling to find the point of this diatribe; one says:

The point is simple. 1) Find a group of people with a large constituency, but not a majority one. 2) Create a straw man by painting the entire group with the worst characteristics of a few members of the group, even if you have to make them up. 3) Pen a screed in which you knock down the straw man. 4) Get page views. 5) Profit.

I'd have to agree. The semblance of an argument found in the essay is that appreciating your food more than what he deems 'normal' is gluttonous. He fails to support his own definition of either normal or gluttonous, and the article simply quotes 'gluttonous' passages from Michael Pollan, Anthony Bourdain and the Best Food Writing 2010. He argues that foodies are a subculture that get too much media attention, mainly from other foodie writers, that they hypocritically enjoy cruel animal dishes, that they eat too much, that they eat food too expensive and rare for mainstream eaters.

Well, they are foodies, aren't they? If they truly live for food, so be it; at least they know their life purpose. What's more, Myers' seems to be ignoring the basic fact of life, that food and eating is the one commonality between our human species. Therefore, there will naturally be those, our chefs and culinary explorers, that are in the business of trying all there is in the wide world to eat. After all, why close your mind to the customs of others, to enjoying the various ways our fellow humans serve their food? But his article seems to heap shame upon enjoying the practice too much, but how much this is he can't say.

OK, I concede with Myers that foie gras and ortolan are ethically dubious, and factory farms should have no place in the foodie diet. Yet most everyday foodies I know, the 'normal' ones that don't fly to France for cheese, take no part in foie gras and even reject the factory farmed meat Myers bemoans. He's making a big case against a small minority, and this cadre of foodies who have access to try such dishes are almost required to take part, if they truly live to cook and write about food.

Secrets in the Kitchen W7

Coca-Cola has a pretty good reason to keep their recipe secret; the international company has almost $50 billion dollars of assets all riding on their signature crisp soft drink.

But I don't believe you need to be a corporation to keep your recipes secret, and I completely understand the pride and sense of self that goes into crafting your own, perfect dish. If you took the time and effort to taste test, swap ingredients, fiddle with cooking times and ultimately perfect something, by all means, guard it like Fort Knox.

For me, it's hard enough to simply follow a recipe from a cookbook without burning something. Over the years, I've learned this is why there's such a tremendous pride that comes from cooking something delicious. I remember the first time I made scrambled eggs and hash browns as a kid, and even though they eggs were runny, it was a great meal because I was responsible for the process from start to finish.

I love to experiment in the kitchen, but my food research doesn't extend much farther than strange sandwich combinations. I feel at my current level of cooking comfort, I wouldn't know where to begin making something daring when there's so much pre-existing cuisine I have yet to try to make. One of my culinary goals is to cook through an Italian cookbook, and maybe the marathon ordeal will jar new combinations to try.

My family isn't big on secret recipes either, and the closest thing I can think of might be my Grandma's biscuits and gravy recipe. The homemade buttery biscuits are perfectly flaky on top with a warm, soft center, and the gravy is thick and creamy with a hint of some herb, I don't know which, that makes the whole breakfast pop. I'm sure she'd tell me if I asked, and maybe I should. Although hers was sausage gravy, I could experiment and adapt that same flavor into a vegetarian recipe. If it's any good, maybe I'll write it down and keep it a secret.

Food Injustice W6

"Food Inc." was a startling film. It was full of persuasive rhetoric and emotionally charged imagery, but for me, the most compelling aspect of the film was its ability to explain the difference between how we produced food a few decades ago compared to today. I consider this the most effective logos-driven technique used, as well as the most important thing to take away from the movie.

The first section of the movie criticizes the current cultivation techniques of farm animals that are only concerned with growing and stuffing them fatter and quicker. Anymore, animals are so far removed from their natural environment, the way thousands of cows are crowded on vast stretches of flat, lifeless land and chickens are packed into lightless hotboxes, they're treated more like meat machines than sentient beings. The fact that runaway capitalism has led us to this point, that animals are degraded to the basest level of commodity, is the reason I'm a vegetarian, and I found it to be an incredibly persuasive argument.

The second section of the movie examines how U.S. government subsidies to corn and soy have transformed the international food economy. Genetically modified corn derivatives are contained within the overwhelming majority of all processed food and animal feed, and they're not that healthy. Even worse, we've exported it to other countries and devastated local economies, forcing them into dependency on our dirt cheap corn. This argument was effective because it compares the natural way of agriculture of the past with the new, technocratic methods and explicitly demonstrates why they sacrifice environmental sustainability and nutrition for profit.

The third section of the movie deals with the legal and economic power of the country's biggest food industry corporations. They've been consolidating and building wealth, bullying local farmers into debt schemes and scaling back their rights in the name of intellectual property (Monsanto's terminator seeds). Americans are eating more and more of this unhealthy food because it's marketed to them, and the country is still trying to figure out why there is a a growing obesity problem.

All three of these main arguments within the movie are framed in such a way that we are able to see the disparity between ways of the past and ways of today, and big corporations are meticulously skirting the well being of humans and animals in exchange for bigger profits. This rhetorical technique leads me to believe that the information in this documentary is so current that not enough people have yet heard how the food industry has changed the way they eat.

Food Studies W5

As my own personal chef, I realized recently that my cooking has become a bit boring. I always cook eggs the same way (sunny side up), I use all the same tricks in my stir-fry (lots of garlic & Sriracha hot sauce) and my lunch sandwiches have become too predictable (grilled cheese, grilled everything). Most likely because I spend so much time thinking about food in this class, my personal standards are slowly shifting, and I'm putting my previous methodologies under review.

Last week, I decided to perfect my scrambled eggs. My old recipe called for cracking eggs in the pan, pouring in a bit of milk from the jug, forking it around and waiting for the eggs to solidify. I notoriously overcook things, and my old recipe's scrambled eggs were dense, sickly looking things.

I did a bit of research and found a much better recipe. Use one teaspoon milk for two eggs in a bowl, fork the mixture in a semi-circle for two minutes to fluff and aerate, pour in buttered pan on low heat, add seasoning, and, as the eggs cook, push the solidified eggs to the center to make room for the uncooked portions. The first morning, my heat was too high and I found myself with a flat disk of eggs. The second morning, while paying extreme close attention, the eggs were perfect: fluffy, soft, perfectly salted and peppered and fresh.

I've perfected one personal recipe, but my quest is just beginning. I decided to spice up my grilled cheese yesterday by frying a patty of tofu in oil and Sriracha (OK, I still have my stand-by ingredients) and layering it within the cheese. Delicious! My next project will be rosemary potatoes, perfectly seasoned, crispy and golden brown.

The Love and Lust of Fast Food W4

My fast food history is probably like many other middle-class suburban youth: if your parents weren't explicitly against fast food, chances are you ate a lot of it.

For my sister and I, the off-chance of Mom swinging into the McDonald's parking lot after getting picked up from day-care became the most exciting part of the day. This happened on especially long days when she was too tired and hungry to cook. The Golden Arches were a permanent fixture on the skyline since I can remember, and we were fascinated by the bright colors of the Happy Meal toys and the dining room, the strange beeping and commotion in the kitchen, and the delicious smell of salty french fries pulled out of hot oil. As a kid, visiting McDonald's was liberating. Their advertising catered directly to kids, our mother allowed us to make our own food choices, and if we had time, we'd scramble through the Play-place and ball pit after eating.

Even as children, we had no illusions that fast food was healthy, but thinking back, these reasons are probably why fast food has become such a popular option in America.

First, advertising to children is a surefire way to make parents spend money. If a kid knows they have both Chicken McNuggets and Power Ranger toys at a restaurant, they'll ask for it all the time. It's no mystery that despite having no income, children have massive buying power. American parents love to make their kids happy, especially if it's as cheap as a value meal.

Second, Americans love novelty, and fast food chains operate like gum-ball machines. The inside of a McDonald's kitchen looks nothing like the one in your home. It's filled with blinking lights, beeping timers, strange cubbies and compartments and futuristic grills and deep fryers. Although we've been taught this is not the way food should be prepared, it can't be taken for granted that ordering fast food is a minor miracle: a minute after the clerk punches your meal choice into the digital cash register, it's sitting on a tray in front of you, steaming and ready to eat. This is saying nothing of the joy of the drive-through. Not only is fast food delicious, it's engineered to be fun.

Third, fast food is the embodiment of convenience. Americans are obsessed with busyness and packing the most they can into their schedules. Whereas many European societies value personal enjoyment and leisure time, the American mentality follows that the more rushed and hurried you are, the more you're pulling your weight. Unfortunately, this isn't a choice one can opt in and out of; we had a single mother working long hours to support a lean budget. For us and those like us, fast food was often the only available choice when the kids are starving, you haven't had time to grocery shop, and there's nothing substantial in the fridge.

I've never been much farther than Canada, so I can't comment on fast food overseas. Yet here in America, McDonalds is one of our national traditions. Despite fast food's health drawbacks, it is rooted deep in our culture, and I think it's unlikely we'll soon rid ourselves of it.