Real Food

“But what do you eat?” a new acquaintance asks, perplexed to learn I never order fast food or buy processed convenience fare.

I try to explain that the list of what I eat is very long since it includes virtually all consumables in the natural world, but she remains unconvinced.

What have we North Americans come to when those among us who refuse to eat manufactured or non-food foods are considered strange or unusual? What does it tell us that “non-food food” is an actual food industry term applied to artificial concoctions like whipped topping or processed cheese food and that millions eat these fabrications?

Europeans who visit this continent are appalled by the dismal quality of what most of us accept as food. "Have Americans no taste buds?" they wonder. And, indeed, excessive sweetness, unrelenting saltiness and heavy oiliness can actually dull the sense of taste so that only sweet, salty grease satisfies the palate.

The sad thing about this, aside from the well documented health consequences, is that food is such an ubiquitous joy. And it doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive. Sure I can spent days creating a complex and delicious cassoulet, and there are times I want to do this. But I’ve also had a simple bowl of pinto beans from a tiny Mexican restaurant called Mia’s that I still dream about years later. And the summer I was fourteen I stood on a street in Manhattan and bit into what was surely the most perfect peach in the world. Sweet and tangy, it was so exquisite that the memory of the gaudy fruit stand, the hot pavement under my sandals, the raucous clamor of the traffic are forever affixed in my mind by the radiant taste of that peach.

Good food is a primal joy of life. I shudder to think of being deprived of it.

But how do we avoid being seduced by the illusion of convenience? Food preparation (or non-preparation) habits form and harden and make real food seem beyond reach. Let’s encourage one another—share not only recipes but tricks and ideas for welcoming real food, glorious food, into our lives.