Foodies, Part 1

The New York Times Magazine was devoted to food this week. I admit it; I'm an information age Luddite and I look forward to my daily newspaper. I find that reading it in its non-digitized form means that I spend more time reflecting on what I've read. And the headlines catch my attention in a way they don't when I'm reading online. I like paper; I've come to terms with this.

What I found intriguing about the Magazine this week was that it hit upon some things that have been bothering me lately. In particular, the way we've come to think about food.

Allow me to preface what comes next by admitting that the whole "foodie" movement smacks of an elitism that annoys me. This annoyance has many roots--memory, expectation, an innate disdain for most forms of snobbism. I'm no kind of social scientist, but what occurs to me as I'm considering this idea of snobbism is that unlike the $8million apartment in Manhattan, foodie-ness is potentially classless. With CSAs sprouting up not only here in farm country, but also in places like Detroit (where there are no major supermarket chains), there is the potential for all of us, no matter what our social status, to rethink how we think about food.

I adore the Food Network, I do. I love watching chefs compete on Chopped or The Next Food Network Star; I giggle when watching Guy Fieri barge into a Drive-In, Diner or Dive, and I steal ideas from Rachael Ray (but never Paula Deen who's Southern treacle makes me grind my teeth. I know Southern cooks. They make PD look like a mess cook. Confession: I have PD kitchen knives, but only because I needed a set of knives for the apartment last year and they were on clearance for $20 at a place I will not name).

But as much as I adore Food Network, I also watch it with a sense of real guilt. I suppose that's why they call it a guilty pleasure. My guilt comes from watching people desperate for stardom, or cash, or notoriety furiously plying their trades in hopes of impressing a food snob for whom, oftentimes, failure to garnish is a criminal act. The real criminality, of course, is the waste that is a result of our intrepid wanna-bes' attempts to serve only the best and in this attempt carve the four choicest bits out of the meat and leave the rest behind. (Perhaps the crew is allowed to feast on the scraps. I don't know--it wouldn't make for good television.)

I'm not planning to turn this into another foodie blog. Honest. But I'm fascinated by, and at times a willing participant in, our growing elitism about what we consume. What intrigues me more, and the heart of my thinking that was later explored by the NYT Magazine, is the idea of community. I'm also coming to understand that living in farm country brings, almost by default, changes in the ways that I think about food.

Since I've clearly opted to go down this cursed path, the least I can do is set out with a plan. I'm allowing myself a total of four entries on the subject, including this one. The remaining entries will cover (in no particular order): community; memory; cooking. Chances are good that no new territory will be covered. Still, sometimes the compulsion demands following. See you at the Farmer's Market.