Process Writing

The process I went through when drafting and re-drafting the three major assignments this quarter varied from piece to piece.  The hardest piece for me to write was probably The Perfect Meal as the assignment in itself caused me a good deal of anxiety.  As I have very little cooking experience, a college student's budget, and almost no cooking resources to speak of on the K campus, the responsibility of cooking a perfect meal overwhelmed me.  Deciding on a menu that accurately represented some of my favorite foods (I actually felt like I was cheating on gyoza and tortilla de patata when I didn’t include them in the menu!), while simultaneously being conscientious of the film Food Inc. and the book The Omnivore's Dilemma was incredibly difficult.  I had trouble deciding the most basic things, like what kind of food to cook or whether or not I should go home to prepare the meal.  Pair that with trying to live up to Michael Pollan or Anthony Bourdain’s expectations of a perfect meal, and you have one stressed out foodie.

After cooking the meal, the writing, too, was stressful.  Due to poor planning on my part, I opted to write my rough draft the morning before making the five-hour drive back to Kalamazoo.  Though I anticipated on having a leisurely coffee and computer morning, I had forgotten to factor in finishing my Graphic Novel midterm, reading for Anthropology, and doing laundry.  Needless to say the allotted time for my Perfect Meal rough draft dwindled away leaving me only a solid couple hours to pump out a semi-respectable draft.

However, the upshot to a mediocre rough draft is that it allows significant room for improvement.  The in-class workshop helped me define what specific elements were still lacking.  For example, I realized that I had not acknowledged my brother’s existence in the piece, giving the illusion that I was an only child.  Other helpful criticisms included taking out the part about the wine tasting, avoiding chronological order, and including more details about the relationship with my mom and what it meant to cook with her.  However, the downside to the workshop was that going into it, I knew I was pretty much going to re-write the whole thing.  As a lot of my peer's critiques were about things I had already planned on scrapping, some of the comments didn't really have much impact.  After work-shopping my piece, I ended up tearing it apart and attempted to build it back up.  Though I only ended up keeping a few of my original sentences and ideas, I think that in this case, writing a horrible rough draft led me to the polished final product I have today.  I really like how it ended up, and had I written a better first draft, I’m not sure it would have turned out the same way.

Overall, writing The Perfect Meal, and all the pieces for the Food and Travel Seminar, significantly improve my writing.  I now understand more accurately what it means to show, don’t tell by avoiding over-used or hyperbolized adjectives.  Instead of saying the meal was divine and delectable, I need to show that through description and let the reader come to his or her own conclusion.  By showing the reader how it is, instead of telling them I can create a voice of authority as the reader learns to trust me. 

Other specifics I learned this quarter include avoiding loaded words such “authentic,” “real,” “exotic,” and “unique.”  Before taking this class I didn’t realize the implications (or lack thereof) of using these words.  However, I now know that words like “authentic” tread into dangerous territory and essentially raise more questions than they answer.  Authentic to whom?  What makes it authentic?  Who are you to say it’s authentic??

Finally, the last thing I learned about my writing this quarter is the importance of a central theme in a piece.  When I was writing my memoir piece (Our Sevilla) it took me a long time to figure out what the piece was actually about.  In my rough drafts I tended to start in one place and end up in a totally different place.  I can now see that having a strong theme woven throughout the piece not only makes it easier and more enjoyable to read, but give readers a solid idea to take away from the piece. 

The Food and Travel seminar had given me a great base to start seriously writing about food and travel.  When I go abroad next year, I will be able to articulate my thoughts and experiences in an educated and engaging manner, drawing on this class for context.

Thanks for a great quarter, Marin!  What a wonderful class!!

Review: Taverna Ouzo (final draft)

Taverna Ouzo 

Intended publication: The Index

FOR THOSE of us college kids looking to kick back on a Saturday night and order a drink, or maybe an appetizer or two, before making the rounds to the off-campus parties, Taverna Ouzo is the place to go.   

With its mahogany colored banquettes and high-top tables, its low lighting and multi-mirrored walls, and its jazzy, funky soundtrack that keeps the toes a-tappin', Taverna Ouzo is East Michigan Avenue's hidden hotspot, located just a five-minute drive or twenty-minute walk from campus.

Owners William and Katherine Adams opened their restaurant in 2002 in hopes of creating a place where guests could relax, unwind from the week, and experience homemade European/Greek food without leaving Kalamazoo.

But while they have made good with providing a pleasant, comfortable atmosphere to squander away the 7-9 p.m. humdrum of a Saturday night, the Adams' family has yet to make their food anything of consequence.

To start a meal, the best available option is probably the saganaki, a skillet of lightly breaded Kasseri cheese drenched in brandy and flambéed tableside, then extinguished with a good dose of lime juice and a hearty Opa! from the nearby wait staff.  Served with toasted Sarkozy's Bakery French bread or baked pita chips, this light, creamy, crispy, $6.75 combination is a good appetite whetter.   

But the entrées following this palate-pleasing first course are comparable to the second half of a Nicholas Cage movie: bland, one-dimensional, and a good excuse to order another drink.

The mousaka, layers of baked eggplant, potato, and ground beef topped with a Parmesan béchamel sauce, lack flavor and texture.  The beef, desperately needing a hit of salt and pepper, grossly out-proportions the number of veggies creating a dish so dense and heavy, that it is actually laborious to eat.  The béchamel, usually a reliable source of sodium and cream, is used so sparingly that it detracts from the dish rather than working to offset the overbearingly meaty entrée.  

Though beautifully presented—the mousaka is arranged carefully in a white ceramic au gratin dish and baked until golden brown, then garnished with slices of toasted pita—the novelty unfortunately wears off after the first bite.

The dining room, however, is pretty and inviting.  With exposed hardwood floors, original brick walls, and ornate high ceilings, it exudes a 1920’s big-city feeling with a modern twist.  Though the eye naturally wanders to the gorgeous cocoa-colored bar, hand carved by local wood-working artist Rock Bartley, the tiffany-style glass lamp, oil paintings, and twinkling Christmas lights also work well to create a relaxed, urban atmosphere reminiscent of Chicago’s Lincoln Park.

Yet the food quality and prices need work.    

The fifteen-dollar shrimp ouzo, sautéed in a light marinara sauce served over a bed of orzo pasta and finished with a warm a blend of feta and mozzarella cheese is as impressive as a Sunday night dinner with Sodexo.  Severely lacking in flavor and creativity, customers are better off ordering from the Coney Island hotdog stand next door and having the dogs delivered tableside, as the food quality and prices are more reasonably balanced.  (The Adams’ family owns both Coney Island and Taverna Ouzo allowing customers to order from either menu.)

The clientele, however, seems unconcerned by the mediocrity of the food.

The 12 different specialty beers on tap, in addition to the other 28 bottled varieties, allows the thirsty customer optimal choice when deciding on how to wash down this semi-satisfactory meal.  Beer not your thing?  Taverna Ouzo is also home to a wide selection of homemade martinis (26 distinct flavors!) as well as an extensive wine list hailing varieties from around the world.  

Too busy sipping on drinks and licking their grease-stained fingers before reaching for another handful of thick, Greek-style fries, no one is paying much attention to dinner. 

With the 50+ inch flat screen TV, catchy music, and the prime hours for Saturday night shenanigans drawing near, everyone—from the semi-raucous frat boys to the couple celebrating a 70th birthday— seems to be having a good time.   

The wait staff included. 

Dressed in all black, the waiters rush from table to table joking casually with one another, throwing in a good Opa! when someone breaks a glass or sets an appetizer ablaze.  Together in the family business, brothers Frank, Steve, and Michael Adams take control of both the floor and the bar, letting their sense of humor and dedication to family shine through in their work.  

Though very knowledgeable about the menu, and eager to make a recommendation or two, their anticipation of the customer's needs is sub par especially when the floor gets busy (A young woman had to ask twice for a glass of wine, and other customers were observed waiting 20-25 minutes to get their dessert).        

The dessert, however, is worth the wait.  A specialty of the house, the homemade baklava is like a gift from the Greek gods themselves.  Layer upon layer of flakey, golden brown phyllo dough, smothered in honey and chopped walnuts it is enough to appease anyone’s sweet tooth.  At $3.95 a slice, it's one of the more reasonably priced items on the menu.

Though Taverna Ouzo is not a restaurant for fine cuisine and service, it is a place for folks to kick back, relax, and kill a couple of hours.  The perfect pre- or post-dinner stop, one can avoid the menu and still have a good time.  Besides, it’s a great place to come for a Coney dog.  

Taverna Ouzo: Part 3

Now that I have visited Taverna Ouzo, written a review about the experience, and received feedback in workshop, I see my pre-writing (titled Taverna Ouzo: The Anticipation) in a new light.

Specifically, I now have mixed feelings about my expectations regarding the quality and origin of food, as well as the environment and ambiance.  First and foremost, after re-reading many of the online reviews I had looked at pre-visit, I now feel I relied too heavily on the words of potentially inexperienced, unsavvy, and only semi-food conscious "critics."  Instead of accurately portraying the overall food quality at Taverna Ouzo, many of the reviewers just focused on one or two things to rave about and didn't actually provide much of a substantive argument. (You can check out a few of the reviews I read here, here, and here.)  Due to the generally stellar reviews, I feel that I had high expectations for the quality of the food that were sadly not fulfilled.  

Aside from the caliber of the food, my expectations for finding out the origin of the dishes was also a bit unrealistic.  Although I was able to ask the waiter specific questions about a few dishes, I thought it a bit over-kill to ask him a millions questions such as if the cheese in my mousaka was grass-fed, if the ground beef was 100% organic, or if the potatoes were locally grown.  Instead, I ended up asking him about a couple of things, but then turned to perusing my menu for further clues regarding the origin of certain foods.  However, my pre-writing makes it seem that figuring out the origin of the food is one of my top priorities for my visit to Taverna Ouzo, and unfortunately I was unable to deliver many nominal results. 

I think I was right, however, in not crafting my expectations of the food (and the environment) around the idea of "authenticity."  Because I did not go into Taverna Ouzo looking for "the perfect Greek meal" or "the authentic Greek experience of Kalamazoo," I dutifully avoided the controversial discussion of what is truly "authentic" and to whom.  After reading the article Culinary Tourism I believe that this was the best tactic.  Had I had the resources to make a strong, educated argument about "authenticity" as whole, or specifically what Greek authenticity means to me, I perhaps could have taken another route with this concept in my review.  As it was, however, I thought that avoiding the subject altogether was a better choice due to the obvious limitations.

As far as my expectations about the environment and ambiance of the restaurant, I think they were more or less on track.  Since I had never been to this restaurant before and simply did not know what to expect, it was hard to formulate any pre-conceived notions about the environment.  However, I think that it was important to go into the entire experience thinking about it from the lens of a college student.  (Since I am a college student, this wasn't too much of a challenge!)  Before going to the restaurant I made a list of all the things I thought a college student would want to know about the ambiance or environment, then made sure to observe those things when I went.  Some of the items on my list included lighting, sound level, music soundtrack, and clientele.

Overall, I am pretty happy with the expectations I set up before visiting Taverna Ouzo last weekend.  I think the most important thing about my anticipations was that I tried not to have too many concrete expectations.  As I have done a significant amount of traveling in my life, I've come to realize that when I plan things out or over-think things, I often am left feeling disappointed or uncomfortable when things don't go according to plan.  The best approach, in my opinion, is to have some basic level of expectation (such as this restaurant is fancy, I can at reasonably expect a little better food quality), but then after that just go with the flow.  While I think this approach worked well for my visit to Taverna Ouzo, I think it is also a good philosophy to keep in mind next year when I go on study abroad to Ecuador and for any future traveling I may choose to do.                      

Review: Taverna Ouzo (first draft)

Taverna Ouzo
Intended publication: The Index
FOR THOSE of us college kids looking to kick back on a Saturday night and order a drink, or maybe an appetizer or two, before making the rounds to the off-campus parties, Taverna Ouzo is the place to go.   
With its mahogany colored banquettes and high-top tables, its low lighting and multi-mirrored walls, and its jazzy, funky soundtrack that keeps the toes a-tappin', Taverna Ouzo is East Michigan Avenue's hidden hotspot, located just a five minute drive from campus.
Owners William and Katherine Adams opened their restaurant in 2002 in hopes of creating a place where guests could hang their hats, unwind from the week, and experience homemade European/Greek food without leaving Kalamazoo.
But while they have made good with providing a pleasant, comfortable atmosphere to squander away the 7-9 p.m. humdrum of a Saturday night, the Adams' family has yet to make their food anything of consequence.
To start a meal, the best available option is probably the saganaki, a skillet of lightly breaded Kasseri cheese drenched in brandy and flambéed table side, then extinguished with a good dose of lime juice and a hearty Opa! from the nearby wait staff.  Served with toasted Sarkozy's Bakery French bread or baked pita chips, this light, creamy, crispy combination is a good appetite whetter.  
But don't be fooled.
The entrées following this palate-pleasing first course are comparable to the second half of a Nicholas Cage movie: bland, one-dimensional, and a good excuse to order another drink.
The mousaka, layers of baked eggplant, potato, and ground beef topped with a parmesan béchamel sauce, lacked flavor and texture.  The beef, desperately needing a hit of salt and pepper, grossly out-proportioned the number of veggies creating a dish so dense and heavy, that it was actually laborious to eat.  The béchamel, usually a reliable source of sodium and cream, was used so sparingly that it detracted from the dish rather than working to offset the overbearingly meaty entrée.  Though beautifully presented --the mousaka was arranged carefully in a white ceramic au gratin dish and baked until golden brown, then garnished with slices of toasted pita-- the novelty unfortunately wore off after the first bite.
The fifteen-dollar shrimp ouzo followed in suit.  Shrimp sautéed in a light marinara sauce served over a bed of orzo pasta and finished with a warm blend of feta and mozzarella cheese was as impressive as a Sunday night dinner with Sodexo.  Severely lacking in flavor and creativity, customers are better off hitting up the Coney Island hotdog stand next door, where the food quality and prices are more reasonably balanced.
The clientele, however, seemed unconcerned by the mediocrity of the food.  
Too busy sipping on drinks and licking their grease-stained fingers before reaching for another handful of thick, Greek-style fries, no one was paying much attention to dinner.  With a 50+ inch flat screen TV, catchy music, and the prime hours for Saturday night shenanigans drawing near, everyone seemed to be having a good time, the wait staff included.
Dressed in all black, the waiters rush from table to table joking casually with one another, throwing in a good Opa! when someone breaks a glass or sets an appetizer ablaze.  Together in the family business, brothers Frank, Steve, and Michael Adams take control of both the floor and the bar, letting their sense of humor and dedication to family shine through in their work.  
Though very knowledgeable about the menu, and eager to make a recommendation or two, their anticipation of the customer's needs seems to fall flat especially when the floor gets busy (A young woman had to ask twice for a glass of wine, and other customers were observed waiting 20-25 minutes to get their dessert).        
The dessert, however, is one item worth waiting for.  A specialty of the house, the homemade baklava is like a gift from the Greek gods themselves.  Layer upon layer of flakey, golden brown phyllo dough, smothered in honey and chopped walnuts is enough to send any sugar-addict into a frenzy.  And at $3.95 a slice, it's one of the more reasonably priced items on the menu.
Though Taverna Ouzo is not a restaurant for fine cuisine and service, it is a place for folks to kick back, relax, and hang their hats.  The perfect pre- or post-dinner stop, one can avoid the menu and still have a good time.  Besides, there's always the hotdog stand to hit up on the way out.   

Taverna Ouzo: The Anticipation

My experience with Greek food extends about as far as my 7th grade end-of-the-year toga party, to which my classmates and teachers brought a variety of "Greek" dishes to share in pot-luck-style fashion.  While one adventuresome student brought in an American rendition of grape leaves, the majority of the other dishes consisted primarily of spinach and feta pastries, olives, and baklava.  To my 13-year-old palate, the food I tasted that day seemed delicious and "authentic."  However, after reading Lucy M. Long's article "Culinary Tourism," I now realize how loaded the concept of "authenticity" really is.  Though I hope to expand my knowledge of Greek cuisine and try a variety of new dishes tonight when I visit Taverna Ouzo, Kalamazoo's Mediterranean/Greek tavern, I will not be looking for "authenticity," rather a dining experience welcoming to a college-student crowd and a tasty meal.  
Completely unaware of its existence until this morning, my online research has told me that Taverna Ouzo is one of Kalamazoo's better Greek dining establishments.  According to a variety of online reviews (by bloggers, foodies, and the common eater) Taverna Ouzo provides a mix of Mediterranean and European-style dishes during the week, and on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights serves up a variety of Greek specialties including mousaka, gyros, and a variety of shrimp, steak, and chicken entrees cooked in their signature Ouzo sauce.   
As my knowledge of Greek food is limited, I am hoping to use this opportunity tonight to partake in the kind of "border-crossing" noted in article "Culinary Tourism."  Though I am not actually going to Greece, in a way, I am wearing the hat of a tourist as I look to appease my curiosity and ignorance about another culture.  Tonight I will consider myself a experiential or even recreational tourist, looking only to "participate in the foodways of another" while avoiding the rigid and controversial objective of authenticity (Long, 21). 
To do so, I plan on focusing on a variety of things during the meal.  First, because I have very little pre-existing knowledge about Greek food, I will have to rely on my personal assessment of the taste and texture of the food.  To get the most out of my meal, I plan to focus on the flavors of the food by eating slowly, trying a variety of menu items, and perhaps even taking a leaf out of Hannah's book and taking a few bites with my eyes closed. 
Apart from the eating of the food, I hope to find out more about where the food comes from. On the Taverna Ouzo website, it claims the food is prepared with finest and (when possible) local ingredients.  After reading Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma, however, I feel it is only fitting to ask the questions, Where exactly the salmon in the smoked salmon sandwich is from?  And, how exactly did the spinach in my spanikopita get to my plate?
Finally, I plan to focus on the atmosphere and logistics.  As I am a college student writing this review for other college students (my intended publication is The Index) I am essentially looking to decide whether this place is worth a college kid's time and money.  If the clientele is mostly 55+, or the bill comes to more than 25 bucks a person, then ideally, this may be a restaurant to visit when mom and dad are in town.  
While I have illustrated some of my expectations and hopes for my visit to Taverna Ouzo, I have learned through experience that a good tourist shouldn't have too many expectations when meandering into the unknown.  The most important thing about tonight, I think, will be to keep an open mind as I look for a tasty, different, and potentially "Greek" dining experience.    

Final Draft: The Perfect Meal

The onions hit the pan with a satisfying sizzle, flecking my kitchen counter top with pin-sized medallions of smooth olive oil, as I stood over the stove with my mom getting a lesson in what it means to make onions “sweat.”

“You’re going to want to stir them occasionally,” my mom said.  “Until they turn translucent.  They’re going to start caramelizing and will be super yummy over burgers,” she said.

I nodded, setting up camp in front of the stove.  Every now and then I gave the onions a good stir (only slopping a few over the sides of the pan), while munching happily away on the walnuts toasting on the nearby burner, and only half listening as my mom began explaining the difference between mincing and mashing garlic.

The two of us were cooking The Perfect Meal, an assignment for my Food and Travel Writing class.  Jumping at the chance for a much-needed break from “K,” I had made the five-hour drive from Kalamazoo, Michigan, to my hometown of Wooster, Ohio.  Although being home would be a treat in itself, I also knew that home would provide the resources (and help!) that I needed to make this meal a success. 

I had spent the drive home mulling over the different food items that could possibly make up my Perfect Meal menu.  At first I wanted to make gyoza, a type of Japanese dumpling that my older brother and I grew up on.  But Brennen is thousands of miles away working in China, and gyoza wrappers are incredibly time consuming and difficult to make from scratch, so I nixed that plan before hitting I-69.  Next I thought about making a variety of Spanish tapas.  I could make tortilla de patata and cold gazpacho soup.  But finding all the ingredients to make the dishes taste like my Spanish host mom’s could potentially be tricky.  Instead I decided on doing a spin-off of the traditional American meal: cheeseburgers and french fries.  After reading Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma and watching the film Food Inc., I realized how unhealthy and unsustainable the burger and fry industry could be.  I wanted to try my hand at making a similar meal, but entirely from fresh, local foods, either from farmers or stores committed to practicing sustainability.  It was going to be the conventional American meal, made unconventionally, I decided.

“Are you stirring those onions?” my mom asked me as she plopped neatly cut pieces of sweet potato into a bowl of salt water.  Jumping into action I put down my fistful of warm walnuts, and began stirring the onions vigorously.  They hissed loudly, as if angry to have been forgotten.  My mom gave me the same look she used to give me as a kid: I had been caught with my hand in the cookie jar.

This was not the first time my mom and I worked in the kitchen together.  From a young age I had showed an interest in baking, though my repertoire consisted mostly of variations of chocolate chip cookies and the occasional box of brownie mix.  However, my problem with cooking is I never really could find the patience to finish the task.  By the time my first batch of cookies would emerge moist and golden from the oven, for example, I would have eaten my fill of raw cookie dough and lost interest in the entire project. Abandoning the flour-covered counters and piles of dirty dishes I would run off to play, leaving a trail of cookie crumbs in my wake.  I think my mom was sensing a similar conclusion from me now, as I was too busy munching away on various parts of our dinner before we had even finished preparing it.

Just then my dad walked into the kitchen, rubbing his hands together in anticipation. 

“What’s for dinner?” he asked peering into our various pots and pans.

What’s for dinner seems like such a simple question.  And two months ago I probably could have given a very simple answer.  After reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma, however, I’ve come to realize that, in fact, it is a very complicated question.  Luckily, I had prepared for this question and had come up with a response that I think even Pollan would be proud of. 

“Classic hamburgers made with 100% grass fed beef,” I told him. 

“They’re topped with grass-fed baby Swiss cheese, sautéed oyster mushrooms, and caramelized onions, all on fresh baked pretzel rolls.  Accompanying the entrée is sea salt sweet potato fries, a field greens salad with cherry tomatoes, toasted walnuts, and a homemade lemon and olive oil dressing, and, if you’ll be so kind to run out to the garage, an ice cold Great Lakes Brewing Company lager.”

“Sounds like you went to Local Roots,” my dad said opening the garage door. 
It was true.  That very morning my mom and I had made a trip to Local Roots, a market committed to ensuring direct producer to consumer contact, sustainable farming methods, and fresh, organic produce.  A regular customer, it was no surprise that my mom knew just where to find the various ingredients we’d need for the meal.  After deciding upon a pound of grass fed ground beef, a quarter pound of grass fed baby Swiss cheese, and a large assortment of beautiful, soft, white, grey, and yellow oyster mushrooms, we made our way to the veggie booth in hopes of finding some yummy looking greens.  When we arrived, however, we were met by a lonely sign:

No Greens This Week, it read. Things are growing slowly in the cold and needed time to recoup… sorry for the inconvenience!

I sighed.

This would require Plan B.

After checking out at Local Roots and swinging by The Bake Haus, a local bakery that supplied us with freshly made pretzel rolls, we headed to downtown Buehler’s, one of the eight Buehler’s stores in the area.  Formerly a local one-branch grocery store, Buehler’s has since gone on to open stores in numerous neighboring counties and now considers itself corporate.  However, it was Wooster where Buehler's began, where the Buehler kids went to school, and where "Buehler Hill" is located, a plot of land on which the entire Buehler family seems to live.  Even though Buehler’s has now expanded and is a supplier of industrial foods, it still promotes local products and sustainability whenever possible.  And it was there where my mom and I bought four large sweet potatoes, onions, lemons, cherry tomatoes, and regrettably, a pre-packaged field greens salad mix. Our last stop was at uptown Buehler’s to get a six-pack of Great Lakes, the local brewery of Cleveland.

Cracking a beer, my dad began to set the table for three as my mom and I put the final touches on our meal. 

Pulling the burgers out from the oven, I slid them (somewhat) gracefully onto the warm rolls, arranging them carefully on a plate.  They looked kind of beautiful there, I decided.  The cheese, though still gooey in the middle, had melted completely on the outside and sent milk white waterfalls cascading down the sides of the burger before coming to rest in the toasted crevices of the pretzel roll.

“Alaina! Fries!”  my mom’s voice snapped me back as I saw steam pouring from the oven.  I whipped open the over door, pulling out the scalding trey of sweet potato fries which, with the exception of a few blackened, crispy causalities, looked perfectly done in my eyes. 

I placed the fries on a plate while my mom tossed the salad, and in no time it looked like we were ready to eat. 

Sitting down at the table with my mom and dad, I was both nervous and excited to see how the meal I prepared had actually turned out.  Though a sophomore in college, I felt almost like a little kid again waiting eagerly for their approval and praise as they took their first bites. 

“Mmm delicious,” my dad said.  “This is really good,” agreed my mom. 

I exhaled, and got ready to try the burgers myself. 

The first bite of the burger was… difficult.  The pretzel roll was so thick and the meat patty so large that it was honestly pretty hard to get my mouth around.  I think I even ended up cutting the roof of my mouth on the hard, salted crust of bread before I finally got a good solid bite.  But when I did, it was delicious.

The meat was flavorful and moist, sending rivers of red juice down my chin, smattering the sweet potato fries below on my plate.  The fries themselves were sweet and crisp, and balanced the acidity of the lemony salad and bitter swigs of beer. 

As the three of us tucked into our dinner, silence fell over the table, which in my family only means one thing: we were all too busy eating to talk. 

It was nice cooking this meal, I decided.  I felt a sense of accomplishment now that I was sitting here eating the fruits of my labor.  Successfully cooking a healthy, sustainable, and delicious meal from start to finish was an achievement in my book, and perhaps, had even proven to my parents that I could make a meal (mostly) on my own.     

By the time we had had our fill, night had fallen, and the conversation turned to my departure in the morning.  I’d be making the drive back to school tomorrow, back to the stress, the bland cafeteria food, and the lake-effect snow. 

But for now I was home and the three of us were together. I had made a successful meal, and for me that was enough. 

I barely even noticed that there were clean plates all around.

Good Eats: Sam Sifton and the New York Times

Ah, if only all of us could have a To Do list like Sam Sifton.  Wouldn't that be the life?  To eat, to drink, and to get paid.

Far more manageable to read and absorb than the excerpts we read from Secret Ingredients: The New Yorker Book of Food and Drink, Sifton's work as the New York Times chief food critic made me realize how physically and mentally exhausting the life of an acclaimed foodie can truly be (eating out 6 - 7 days a week is just the start!).  However, my pity for him does not stretch far, as his life seems borderline idyllic.

About to embark on my own trip to New York City over spring break, I have to say I really enjoyed reading all of Sifton's critiques, reviews, and raves of good eats in the Big Apple.  Sifton's use of description and imagery such as in his review of restaurant Ai Fiori practically transported me to the simple farmhouse tables to enjoy the salad of blue crab and grapefruit, avocado, tarragon and crisp flatbread, and lobster velouté with shaved chestnut and black truffles, or the plate of wine-glazed ravioli stuffed with ricotta and mascarpone, with truffle-infused boschetto cheese; and braised veal agnolotti with a brush of butternut squash and sugo with the critic himself.  

Apart from his wonderful, mouth-watering descriptions, I was glad to see the balance of pros and cons in so many of Sifton's pieces.  The fact that he could come right out and say that the red shrimp from Bar Basque was bland and uninteresting or that the New York strip steak lacked crust, made him, in my eyes, a more credible narrator, and an ordinary guy in search of a good meal just like the rest of us.

I also really enjoyed reading the piece titled My Life in Food, where Sifton gave readers a play by play of every single calorie he consumed and burned over a one week period.  Although in numerous other articles Sifton claims that even though he eats for a living, that with the proper amount of exercise and the occasional day off, he's in the best shape of his life.  After looking at everything that Sifton actually consumes and comparing that to his 3-4 times a week workout routine, I found myself asking "Really, Sam Sifton?  Are you really in the best shape of your life? It just seems highly unlikely that a guy who eats and drinks his way through one New York restaurant after another has no major health problems, or won't in the future.  What about cholesterol?  What about high blood pressure?  What's the average life expectancy of a food critic anyway??

The last element that I found particularly entertaining in regards to Mr. Sifton's articles was his witty remarks about going in disguise.  From wearing fake mustaches to having his very own children address him by a different name, I thought it was amusing and endearing how Sifton approached the task of anonymity.  Although I know the task of a reviewer is to appear like the average customer, I can't help thinking that there would be some fun in letting a restaurant know a reviewer is in the house.  Would I get points off on next week's review assignment if I did that?