The comfort of food.

We hear the term "comfort foods" thrown around all the time. There's an entire industry, even a style of restaurant cooking, devoted to comfort foods. In this age of dietary hyper-awareness, some foods are considered "off limits" from the scrutiny of the overactive, self-righteous health nuts that have tried to dominate the food landscape for decades, with only moderate success.

Please understand, I am an advocate of healthy eating, though I don't always practice what I preach. I am overweight and have nasty digestion issues. (which is something I'm dealing with as I write this.) But I believe in moderation is the key to nearly all things that are good in life and eating the freshest, most nutritious food available is part of that.

With that being said, there are certain foods and dishes in this world that will make me extraordinarily happy when set before my gaping, hungry maw. Most people think of comfort foods as pure nostalgia, something that mom or grandma used to make back when you were but a wee lad or lass that you loved, and perhaps still do. For me, that's only a part of it. I think of comfort foods as belonging to one of three categories:

Nostalgic- stuff that mom and grandma made way back when. My mom was young when she had me, so she wasn't a great cook in the beginning, (she's an AMAZING cook now!) My comfort foods in this category are things like mac n cheese with tuna, buttered extra wide egg noodles with cottage cheese, and vanilla wafer banana pudding. We weren't completely poor, but we were definitely lower middle class. Money was tight and sometimes mom had to make due with what she could afford. Pasta dishes with alternative protein sources were common and I still love them to this day.

Indulgence- good Catholics, children of Jewish mothers, and dessert lovers everywhere see guilt as an old, trusted friend that has been there since the beginning. Indulgences in food are something that are often savored with the intensity normally reserved for religious experiences and sex. Two desserts fit this bill for me: a really well made New York style cheesecake and a Baker's Square French Silk pie.

And lastly, Therapeutic- there are some foods and/or dishes out there that just make you feel good eating them. Sometimes this is because what your eating is not only unbelievably delicious, but it's also good for you! Sometimes it triggers a wave of happy thoughts. Sometimes, it's just REALLY fucking good. My favorite therapy dish is the chicken shawarma plate at Mediterranean Cafe on State Street here in lovely Madison. It's quick, easy, cheap, has my favorite hummus ever on it, and it's just plain good!

What foods and dishes do you find comforting?

That which is difficult to obtain: food elitism in 2011.

I've been thinking a lot about this subject lately.

There's a battle that is currently raging, on our kitchen tables, in the hallowed halls of government, and on farms across the country. The ultimate prize in this fight is the hard-earned dollars you devote to keeping you and/or your family fed. There have been few winners and lots of losers in this battle and I'm afraid that, at the moment, one of the losers is you and I. You see, forces with a great many more resources than most of us are trying, with an increased sense of desperation, to stack the deck in their favor. They want you to buy food from them, and if they get their way, from them only. Food producers in 2011 have figured out that it is easier and cheaper to lobby and legislate the competition away than it is to make a better product that has value and that people will enjoy. (Value being the key word here)

I will try to not turn this into a diatribe on factory farming. If current farming techniques, monocultures, and concentrated animal feeding operations is something you're interested in learning about, I would suggest reading "In Defense of Food: An Eaters Manifesto" by Michael Pollan or "Fast Food Nation" by Eric Schlosser. I'm going to write this assuming I'm preaching to the proverbial choir.

I have my own ideas of what I consider to be "elitist" when it comes to food: foie gras, black truffles, caviar, $80 slices of fatty tuna, real Kobe beef, what one might consider "the good stuff". I use the term elitist in such a way to connote a sense of guilt more than disapproval. I have eaten just about everything I would place on my elitist food list...and will do it again and again assuming I don't end upon the street, eating out of garbage cans and church basement soup kitchens. (being in college gives one a sense that this could become a reality at any moment) It's a guilty pleasure for me, eating these things. But there are locales in the world where eating such delicacies is commonplace. What makes these foods so desirable is commensurate with the trials and tribulations attached to obtaining them. As a result, they are also expensive and can be out of the reach of the everyday consumer.

Thinking of food elitism in this way sends a shudder down my spine. It explains a lot about our current situation. We have gotten to the point where buying fresh fruits and vegetables, grass-fed beef, and free-range pork and chicken at the local farmer's market, directly from the farmers themselves, is now seen as elitist. Choosing quality over quantity is a luxury, where other parts of the world see such choices as a birthright. The "food industrial complex" has certainly done its job, and done it well. It has bullshitted multiple generations of Americans into believing that more is better and that convenience is king. We are no longer aware of our own food system. We have forgotten what real food looks and tastes like...and we are worse off for it.

"Nevermind what's behind the curtain....the Great and Powerful Oz knows all!!!"

The more I read into it, the more I feel my future studies as a budding anthropologist will include this subject, again and again.

Would YOU pay $19 for a hamburger?

If you had asked me this question a year ago, I would have asked you, in the nicest way possible, "Are you out of your fucking mind?!"

My opinion has changed...and I'll tell you why.


When I see such a large price tag for a hamburger, I figure it falls into one of two categories: Massive Monstrosity Burger where you get it for free if you can eat it in under 45 minutes, or, Upscale Gastro-Pub Burger in a major city that infuses the meat with black truffles, uses beef raised eating only the finest imported Belgian grasses, and is topped with -insert odd flavor here-aoli.

The hamburger in question doesn't fit into either category. It's a 1/3 lb. burger and I don't live in a major city. (I live in a minor one, Madison has 230,000+ people living in it) But, I found a burger I would consider paying $19 for.

Here's the story:

Madison Magazine's Restaurant Week 2011 was during the the last full week of this past January. It involved 35 local restaurants offering a $25 prix-fixed menu that included three courses and three options for each course. I checked out one of these restaurants during this week called Graze with a couple of friends. It's owned by the folks who own L'Etoile and, yes, it's an upper-crust Gastro-Pub with black truffle oil and frites with aoli. It's not the kind of place I would hang out in on a regular basis, but a $25 prix-fixed menu for higher end food is too good to pass up. On the special menu they had a 1/4 lb. version of their normal $19 burger, so I tried it. Think of a burger with in-house ground sirloin, ribeye, and short ribs (the fat content is balanced perfectly) caramelized onions, cabernet jus, on a sesame seed brioche.

I can't believe I'm saying this...but it was the BEST burger I've ever had, period.

I've had some great greasy spoon burgers in my day, burgers made with the perfect combination of ingredients, skill, and love. But this burger was different. It was a flawless balance of ingredients and flavors and I've never had better.

So, to answer the question for myself: yes, I would pay $19 for a hamburger.

And the best part: I don't have to travel to Chicago or New York to get one...though I would anyways, just because.

Have no fear...

...I haven't forgotten about you or my blog. This is the last week of the semester for me and finals is next week. So, I have little time, in between studying and pulling what little hair I have out of my gourd, to write. I will try to post once this week, possibly tomorrow or Friday. Once finals are over and done with, we'll get back to our regularly scheduled programming. My next post involves hamburgers. Until then...