gastropoda

Here’s a new psychological syndrome: Attention Whore Disorder. I was amazed that bloggers would be bummed not to be swept into the Phat Phuck corral. They not only admitted it, they posted at length. As I said before, 8 is the new 12. Now I want to add: Obese food writers are so last century. The one time I went to the Pillsbury Bake-Off, in Miami sometime in the Eighties, I was horrified at the herd of lumbering food editors engaging in gavage at the breakfast buffet in our hotel. All of them were women. Today they would be aberrations. Which is just one objection to that silliness in search of a nut graf. It should have been headlined Boys Don’t Scarf and Barf. Only one woman was quoted, and she happens to be one renowned for wrestling with the object of her profession. (I was happy to see the only other one mentioned, and photographed, was not allowed to sell herself as a role Moss, not with a full Olsen left to drop.) The one story no one could ever do would cover the extent of eating disorders among people who eat for a living; I can’t remember how many press events I’ve been to where women (and one particular guy) disappeared into the bathroom after inhaling everything in reach (one was renowned for an accessory worn to cover the external damage she was doing to herself). So I thought this piece was all about piggishness, then I opened my magazine to see the lithe spirit had not moved the Omnivore to reconsider his intake — he was writing for the shape issue. Don’t read it if you don’t want to think about him in “the teensiest bathing suit,” though. I had to go back and brave the photo of the creature from the gluttonous lagoon to flush that image out of my cranial sieve. And that made me wonder: Forget a gut you would have to lift to be able to pee. Wouldn’t skin the color of a Silkie chicken be a sign that all was not well in Whaleville?

Until recently, I assumed all women lied about their weight. Now two friends are telling me 150 is not to be dissed, and neither of them looks a gram over acceptable. For once I’m sorry I sounded mean. I should have been clearer. Weigh away — just don’t try to make yourself a role Moss. And please consider what I learned the hard way. Every extra pound adds five pounds of stress on your hips and knees and ankles (get sentenced to 20 months of physical therapy and you will be haunted by visions of people who can barely hoist themselves onto treatment tables, not to mention those who could pull over a stationary bike just trying to dismount). If that’s not cautionary enough, imagine lugging yourself around on crutches for months. Every fucking ounce counts, painfully. Figures may lie, as my friends demonstrate slendiferously. But if you want to sell a diet book, at least look as if the Weight Watchers worked.

And I see there’s a new snack for cretins (or, as they prefer to spell it, creationists). If the ad didn’t have a Big Food name in it, you would swear it’s a spoof. The brand is Flat Earth. The bag is held up by flying pigs. And the copy promises half a serving of vegetables in an ounce of chips. That is a lot of disbelief to suspend. Even the trademark sounds straight out of the Onion: “impossibly good.” They paid lawyers actual money to register that? It must have tested really well with the lumbering throngs down at Dinosaur Adventure Land, riding the Leap of Faith swing.

I can’t imagine surimi is any better for you than the steak of the sea even with mercury in it. But I’m no expert, and the one Time magazine found said it best: Readers are done no favors by single-food scare stories. On a petty level, I did wonder why the store next door was, yet again, given a pass in the testing; it only is about the biggest seafood retailer in town. And it should not have taken a listen to Brian Lehrer to hear from a real authority how the dangerous stuff actually gets into the tuna to begin with. Phyllis Richman predicted many years ago that sushi would  become the new hamburger. If we can swallow the reality  of mad cow and E. coli, what’s a little industrial spillover? We do like to leave the lights on and the microwaves humming in this country. . . .

In other nutrition nuttiness, let the “consumer advocates” rail against NYC’s new rule requiring certain restaurants to post calorie counts. As I must have said a thousand times, I have not eaten a Mrs. Fields cookie since learning back in the last century that each one contains about 260 calories. And I was, back then, a scholar when it came to the back of Fritos bags. So all those defenders of the public’s right to be stupid, the ones who say anyone can easily discern the difference between a bucket of chicken wings and a salad, should be sentenced to Southwest-salad-with-crispy-chicken hell. With Big Gulp cholesterol drugs for the ride.

By contrast, I was happily surprised by the junk brochure from the College of Physicians of Philadelphia that my consort dropped off on my desk the other day. A promotion for a health web site, it included not just a notice of a “dark chocolate and red wine reception” but a photo of and recipe for a salad made with warm goat cheese in a panko crust. We’ve come a long way from the “pasta makes you fat” attitude toward healthful eating. I’m not sure, though, I would want a tour of the Mutter Museum after that reception. Elephantiasis is a terrible petit four.

Judging by a survey that turned up in my email one morning, Michael Pollan has his work cut out for him in trying to persuade Americans to eat primarily from the perimeter of supermarkets. Of the top 10 sales categories, only milk, bread and eggs are showcased in the healthful real estate. Cereal, cookies, canned soup, chocolate candy and potato chips were the other “foods” on the list, and I just read that and heard Fat Albert hey-hey-heying his way toward the deli. Why do I suspect cloned meat is the least of the threats to the food chain?

One thing that struck me in the news photos of the subway tsunami was how lardy New Yorkers have gotten. Most photos of people thronging buses could have been shot in Des Moines (if they have buses there). We must all be Americans now. And it’s no wonder, considering Bertolli has started a frozen line of pasta and the shape advertised first is “gigantoni.” Apparently there is such an entry in the noodle lexicon, but it sounds so un-Italian. Also, the label shows a glass of red wine, but you know it will be served with soda. The only wonder is that they aren’t stuffing supersized pasta with cheese, bacon and raspberry fudge.