Conversation with Larry
My friend Larry says I can make any food sound too awful to eat, and I should write about how I do this without even trying. Humpf! I think. But it’s true. I’m opinionated, especially about food. Someone who appreciates good food also has strong feelings against foodstuff that doesn’t cut the mustard so to speak. Loving food doesn’t mean you love all food, especially ill-prepared or foodstuff that is simply too rough and that brings us to the subject of tabouli.
It all started when Larry came home with tabouli, and I didn’t act very excited about it. “I thought you liked tabouli,” he said with that slightly aggrieved tone in his voice.
“I don’t dislike it,” I said. And it’s true I don’t, but that doesn’t mean I actually enjoy it very much. Or that I would choose it to take to a picnic when I had other choices in front of me. Like fried chicken.
I know I’m supposed to like it, and it has been a staple on liberal food conscious people’s menus since the early 70s. Maybe that’s part of the problem. Too many people brought it to too many potlucks back in the good old days. And since then, I have made it myself too often when I couldn’t think of anything else. You can even biu it partially prepared in a box along with the proper spices, and then, of course, you have to add fresh tomatoes and maybe cucumbers and mint if you have it.
“I always make it from scratch,” Larry says with that note of triumph in his voice that always makes me want to take him down a peg or two.
“How many times have you eaten it?” I asked him.
“You mean you really want me to count?” he answered, incredulity in his voice. I did. “OK, let’s see,” he hesitates, does some counting on fingers and mumbling. “Probably three or four times a month …” Finally, he looks at me and says, “Oh, I don’t know, several dozen times, something like that.”
“OK,” I said. “We’re probably about tied in number.” We sat there in silence for a moment, but as per usual, I couldn’t let it go. “It’s just..” I started in again.
“What now?”
“Well, it’s a hard little grain, only slightly better than oatmeal, with a grainy nutty flavor that seems more suited to breakfast than dinner.” I could feel myself warming to the subject. “And I got sick of everyone making it when they either couldn’t think of anything else or were too lazy to make something that had some subtlety of flavor. More so than the sour taste of lemon and parsley and hard wheaty things, like tiny rocks. It’s in that category of cold, un-comforting foods. I want to be comforted when I eat…”
“OK. OK,” Larry says, as he get’s up to leave the porch. “I’d better go before I start to dislike this stuff.”
Too bad. I was just getting warmed up.
