Let the slobbering begin . . .

Since I’m a dedicated eater with fairly catholic tastes, I guess I can reasonably unveil some of my internecine gastronomical brain-waves on what better-equipped food experts now celebrate online as Foodie Tuesday. Prepare yourself, darlings. I’m just gonna hand you a bunch of snapshots of the inside of my skull when food is on my mind. Yeah, basically, always.

Scared yet? Onward, soldiers.

I often ruminate on menus and recipes–but very seldom in any formal way; the closest I come is pretty much when there’s a dinner gathering ahead and I try to plan just enough to be able to make an actual and sufficiently cogent grocery run. Now, as far as I’m concerned, recipes are made to be broken. Nobody need ask whether I’m a pastry master or baking genius. You want me to weigh and measure what?? Honey, I love ya, but I’m just not very good at adhering to, especially, strict rules. So most of the time I tend to work in more forgiving parts of the kitchen. Good thing I managed to surround myself with forgiving eaters, too. Not that I don’t ever bake, but you can be sure that I’m still monkeying with the contents if I can’t mess with the science.

Don't say I didn't warn you . . .

Yeah, when I’m not in the midst of the act of eating I tend to be thinking about it. A lot.

. . . and this is just a tiny sampling . . . an amuse bouche . . .

Once my brain starts going like a salad spinner, it’s too late. I’m concocting dishes and combinations of foods and compiling lists of ways to use a particular ingredient and, oh, all of a sudden I’m snapping out of a reverie with unseemly drool pooling on the front of my shirt and the ghostly scent of beurre noisette drifting dreamily in my nostrils.

. . . and furthermore . . .

I get these unseemly food urges and imaginings with such frequency that I can only comfort my would-be-gigantic self with the thought that I am far from alone. There are enough foodie blogs in the eater-net to choke a horse, for one thing. Many of them also guilty of making me think of food all the more, pitiless knife-wielding creatures that they are. What I’ve learned thus far is that, while it’s not a genius idea to indulge every one of the dining-related wishes and fantasies I have (nor could I ever afford it), enough of the pleasure relating to food and eating comes from all of the prefatory delights of imagining, plotting and planning for the preparation and consumption of food when the right time comes.

Sometimes, when I'm lucky, the mere immersion in extravagant imaginings of food and eating will put off my having to indulge them for a moment or two--during which I will not, of course, refrain from further imaginings . . .

. . . and those so often do lead to, oh yeah, eating, then further fabulations, then more eating, and so on and so forth. Yep, a vicious circle, a psycho-cycle. What’s a poor obsessive to do?

Things can get into seriously crazy territory when I start getting my food freak on . . .

I do understand that other people have survived this particular ailment ever since the concept of food as anything other than straight-up survival existed. So I know I can manage to overcome my most over-the-top urges just enough to not die of from my own excesses. If I really, really work at it. If I stop rhapsodizing inwardly or, okay, just tone it down on occasion. Oh, who am I kidding, not gonna happen.

Eat, dream, eat, dream, eat, eat, dream . . .

. . . and while I’m being semi-honest about this with you, that’s just while I’m awake. Asleep, I can achieve yet more monstrously grandiose food frolics as well. And why not. One of the sweetest miracles of creation, food. Not having it, or enough of it: hell. Having enough to share, both physically and in spirit (talk, shared secret family recipes, foodie blogs, secret kitchen handshakes, MFK Fisher and Jeffrey Steingarten and Calvin Trillin) is sheer heaven. Even if it makes my stomach growl indelicately just thinking about it. Even if it makes my poor head spin just a bit more.

Oh, the gears are ticking over now. Internal cafeteria-tumbler on full blast! Run! Save yourselves!

Do you think I’ll ever fully recover from this stuff? No, of course not, and why should I. Going bananas over bananas is not necessarily a bad thing (although with the potential collapse of certain long-hybridized banana crops it might become a rarer thing). I admit to applying my father’s excellent philosophy of Anything Worth Doing is Worth Overdoing with equal abandon not just to other parts of my life but also to any and everything food-related. Sue me. But get the process-server to bring me a fork and a couple of extra serviettes with that, please. And just a pinch of Maldon Sea Salt. Oh, and while you’re over there between the pantry and the fridge . . .

. . . wouldn't that be even better with a little bit of chocolate ice cream?

Sorry, I was channeling my late Grandpa there, the one who knew that fourteen freshly baked cookies were worth the punishing for the pilfering, who understood that nearly any edible could be improved by more of it or perhaps just by the addition of a modest scoop of butterfat-loaded ice cream, and most of all who reveled in sharing the delights of the table with all the silly grandkids and anyone else interested in squeezing around the table with us. And this, naturellement, just tends to confirm my conviction that my love of food is yet another love that springs from the joy of connectedness. I’m looking for foods that belong with each other on a plate, in hand or in a recipe, and far more than that I’m always on the hunt for the beautiful connectedness between people that springs from sharing life over that same food. For what we are about to receive, I am always truly thankful.

May life always be as sweet as the best treasures of the table . . .