Why Aren’t You A Foodie(BP#3 revised)

Few people appreciate food they eat every day. The rich usually complain about a shortage of time and the idle might use a lack of money as an excuse. However, “foodies” don’t just have more time or more money. The key difference between “foodies” and others is their attitude toward food: “foodies” are interested in food whereas others are in need of food. Socioeconomic status has little to do the appreciation of food. What really matters is what food means to a person.

Successful businessmen might attribute their lack of interest or concern about excellent cuisines to a lack of time. They are wealthy, but they are also under stress of a large workload. As the saying goes, time is money. For business giants, spending quality time over a meal not only means paying for the meal, but also means losing money from a business point of view. As a result, they don’t bother to use their taste buds even though they can afford a luxurious meal. My neighbor told me that her father ate at home no more than twice a week, but when he did eat at home, he always finished his meal as soon as he could to get away from the dining table.

On the other hand, not many individuals with considerable time on their hands, those who have more leisure time to think creatively about the next meal, are foodies either. Appetizing meals are only a figment of their imaginations because they usually don’t make enough money to carry out their fanciful thoughts. Not only is dining in a top restaurant expensive, but getting excellent ingredients for a dish also costs a lot. Eventually, they give up the idea of an appealing taste and instead get used to tasteless dishes. Many of my friends are in this situation. The dining hall is a tragedy to them, but they keep visiting it because they already paid for a meal plan for the whole semester. Some of them even eat five times a day in the dining hall because they want to get their money’s worth from their unlimited meal plan.

Whereas the people with time on their hands are short of money, the rich don’t have enough time. Although these groups have both the time and the money, respectively, to become foodies, they do not. Neither of these groups of people appreciate food. In other words, having an abundance of time and money does not necessarily lead to an individual’s becoming a foodie. One can always be interested in food regardless of either his or her socioeconomic status or time restrictions.

It is a pretext that one has no time to appreciate food. Making a reservation for a lovely meal or enjoying a delicious dish doesn’t take a long time compared to the pleasure it brings. Even preparing a meal on one’s own could be a satisfying experience. The cooking show, The 30 Minute Meal shows that a delectable dish could be prepared within 30 minutes. Appreciating food is not a time-consuming task, but a way to take a breath. The problem lies in the businessmen’s attitudes towards food. They look upon food as something that recharges them but not something that pleases them. Some of them might be as ignorant as to consider a meal is an inevitable task, only worth 20 minutes of their precious time; others might be as lazy as to think eating takes up valuable energy used to contemplate business affairs. In one sentence, food is just a necessity for them rather than something worth spending time on.

Having no money is also a “song and dance” for not appreciating food. A memorable meal doesn’t have to be costly. A restaurant or chef might have good reasons why an expensive dish costs “an arm and a leg,” such as the time it takes to make it or rare and expensive ingredients, but food that is delicious doesn’t always cost a lot. The Chinese snack, Dim Sum, is a good example. Many types of Dim Sum are invented by probably the poorest people in China and served at a reasonable price on the sidewalk. One-tenth of the money spent at extravagant restaurants delivers the same pleasure. Fancy ingredients, such as those that the cooks on the cooking show Iron Chef use, may not be available for a daily meal, but those who get up early to have the first pick at the market will always be rewarded with the freshest ingredients. Since they are just in need of food, people are justifying their laziness of exploring for food and ingredients by the pale saying, “I have no money.”

One’s socioeconomic status can’t stop the love for food. Time and money are just covers for people who don’t appreciate food. Underneath these excuses lies the real reason why they are not “foodies”: the attitude towards food, or the role food plays in one’s life. Since they are indifferent to expensive or gourmet food, the rich usually take a table of rich food for granted. An unforgettable taste is the reward of the large amount of money they spend. A delicious meal deserves a great payment rather than appreciation, and what they have is just the happiness of spending money rather than the joy of food. Food for them is a symbol of wealth. Such a view makes them see only the prices on the menu. The effort and creation of the chef beneath the attractive images has no position in their minds. They are never going to understand how delicate a dish is and why it is worth such a price, not to mention to appreciate the food.

Even with mouths full of satisfaction, such individuals probably pay more attention to the business they are talking about. For example, playing golf is never about sports; it is about doing business. A meal is never about food either. It is a pretext for talking about business. Those giants care what comes out of others’ mouths, not what is in theirs. I know it from my own experience. I often went to my dad’s business meals when I was a child. The business partners always ordered the most expensive dishes on the menu, and the most interesting thing was that none of them ate their meals (just drinking). They were just talking about business. I was happy to take advantage of the situation, eating more than I usually ate.

The idle are always careless with their daily fare because they think regardless of what they do to prepare a dish, it will not make any difference. They regard cooking as simply making something edible. Regardless of what has been done to the potato, it will still taste like a plain potato. Thoughts on those dishes are just a waste of time, time that could be used to earn more money and get better ingredients. However, this is totally wrong. On one episode of Iron Chef, two top cooks were required to use milk as a main ingredient to serve a meal. I had never thought about using things as simple as milk to cook before, but both of them impressed me by eight creative milk dishes. The commonness of milk cannot conceal the beauty of those inventions.

Paying too much attention to taste is always a bad habit among the idle. They know they are not going to having the most expensive dishes on the menu, so they decide to at least get something palatable. Food to them is not something that will improve their standard of living, but just satisfaction of the taste buds. However, one doesn’t have to choose between healthy ways of cooking and deliciousness. They are simply too lazy to seek both healthy and delicious food. My mom is a foodie with respect to a healthy diet. She always remembers which kinds of food cannot be combined to make a particular dish and always makes an effort to create healthy dishes with a delicate taste.

There is no doubt that time and money are needed for appreciating food. However, most people do not have a shortage of time and money. They just value others things over food. To appreciate food, we don’t have to be like those professional food critics whose job it is to eat all the time and who have the money to do so. We can simply be interested in food. We might read restaurant reviews in the newspaper and try to find a good restaurant to dine in once a week, or we can choose to watch the sports channel rather than cooking shows to learn how to create a new dish. All these ways lead to an appreciation for food once we gain enthusiasm for it.

“Foodies” are not different from others in terms of socioeconomic status. However, they hold a different attitude towards food. Food to others may be a ten-minute routine, a way of alleviating hunger, a symbol of wealth, a way of talking about business, or simply satisfaction to the taste buds, but to foodies, it is the essence of their lives. Time and money are not problems in a foodie’s world. Spending time looking for healthy and simple dishes becomes an essential part of recuperating for the next day. Food provides happiness to all people who appreciate it. We can’t easily change the time or the money we have, but we can decide how to spend them. The key is one’s attitude towards food, one’s attitude towards life.