Eating Bugs

Quito, 1954. My mother comes excitedly home from the market with a package of shrimp, the first she’s found since we arrived from Barcelona, where shrimp was only one of several marine species in our Sunday paella. She places the package in the sink and asks the indigenous maid, Maria—black braids, embroidered blouse, felt skirt—to wash them in preparation for cooking. Maria opens the package, takes one look at the contents, and runs out of the kitchen, her braids streaming behind her, screaming that those bugs in the sink are just like the bugs with many legs that you find curled up under a stone, and she would rather die than touch one, much less eat it. 

It’s my first lesson in gastronomic relativity, in which I realize that what we like to eat or can’t bear to even think of eating is determined more by where we come from than by the merits of the thing on our plate. Ecuador is replete with challenges to gastronomic provincialism. There is the Andean village where at dusk small flying beetles take to the air, and are chased by swarms of little boys who catch and eat them. “They are sweet,” they tell us, munching. And there is the Saturday afternoon ritual when native families sit in front of their houses ridding each other’s scalp of lice, which they eat--a practice that supposedly helps to protect them against typhoid. And in the Amazon basin, we are told, people hunt monkeys with blow guns and boil them whole…. 

In Spain, before we went to South America, everything that I ate was anatomically correct: small fish were served entire on my plate, and I don’t remember being grossed out by their fishy eyes looking up at me, or by the knee caps and hip joints of rabbits and chickens, or by the chicken’s comb, which my  grandmother used to save for me. 

But the years have changed me. Long before I became vegetarian I stopped eating chicken thighs, because I couldn’t bear the sight of all the muscles and tendons; then I stopped eating chicken breasts (those ribs!); and then I stopped eating chicken altogether. Now, wishing I had the energy and resourcefulness to be vegan, I make-do with vegetables and dairy products, with an occasional can of salmon or sardines to boost my protein intake. 

I recently read “Grub,” an article in the September 6 issue of The New Yorker about entomophagy, or the practice of eating insects. Given the expanding human population and the diminishing resources of the planet, insects offer an ecologically sustainable source of high-quality protein, so it becomes almost a moral duty for us all to support the companies that are working to make entomophagous cuisine available to the world at large—and that includes actually eating their products. 

This is something that I will happily do as long as I cannot tell what I am eating. That means no legs, no antennae, no compound eyes, no diaphanous wings, no chewy bits of exoskeleton. Give me bugs ground into anonymous, homogeneous powder, and I will ingest not only cute, small things like ants and ladybugs but Luna moths, tarantulas, locusts, and Madagascar hissing cockroaches. Shared by most Americans, this preference for bugs in powder form presents a problem for the “tiny livestock” industry, because insect protein, as you know if you’ve ever squashed a bug, is gooey instead of solid. But they’re working on it. 

Note that I haven’t said anything about flavor. But mix some insect powder with an egg substitute, dredge in bread crumbs, fry lightly in olive oil, and what’s not to like? I just celebrated Labor Day with a sad little vegetarian patty made of mostly beans and corn. After that, critter croquettes don’t sound half bad to me. 

When Did Bread Become Bad?

It used to be the staff of life.  Now, you'd think it was the staff of death.

If the latter is true, it's a miracle that I survived my Barcelona childhood, for my days were punctuated by slices of bread.  Bread and butter for breakfast and, after school, bread and chocolate, or pa sucat amb oli--bread drizzled with olive oil.  And bread with lunch and dinner.

I can still hear my mother's serrated knife cutting into the brittle crust as crumbs exploded everywhere.  The pale yellow and gray tiles of the dining room floor had to be swept after every meal.  But before that, as my parents and my aunts lingered over a dessert of almonds, oranges, or dried figs I would lick my index finger and press it into the little shards of crust on the tablecloth and eat crumbs until only flour dust remained.

When we moved to the land of Dixie in the late 50s, the supermarket shelves only stocked variations on Wonder Bread, and my father used to say, wrinkling his nose at the floppy white square in his hand, "this bread--it's like eating a piece of towel!"  There were no crumbs to sweep up after those meals.

Me, I even kind of liked Wonder Bread, but then, in the 1970s, when my children were young and I was trying with all my might to do the right thing, I found a recipe for whole-wheat bread that was supposed to be healthy and nutritious.  For years I spent Sunday afternoons baking six-loaf batches, which I would then slice with an electric meat slicer and freeze.  That bread was nothing like the crusty Catalan bread of my childhood, and my kids were embarrassed to take it to school in their lunch boxes, but it was sweet, nutty and robust and oh, how the kitchen smelled on Sunday afternoons.

The downfall of bread began shortly after that.  First, we were told that it was fattening;  then there was concern that its carbohydrate load would cause hypoglycemia;  and finally, millions of people developed wheat allergies that ranged from annoying to life-threatening.

I was one of the many who developed a sensitivity to wheat, and for a year I abstained from it altogether, a sacrifice compared to which giving up cigarettes in my twenties was a snap.  Now I can eat wheat, as long as I don't eat too much, or too often.

I come from generations of bread eaters.  True, they didn't grow nearly as tall as milk-and-meat-fed Americans, but they were healthy enough, and not a single one was obese.  So what has changed?   Did the old varieties of wheat have something that the new ones don't, or vice versa?   Have our bodies evolved away from this most basic of foods?

These days I hardly ever eat bread, for where is the pleasure in eating only a little and not too often?  If I have to monitor every bite, I'd just as soon do with no bites at all.  But still, I mourn the absence of bread from my life.

I may some day look into the matter of wheat varieties, and see if there are any that are less noxious than others.  And if there are, I know how I'll be spending my Sunday afternoons.

Eager Dread

In Girls of Slender Means, Muriel Spark says of a plump young woman that she "spent much of her time in eager dread of the next meal, and in making resolutions what to eat of it, and what to leave." Doesn't that just about sum up the American attitude towards food? 

We are surrounded by mountains of it, when we should be eating molehills.

Take an ordinary day out of my ordinary life.  Better still, take just half a day.  Even before I was fully awake, I had to use my willpower at breakfast. I had to decide how much yoghurt, blueberries, and almonds to put into my bowl.  I adore yoghurt, and blueberries, and almonds, and could have eaten a great deal of each because it was there in the fridge, but I didn't.  I just had a little bit.  And because I've been warned about caffeine I drank tea, which tastes to me like one step above plain water, instead of coffee, which is what the gods really drink.

I had an optometrist's appointment that morning, and my husband offered to drive.  But first I had to stop by the vet's, and there on the counter was a bowl of candy.  Going in the door, food had been the last thing on my mind, especially since I was carrying a bag with Wolfie's and Bisou's samples for their annual parasite check.  But there it was, and it wasn't even ten a.m.  Again, I flexed my willpower muscle and gave it a miss.

While we were waiting at the optometrist's the receptionist brought us a plate of cookies.  "My sister-in-law made these," she said, "and I didn't want to eat them all myself."  We hadn't been thinking about food when we walked in, but here it was once more.  We couldn't refuse, so we each had a cookie.

After the appointment we went to lunch at a diner, where the menu filled three legal-size pages.  When the food arrived, my husband and I looked at each other and said "Pact!"  This means that we agree to eat only half of what is put before us, and save the other half for dinner the next day. For years I resisted "doggie bags" because I thought they were uncool, but that was before restaurants started serving food in platters as opposed to plates.  I can now be regularly spotted exiting restaurants with a  styrofoam box in my hand.

The menu was studded with photos of fabulous desserts, which we did not intend to order.  But while we ate our half-rations our eyes wandered to the racks of pies and cakes that lined the walls of the diner.  More willpower was expended dealing with this.  On the counter where we paid our bill there sat, you guessed it, another bowl of candy.

I think that our relationship to food is more problematic and less pleasant than, say, that of a humble seamstress a hundred years ago. (I am not talking here of the starving poor, but of someone who had enough decent food to eat.)  My seamstress, unlike me, could look forward to her meals with eagerness untinged with dread.  She probably didn't have much choice in what she ate, but she was free to eat it without second thoughts.  Her ice-box, unlike my fridge, was not stocked with more food than she could eat in a meal or two, so she needn't fuss about portion size. But then, she probably didn't even have an ice-box.

She also didn't have a TV, so after dinner she wasn't assaulted by pictures of platters heaped with breaded shrimp and lobster and French fries.  On her way to work in the morning the streets were not lined with eating establishments, nor did huge photos of donuts decorate the sides of buildings.  And her co-workers probably did not pass around baskets of cookies while they sewed.

If she went to the doctor, she wasn't offered food by the nurse.  If she needed to buy something at the pharmacy, there was no food there.  (Have you been to a Rite-Aid lately?  Half the aisles are dedicated to food, every molecule of it processed.)  If she needed to buy stationery for the novel she was writing, no packages of foil-wrapped chocolates distracted her at the stationer's.  (Have you been to Staples lately?)  If she went to a book shop to buy a something to read after work, she didn't have to walk through the cafe annex with its display of muffins and pastries.

In short, my well-nourished seamstress, except when she was eating her three squares-a-day, was mostly spared the sight of food, the need to make decisions about it, and the guilt attendant on making the wrong choice.

Whereas we, her great-grandchildren, are forced to act as our own prison guards, doling out the day's meager ration lest our livers, hearts, and figures deteriorate.  Modern technology enables us to avoid almost all physical movement so that, surrounded by more food than humanity has ever known, we need less of it than ever.  Our willpower is called upon to make efforts which it never evolved to handle, and as a result our straightforward, joyful approach to food has, like love in a postmodern novel, been replaced by eager dread.

What's Left To Eat?

Every few months a new item is added to the list of Foods That Can Kill.  Here are some of the ones that come to mind:

--Salt, because it gives you high blood pressure.
--Sugar, because it is as lethal and addictive as heroin, and, unlike heroin, makes you fat.
--Fat.
--Dairy, because it causes phlegm and inflammation and makes you fat.  Plus, you're consuming all the hormones and antibiotics the cows were given to keep them at maximum production.
--Soy, because it is estrogenic, and estrogen is linked to cancer.
--Eggs, because they have cholesterol, and are allergenic.  (And you don't even want to think about the conditions of the poor hens in egg factories.)
--Wheat, because it is allergenic, causes inflammation, and makes you fat.
--Fish, because it contains mercury.
--Meat, because it clogs your arteries and makes you fat.  (And you don't even want to think about the conditions of chickens, pigs and cattle in factory farms.)
--Apples, because they are sprayed with some of the worst pesticides in existence.  (BTW, have you ever checked the price of organic apples?)

And on and on.  (Notice that I have only included non-processed foods on this list.)

But until last week, in the ever-expanding desert of dietary choices there was one food that you could always count on.  It was cheap, easily available, nutritious, non-fattening, bland, harmless, and user-friendly.  It was accepted without complaint by little children, snarky adolescents, and adult foodies alike, not to mention dogs.  It was rice. 

Now it turns out that under those glistening grains rice harbors arsenic, a well-known poison that is linked to various cancers.  Even organic brown rice, which I used to serve several times a week because it was so much better for us than potatoes, pasta or couscous, carries the stuff.

Rice is, of course, a long way from being taken off the grocery shelves.  We're supposed to eat it, like everything else, in moderation--whatever that means.  Pediatricians are recommending that parents serve babies rice cereal a maximum of once a week.  But who wants to give a baby even a tiny bit of arsenic every week?

Rinsing rice prior to cooking, I'm told, will wash away some of the arsenic.  Words cannot express how much better that makes me feel....

Cookies For Lunch

Ate cookies for lunch yesterday, because my spouse is away.  This is something I would never do when he's around, not that he would object in any way.  The most he would do is ask me to let him have a couple.  But still, I wouldn't do it.

Then in the evening I worked straight through the "dinner hour" on a clay sculpture, not stopping until I reached a true stopping point.  I cleaned up, made a fire, had a glass of wine and the rest of the cookies, and some almonds.  And did the universe punish me by making me sick to my stomach or, worse, causing me to gain five pounds?  Not at all.  In fact, this morning I am half a pound lighter than yesterday.

Today I may commit other infractions, though they won't be cookie-related (I cannot bear to even think of cookies right now).  I may have an all-spinach dinner--sauteed with olive oil and garlic--or I may spend the entire night downstairs in front of the fire, with the dogs.

I am always surprised by the pleasure that these short periods of solitude bring.  Since the earliest days of our marriage, the prospect of my husband going on a trip has plunged me into separation anxiety.  Though the passing decades have taught me to abstain from throwing hissy fits as he packs his garment bag, I still, every time before he goes, devoutly wish he wouldn't.

And every single time, the moment the car disappears down the driveway, a strange exhilaration seizes hold of me

Don't think that the thought of his return depresses me.  The only thing that would depress me about that is if it were delayed by even five minutes.  But there is something about the change that a  temporary separation brings--the slight variation in daily rhythms, the ability to follow one's impulses from moment to moment, the silence--that is, temporarily, rejuvenating.

Eventually blessed conjugality resumes, enlivened by the hiatus.  As Bertie Wooster would put it, variety is the s. of l.  Or, as the witches say, "merry meet and merry part, and merry meet again."

Fear Of Food

"Americans," I remember hearing Julia Child warble, "are afraid of their food."

So true--for me at least. My first apprehensions about food were based on a realization that, unless one was extremely careful, food could make one fat. But since those days, my food fears have expanded and become more sophisticated as a result of years of exposure to "healthful hints" and the latest reports on what is likely to kill us in the food we eat.

On grocery-shopping days, my food fear escalates into a phobia. Take today, for instance. Heart full of dread, I wheeled my cart into the supermarket's produce section. Ostensibly, this should be the least fear-inducing part of the place. What could be healthier than fresh veggies and fruit?

Because I grow most of the vegetables that can be frozen, I don't even look at broccoli, spinach, chard, and so on. Those are safely in my freezer, and I am not afraid of them. But I don't grow my own apples, for example. And here the dilemmas begin. Should I buy expensive organic apples that have been trucked across the continent with much damage to the environment, or opt for local apples that have been sprayed with god-knows-what? There is a new apple on display today, the "Pinata," fresh from Washington State and combining "typical apple character with tropical flavors." What kind of idiot do these grocers think I am? Don't I know genetic engineering when I see it?

O.k., but I need some fruit. What about grapes? There they are, in seedless splendor, just arrived from Chile. Forget the hydrocarbons that their trip shot into the atmosphere. Who knows what they were sprayed with? Ditto for those beautiful pineapples, and the oranges, and the off-season berries. I leave the produce department with some sweet potatoes (at least you peel those) and a box of raisins (I need those antioxidants in one shape or another, and these come from nearby California).

I push my cart to the fish department. Fish is supposed to be good for you, and I like fish. I like salmon. Here's some--oops, no. It's farm raised. You thought factory-farmed chicken was bad? Wait til you hear what the fish farms are doing not just to the fish, but to the coastline. Plus, see that orange color? Do I really want to put that into my body? There is some fish that is not farm raised: it comes from Ecuador, and from Indonesia. I can just see the black clouds of diesel behind those trawlers. I can feel the emptiness of the over-fished depths.

Deep in the bowels of the store are canned goods, sitting in their baths of salt. I put a can of organic chickpeas in my cart anyway. Who cares where they came from? Here be pastas. What could be wrong with macaroni? Wheat, that's what! Wheat these days contains high amounts of gluten, and you should eat it in only tiny amounts. But, you say, bread is the staff of life! As if.

I pick up a 25lb bag of white rice--don't worry, it's for the dogs! So is the big tray of chicken drumsticks, and I even feel guilty about feeding those to the dogs, given what we all know about Purdue et al., but it's better than the regular dog food, which contains even worse horrors.

The Mediterranean diet is supposed to be the epitome of healthy eating. I was brought up on the real thing, and I love that kind of food. Which begins with olive oil. I have always looked down my nose at the "extra virgin" stuff, preferring the darker, more flavorful oils. But it turns out that something in the processing makes the extra virgin oil kinder to your heart. I used to like buying olive oil. Now I do it with a frown.

Forget the cereal aisles, the bakery, the ice cream section. I pass those by, a monk in the midst of Vegas. In the dairy section, I buy a big package of string cheese, which I will cut up into tiny pieces for dog treats. I look at the racks of eggs: regular eggs (from hens enduring unspeakable torments in cages), organic eggs (well-fed hens, but probably still caged), cage-free eggs (a million hens kept in a building, as free to move about as people on a metro platform at rush hour), and finally, free-range eggs, almost as expensive as the Faberge kind. Well, at least I have my four girls at home, who are a little bored because they cannot go outside, but are otherwise all right. I go back to the produce section and buy them a couple of cabbages to peck at.

It never fails--by the time I get to the checkout, I am depressed. Isn't it ironic that, in the midst of plenty, I am practically starving. Surrounded by foods from all over the planet, I can allow myself to eat only a tiny percentage of them. What is wrong with this picture?

On my way out of the store, I pass by a new display rack--garden seeds! Utterly premature in this climate, but there they are--the embryos of chard, spinach, lettuce, peppers, basil, tomatoes...my only hope, my bulwark against starvation.