10 Food Priorities

I am genuinely trying to sort out the variables that I prioritize, when deciding what to eat. So far, the list is as follows:

1. Food must be comfortable to eat.

I'm not a fan of heartburn, unpleasant flavors, unpleasant temperatures, unpleasant textures, unpleasant associations, or of foods that are too spicy, too bland, too salty. (I assure you, "too salty" actually can happen, as hard as it might be to believe.) Food must be sufficiently delicious, or I fail to see the point.

I'm sure that you feel the same way.

2. Food must be within my budget.

This is intuitive. I can't eat what I can't obtain.

3. Food must either contain good nutrition, or be an act of defiance against societal rules.

Sometimes, having a breakfast of potato chips, candy, and beer is a completely necessary act of feminism. We can't let The Establishment win, man. Ma'am. Man. Ma'am. Man Man. Ma'am? Ma'am.

However, operating a human body is like operating any piece of complicated machinery. If they're not maintained well, they will not run well.

I will therefore feel run down, irritable, excessively hungry, and nonspecifically "off" if I get dehydrated and/or go for more than a few days without eating serious quantities of nutrient-relevant things. Raw or mildly cooked produce, served with little to no accompaniment is a big deal here, guys.

Eating too little is absolutely horrible. Don't be that guy. Talk to your doctor about it. If you can't afford food, contact your local food banks, poverty assistance programs, gleaners, and charities. Google "food stamps." The body might not need much fuel to run, but it still needs something.

Eating too much will put calories into bodily storage in a way that can slow down the metabolism, make one's joints hurt more, likely mess with hormone production, and prompt bullying from horrible dickweeds. While cultivating and maintaining obesity as a way to stick it to the man is totally fucking kickass, I can't hate people for needing a more comfortable body to ride around in. Everybody's got to sort this one out, individually. I'm more comfortable since I shrunk my way out of obesity, but I try not to be a dick about it or chalk my decision up to bully-related cowardice.

4. Food must be easy to prepare and easy to clean up after, with exceptions made for special occasions.

I have a job and I have a lot of video games, but I DON'T have a dishwasher or much patience.

I also have a metabolism that requires only about 60% of the calories that my husband's metabolism requires, AND I have a sweet tooth, so I tend to snack on candy.

So when cooking meals for myself, an easy, lazy minimalism suits me very well.

5. Food must be as ethically-created as budget will allow.

This one's pretty straightforward.

Anybody who's taken a college class in an animal-model research lab (at least in the US) is familiar with how strict regulations are when it comes to animal safety and health in an academic research setting. I WISH that food production regulations were so kind and so carefully controlled, but even grain harvest has something of an ugly, gory side to it.

Hell. Even the HUMANS involved in food production aren't guaranteed all of the positive rights that lab rats are granted, like the right to quality medical care whenever ill or injured, the right to temperature-controlled and safe housing, or guaranteed access to nutrient-rich, balanced meals.

And while I'm soapboxing, I also want to eat food that wastes as little fuel energy as possible in its production and distribution. Food created nearby takes less gasoline to get into my stomach, and that's a good thing. Food that wasn't processed in a factory, wasn't processed in a factory. We gotta go hippie if we want to lower our consumption of foreign oil, and even people who hate hearing about environmental pollution are probably not literally, if they're honest, actually in favor of polluting unnecessarily.

Still.

I am never, ever, ever, ever a perfectionist. Ever. Except for when I'm doing math. But when doing whatever else? Standards must be relaxed. Perfectionism can breed interpersonal cruelty, and I loathe that.

So while I firmly believe in the importance of voting with one's dollar for minimally processed (or unprocessed) local foods that take animal safety, workers' rights, and ecological concerns into account, my belief system is typically compromised by the actual contents of my wallet. But my husband's planning a vegetable garden in our yard, even though we live in a city, and I'm helping him work towards that goal. So THERE.

6. Food must be purchased in quantities small enough to consume before it expires.

Buying quickly-spoiled produce in bulk, when I'm too busy or lazy to process it for long-term storage via drying, canning, freezing, or whatever, is a terrible idea. It took me a while to unlearn this bad habit, but I'm alright now.

7. Food must be... um... did I already say that it should be comfortable to eat? Shit. That was item #1.

Still. As long as eggs and dairy hold their spell over me, I'll never go vegan. I can go "bumming eggs off of friends who own happy, healthy chickens," but that's as good as I'm getting. And I will fight you in the face if you try to make me give up whipped cream. I just feel better when I eat certain foods, and dairy products really do suit my body well.

8. Eight! Eight! I forget what eight is for.

I like that song.

9. Food should be fun.

I thought of another one! I wonder if I can actually make this a ten-item list?

Anyway.

Pretty much every "rule" on this list can be disregarded, when there's curiosity or playfulness to satisfy. Bam! Just like that. Cultural values.

10. Make your own food, whenever reasonably possible. Or be gracious about it when eating food made by other people.

Get yourself some knives. Get yourself some spoons. Get yourself some ingredients, and pans, and bowls, and supplies, just supplies.

Everybody should know how to cook, just like everybody should know basic first aid. So get to it!

And if somebody else cooked, help clean up, volunteer to make the next meal, tip well, or do whatever gratefully collaborative act is most appropriate for the occasion. Again, don't be a dick about it.

And that's it! I came up with a 10-item list!

To celebrate, I'm linking to the IMDB page for the Beastie Boys' music video for Sabotage..