Food Experiments, Inc.

I put on my experimenting hat this morning. Fridays, as everyone in the world knows, is the main baking day at our farm. We primarily bake fruit pies (ollalieberry, apple, strawberry-rhubarb, strawberry, etc), with the occasional foray into the non-fruits, such as pecan and pumpkin cheesecake (though, technically, pumpkin is fruit). However, due to a mild jolt of inspiration, I took several pie crusts and attempted a savory pie experiment. Sliced tomato, mushroom, fresh basil, cheese, salt and a dash of olive oil, with a milk-brushed crust on top (I can’t stand noun-verb hyphenations, so why did I just use one?). I have to say that they came out amazingly well. I need to fiddle with different cheeses and, more importantly, saute the mushrooms first in order to reduce liquid.

How odd that life has brought me to this place of tomato-mushroom pies.

In other news of food experiments, I’m sure you’ve heard that Mayor Bloomberg of New York City, in his infinite and paternal wisdom, has decided to outlaw large, sugary drinks. I hereby confer on him the International Fathead of the Year Award. No one with their brain inserted correctly is going to argue that imbibing copious amounts of sugary drinks is good for your health. That’s not the issue. The issue is whether or not the Government is supposed to be our Nanny, shepherding us along a risk-free, carefree, sugar-free path, tightly fenced on either side with the barbed wire of bureaucratic benevolence.

I’ll answer that question on behalf of the subset of humanity that possesses functioning brains. No.

Bloomberg, so far, has outlawed transfats, smoking in private bars and restaurants, and requires calorie counts at fast food outlets. Also, he is attempting to have a say in how much salt restaurants can put in their food. Again, I’m not going to argue that any of these things are necessarily healthy (of course, you need a certain amount of salt in your diet). Rather, the issue is simply about who is responsible. Are you responsible for your choices, or is the government responsible for your choices? I wonder when we’ll arrive at the moment when the government is no longer satisfied with telling us what not to eat, but will start telling us specifically what to eat?

“Eat your spinach.”

Who does that remind me of? Oh, yes. My mother.

Sometime in the near future, I’m confident that the pies we bake on our farm, regardless of fruit, will be regarded as illegal contraband in New York.