Spoilt for choice
But Then Again
Can’t stomach it: Too much variety can result in indigestion.
I mean to say, there’s nothing worse than paying for the latest iPhone while having the features of the latest Samsung phone dancing tantalisingly around the inside of your head. Or lying on a beach in Turkey while wondering if the ski holiday you considered might have been a better option. Or looking at facelift packages when your butt is sliding down the back of your thighs and could be made perky for the same price.
And don’t get me started on food choices. I try to avoid restaurants that have a menu the size of a telephone directory. Any decent restaurant, in my opinion, shouldn’t diversify to the extent that its options take up more than three pages.
I once had dinner at a restaurant where I was presented with a complimentary bread basket containing 20 different types of bread. This baked abundance came with five different types of butter, resulting in a whopping 100 possible bread/butter combinations. I felt an ulcer coming on just thinking about it.
Restaurants should really confine themselves to only two choices of bread: Brown and white. I’m not a big fan of white bread, so I’d be laughing all the way through my first course. Of course, that’s assuming I could decide whether to have the pate de foie gras, or the barbecued prawns, or the fresh air-flown oysters, or the grilled peppers…
In fact, the more I think about it, the more I feel that first courses should be outlawed altogether. We should just cut to the T-bone, or the pork loin chop, or the rack of lamb … And while we’re at it, let’s confine menu options to just a few dishes made from each type of meat.
Whenever my son comes home to visit, he loves to go to a certain restaurant that boasts about 50 different steak options. We can study the menu until our eyes glaze over, and our waiter considers ejecting us from the premises because no order is forthcoming after half an hour, and we still won’t be any closer to making up our minds. After much hemming and hawing, we usually end up ordering two different steaks, so we can try each other’s meal, declare the other’s more superior, and switch plates before we’re done – proving that indecisiveness must be genetic.
I think my indecisiveness stems from a childhood that was lacking in choice. My mother was an excellent cook, but she had a limited repertoire. Indeed, if someone had bashed me on the head with a blunt instrument way back then, causing me to fall into a coma for several days, upon regaining consciousness I would have been able to tell you which day of the week it was just by asking my mother what we were going to have for dinner.
You see, although we had something different for dinner every day of the week during the latter more affluent days of my childhood, the day on which a particular dish was presented never varied. There was beef stew on Monday, haggis on Tuesday, Shepherds Pie on Wednesday, bangers and mash on Thursday, fish on Friday, a fry-up on Saturday, and a roast on Sunday.
There are some people who might regard this as culinary boredom, but I never tire of this predictable diet. Indeed, if it wasn’t for my need to watch both my cholesterol and my waistline, I’m sure I could easily revert to this weekly dinner menu.
Even on those special occasions when my parents took my siblings and me to a restaurant to eat, we would always order the same thing. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it did leave me ill-prepared for the myriad choices that would confront me in my adult life.
Now, just in case you’re thinking otherwise, my indecisiveness doesn’t mean that I’m not adventurous when it comes to food; quite the opposite, in fact.
If there are deep-fried octopus hearts on the menu, I might be persuaded to give them a try. So long as the restaurant doesn’t also offer stuffed sea slugs au gratin and pickled ostrich beaks under the same section, I’ll be fine.
But Then Again
By MARY SCHNEIDER
Can’t stomach it: Too much variety can result in indigestion.
It’s great to have choices – in moderation.
VARIETY is not always the spice of life, because too much of it can result in indigestion and regret. Choice is a good thing, but only in moderation. When I’m presented with too many choices, I usually end up in a confused state of indecision that either causes me to make all the wrong choices or renders me paralysed and incapable of making a decision.I mean to say, there’s nothing worse than paying for the latest iPhone while having the features of the latest Samsung phone dancing tantalisingly around the inside of your head. Or lying on a beach in Turkey while wondering if the ski holiday you considered might have been a better option. Or looking at facelift packages when your butt is sliding down the back of your thighs and could be made perky for the same price.
And don’t get me started on food choices. I try to avoid restaurants that have a menu the size of a telephone directory. Any decent restaurant, in my opinion, shouldn’t diversify to the extent that its options take up more than three pages.
I once had dinner at a restaurant where I was presented with a complimentary bread basket containing 20 different types of bread. This baked abundance came with five different types of butter, resulting in a whopping 100 possible bread/butter combinations. I felt an ulcer coming on just thinking about it.
Restaurants should really confine themselves to only two choices of bread: Brown and white. I’m not a big fan of white bread, so I’d be laughing all the way through my first course. Of course, that’s assuming I could decide whether to have the pate de foie gras, or the barbecued prawns, or the fresh air-flown oysters, or the grilled peppers…
In fact, the more I think about it, the more I feel that first courses should be outlawed altogether. We should just cut to the T-bone, or the pork loin chop, or the rack of lamb … And while we’re at it, let’s confine menu options to just a few dishes made from each type of meat.
Whenever my son comes home to visit, he loves to go to a certain restaurant that boasts about 50 different steak options. We can study the menu until our eyes glaze over, and our waiter considers ejecting us from the premises because no order is forthcoming after half an hour, and we still won’t be any closer to making up our minds. After much hemming and hawing, we usually end up ordering two different steaks, so we can try each other’s meal, declare the other’s more superior, and switch plates before we’re done – proving that indecisiveness must be genetic.
I think my indecisiveness stems from a childhood that was lacking in choice. My mother was an excellent cook, but she had a limited repertoire. Indeed, if someone had bashed me on the head with a blunt instrument way back then, causing me to fall into a coma for several days, upon regaining consciousness I would have been able to tell you which day of the week it was just by asking my mother what we were going to have for dinner.
You see, although we had something different for dinner every day of the week during the latter more affluent days of my childhood, the day on which a particular dish was presented never varied. There was beef stew on Monday, haggis on Tuesday, Shepherds Pie on Wednesday, bangers and mash on Thursday, fish on Friday, a fry-up on Saturday, and a roast on Sunday.
There are some people who might regard this as culinary boredom, but I never tire of this predictable diet. Indeed, if it wasn’t for my need to watch both my cholesterol and my waistline, I’m sure I could easily revert to this weekly dinner menu.
Even on those special occasions when my parents took my siblings and me to a restaurant to eat, we would always order the same thing. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it did leave me ill-prepared for the myriad choices that would confront me in my adult life.
Now, just in case you’re thinking otherwise, my indecisiveness doesn’t mean that I’m not adventurous when it comes to food; quite the opposite, in fact.
If there are deep-fried octopus hearts on the menu, I might be persuaded to give them a try. So long as the restaurant doesn’t also offer stuffed sea slugs au gratin and pickled ostrich beaks under the same section, I’ll be fine.
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