What should I make for dinner?
Tyler Cowen has made me laugh with his book Discover Your Inner Economist. But, he has also made me think about markets, narratives, efficiency and the little things that I can do to improve my quality of life. I've already discussed his chapter on high culture. In a later chapter, he also makes some interesting observations about food. Some of his suggestions, I am going to implement and see how they work for me.
I usually operate under the notion that if I can make it at home, I don't want to eat it at a restaurant. I like this guideline for two reasons. First, I enjoy a challenge in the kitchen. Sure, there are other people out there that make a much nicer pumpkin curry. People with a proper background in the art of curry-making who learned from their Mother or Grandmother or Aunties instead of the internet, but my pumpkin curry is still pretty good and it is a lot of fun to hollow out a pumpkin and then to serve guests a meal in the pumpkin shell. The second reason is that I feel that eating out should be a celebration of exploration. I like my trips to restaurants to be interesting, challenging and fun and part of the fun for me is eating something I've never tried before, or something that I've never seen cooked that way before, or eating something that I always mess up at home.
Some of Dr. Cowen's suggestions are in line with my "eating out should be an adventure" guideline. He suggests that when you go to a fancy restaurant, you should order the most disgusting sounding thing on the menu. His idea? Anyone can roast a reasonably serviceable chicken. Not everyone can make Cow's brains taste like something of which you want to take a second bite.
Another suggestion he makes is that when you eat at home, you should eat healthfully. This makes perfect sense, at least for me. Since I am the one making a majority of my meals, I should focus on the skills the create healthy and tasty meals. An obvious bonus of this is that if I only eat healthy things at home, I should end up healthier in the long run. But, the other bonus is if you leave the junk food for outside the house, after you've had the awesome plate of cow's brains (after a started including some foie gras, of course) when someone offers you Baked Alaskan for dessert, you don't have to say no.
So, I look forward to implementing some of these suggestions, especially now that summer and CSA season is here.
