Of Mantras and Men [sic]

One of the less promising developments in our vocabulary in general and our culinary vocabulary in particular is the ever increasing use of the term “so good.” This pithy descriptor annoys me to no end. Applebee’s bread: so good. The chicken nuggets at the cafeteria: so good. That meat thing at that one Middle Eastern place: so good. Some crappy bullshit at an unimpressive bar... you get the idea. If you haven’t gotten the idea, here it is: First, as the examples show, this epithet always follows a monologue regarding a specific item at a specific locale. The item and the place are always mediocre, middling. Usually the aura of the speech act suggests that this little treat is something I have not tried or have under-appreciated. I am, of course, lesser for the lack. I think that often these fools assume that since I cook, write, and talk about food that I actually like eating. I don’t. In fact, despite what I may lead others to believe, I increasingly despise food and eating. That’s why I started this blog: sublimation. All of this makes my hatred of “so good” (the saying, not the blog, though I guess there's a connection) so much stronger. It goes without saying that I am not pleased with the man known as “Mr. Food” who has taken up “so good” as his battle cry. This brings me to my second point.

No one describes a meal at Le Bernardin or St. John as “so good.” Hell, even a burger on the grill gets better treatment. When food is truly enjoyed its description should emerge as a culinary-linguistic performance piece. The passion with which the meal is described should approach a form generally reserved for erotics of the most vile and fantastic sort. When food is truly great one should swoon, get lost in a hoodoo-trance and reemerge into consciousness weeping. This is, perhaps, asking a lot but it brings us to my third point.

Along with the foodie explosion of the last few years has come a certain democratization of taste. While the movement’s elite get all in a froth over “Fresh, Sustainable, Local; Fresh, Sustainable, Local” they limit their passions to foods once thought only fit for peasants, or maybe freaks. For sure this mantra is beginning to sound a lot like this:



There was a time after all when eating local was a form of dietary slavery. So while this elite neo-provincialism blooms so does the pedestrian desire to join in the chorus. People used to wolf down the mediocre food of their little berg in grudging silence. Now everyone wants to share: “So Good! So Good!”

This brings me to my final point. Food reviews (professional ones) have always been a great source of colorful vocabulary and metaphor. Unfortunately, as the English language tops 1,000,000 words it seems like foodie-speak has access to fewer and fewer of them. For sure culinary mediocrity pairs nicely with simple language but the overall blandness of the food we put in our mouths and the words we spit out of them is a bummer. Maybe we should think more and talk less about food. Maybe we need to realize that eating food does not a foodie make. Maybe we ought to see that “so good” and “fresh, sustainable, local” are both dumb mantras that stand in for real thought – D.U.M.B: