Fast Food Nation

To prepare for my interview on "Alimentation" (which is on Monday, the 17th, if you happen to, say, make a trip to the grotto that day . . . ), I just read Fast Food Nation. If you've never read it, and if you ever eat at McDonalds, or if you ever eat anything that you didn't grow in your back yard, I recommend a trip a to the library. Perhaps the most memorable line from the book went something like this: "You're better off eating a carrot that you dropped in your toilet than one you dropped in your kitchen sink." Some scientists studied the toxic matter found in "average" American kitchens and those found in the average American toilet and found that the kitchens were worse than the toilets. This is mostly because of the - literal - shit that comes with a good portion of the meat you buy at the store. So - I think the lesson is: Grow tomatoes in your back yard and go out and kill a deer!

It is a worthwhile read, though, and I recommend it. I'll also comment that it's grossed me out because I seem to continue finding myself in living situations that are just filthy. I can't understand how people live like this. If you don't have any choice - if you don't have any water, if you don't have a house - then ok, the problem the lies elsewhere. But if you have a house, running water, and a market down the street that sells things like ashtrays (not used in my house: They use the toilet instead, which, along with other hygeine fouls, perhaps discounts the idea of eating a carrot out of the toilet), dish soap, towels . . . why not just wash your plates??? It just seems so easy to me.

Right, back to the topic of food. And here's a happy comment, and an invitation for you to participate in the blog! I had my first Roman pizza the other day: super-thin, slightly crunchy crust, the pizza as big as a plate - super! I went with Giovanni, one of my language exchange buddies, and we talked about Pizza: Roman-style vs. Naples-style, the Sicilian variation on the Naples style, and foccaccia as an ever thicker style that really shouldn't qualify as pizza but as another breed of food (oops, "alimentation"!) altogether. His conclusion: Our thick pizzas in the USA really aren't true pizzas; they're more of a pizza-fied foccaccia, super-sized becaused everything in the USA is super-sized :) . I said I'd like to get some photos for his expert consultation. So here's the debate: "American Pizza: Is it really pizza?" Here's what I'm thinking. Can you guys take some photos of different pizzas - Pino's Sicilian, Just Pizza, LaNova, ChickNPizza Works, whatever you have . . . and we'll post them here for "expert analysis"? I think Giovanni has volunteered to be the panel's expert :)

Thanks, everyone! Let the Pizza debate begin!