Questions of taste

Dear Chef,

—Jonesing for Mojo

Dear Jonesing,

I don’t think it’s your imagination. Raw, living foods really are good and tasty.

First suggestion: You can make a salad by grating those carrots, onions, and garlic in your basement. They might not be leafy greens, but they’ll give you that raw foods energy burst. That’s what they do in Siberia, since they can’t run to the store like us tender-skins and get watercress, romaine, and baby spinach. Actually, that does sound pretty good.

Second idea: consider growing sprouts. Many seeds and grains, from mung beans to sunflower seeds to quinoa to wheat, will easily sprout, and the sprouts have the chlorophyll and vitality of spring shoots.

Soak 1 tablespoon of seeds or one-third cup beans in 1 quart of tepid water overnight. The next day, rinse the seeds thoroughly in tepid water and drain. Place in a quart jar covered with a dampened washcloth. Fasten with a rubber band and store in a dark cupboard. Rinse the seeds or beans twice each day. Make sure excess moisture is drained off each time. Depending on what you’re sprouting, it will take 2-5 days.

And if you have to buy a few salads from California, it isn’t the end of the world. After all, California can’t be that far away, judging from all the darn Californicators everywhere. And by the way, that Slow Boat rule is Bill McKibben’s, not mine. Only food that could have arrived on a slow boat from China, - like canned and dried things, not frozen or even refrigerated.

Dear artist formerly known as Chef Boy Ari,

—Salivating As (I) Look At De Salad

Dear SALADS,

Well, as you remind readers in your greeting, I’m no longer Chef Boy Ari. And I must say, this question is interesting, especially to a nickname-less columnist like me. Could this be the start of Mr. Demeanor? If I were a chick I could call myself Miss Demeanor—scandalous!

Meanwhile, Mr. Demeanor’s apparent inability to answer your question—evidenced by the lack of any substance in the response thus far—seems nothing sort of fraudulent.

Right. OK, lemme see here. Is it wrong to steal lettuce from a corporate field?

Well, given the information you’ve provided, I’d say the fact that you really like lettuce is not enough to make stealing a few heads okay even if, presumably, nobody is directly hurt by the crime. (I mean, what do you expect me to say, SALAD?)

Yeah, it’s a little wrong. Just a little. Of course, premeditation makes it worse. And now you’ve dragged me into it, in public, no less. Conspiracy. We might as well be discussing this in a Minneapolis airport men’s room, Skypeing from adjacent stalls.

Obviously, what’s most important is that nobody gets busted, especially me. And then, for you anyway, it’s important to figure out what kind of chemical crap they dump on their corporate lettuce.

Anyway, you won’t see me telling you to strike quickly in the dark when the lettuce is cool, and then wash it very carefully. You just won’t.

Dear Flash,

—Frustrated Falafel Fancier

Dear F3,

Although your letter was more of a comment than a question, I decided to run it because something like that happened to my dad once, and had he hooked up with this other chick he might not have met my mom. So there! Unless you are calling me a weak baby, it seems even rotten falafel can breed strong ones—but only if it’s meant to be, which in your case, clearly, it wasn’t.

Effects on future generations aside, the take-home lesson of your experience seems to be that too much of a good thing, even falafel, can still make you feel awful. And beans, including the chickpeas of which falafel is usually made, are serious business. When not refrigerated properly after cooking, for example, beans can turn into a high-risk food on par with pork. So you might as well have been eating fried pork over there on the streets of Israel … oh wait, I guess not, probably.