Thoughts on food

“Only if it makes you a pig,” I quip.

“But that’s actually one of the deepest things I’ve heard,” he says, suddenly changing tone. And he’s right. That it’s hopelessly cliched doesn’t change the fact that we are literally made up of digested bits of the organic matter that we shovel into our mouths on a daily basis. At least, the matter that we don’t expel immediately. If you’re reading this over breakfast, try not to dwell too hard on that.

This is why we attach so much importance to food. We select eating clubs based on which ones offer the dietary balances we need. We catalog our food choices so that we can remember every meal we had in the last week. We balance our campus food selections with meticulously scheduled outings to eateries on Nassau whose menus are paragons of culinary virtue.

No? Yeah, I don’t do that either.

Food quality — whether measured by taste, nutrition, sustainability or something else — is integral to the experience of eating it. However, as a campus, we put a strange amount of focus on the social aspects of eating without paying much attention to the food itself. Illustrative of this are the eating clubs — literally eponymous with, well, eating. How many times have you heard someone unfamiliar with Princeton ask, “Your social system centers around culinary clubs?” This is, of course, patently and laughably false. Yes, eating clubs generally have higher-quality food than the residential colleges, and sure, the herbivores among us may feel drawn to vegetarian-friendly Terrace, but I don’t think it would be news to anyone here that taste in food is not what separates the members of different clubs. The Prospect clubs are social institutions, and social life at Princeton is centered about where we eat.

And this is for good reason. Socializing while in class is impossible (difficult? dampened? restricted ever-so-slightly only by some latent desire to listen to the distant lecturer at the front of McCosh 10?). And the opportunities for valuable, lifelong bonding while reading for Death Mech or Macro are somewhat limited. Even with fellow members of student groups such as Band or the ‘Prince’, focus on the All-Important Task At Hand tends to drive conversation toward the practical. It is at meals — when bodies are occupied with necessities but minds are free to roam — that we are able to focus solely on our friends.

Thus, the social self-selection of the eating clubs. Thus, residential college study breaks. Thus, the cult of free cookies and tea that is Murray-Dodge cafe — and the related campus-wide obsession with free food of any sort. Thus, “College Night,” whose weekly occurrence at Whitman has driven us to accuse Whitmaniacs (in tones only partially jocular) of elitism and the administration of social engineering. And thus, “Band Dinner,” that semi-official ritual before our gigs, when we descend upon unready dining halls like a swarm of bawdy, fire-orange cicadas, engulfing more than one of Wu’s long tables with plaid and boater hats. We are, for our time at Princeton, not what we eat but who we eat with.

In all this noise, the food itself becomes a mere set-piece, playing no more role than to draw us to Forbes on Wednesday nights and serve as a last-ditch topic of discussion when conversation is, well, starved.

But pay attention. More thought than you’d think goes into the food served here. Surprising as it is to those of us well-acquainted with the dining halls, prefrosh and out-of-town friends are regularly shocked by the high quality of our food. I was, during my Preview, so long ago.

And it’s not just culinary quality. Terrace and 2 Dickinson Street are not alone in considering the ecological and social impact of their food — the dining halls go out of their way to order local ingredients and label vegetarian and vegan options. Those pamphlets in our napkin holders about how close we are to the farms that raise our blueberries and poultry are more than simple public relations. When we are conscious of what we eat, our culinary experiences are elevated considerably.

I’m vegetarian. I’m not against killing animals for food, nor even against breeding them for this purpose, but living in the West, once home to sprawling ranches and now home to packed feedlots and slaughterhouses, has left me with, as it were, a poor taste in my mouth. But I’m not here to push that on you. I find that any formal structure for thinking about food — from halal and kosher eating practices to locavore and raw vegan diets — increases both the quality of the food and our appreciation thereof.

And it is when we think about it that food bonds us even more, creating a community out of friends eating kosher at the CJL or a gourmet meal at an eating club or a deliciously greasy Phat Lady.