I have a good friend who is from New York City. He spends a great deal of his time evangelizing about how great the restaurants are up there and how we poor, ignorant, small-town hillbillies don’t know anything about food and the eating thereof. Now, there are two things you need to know about my friend, (we’ll call him Pete since that’s his name.) First of all, Pete has lived in Atlanta most of his adult life, and yet, he doesn’t appear to have starved to death during that time. Secondly, he’s talking to a guy who leg-presses close to 300 pounds every time I get out of a chair, so I think I know a little on the subject of chewing and swallowing.
As for the proposition that New York City has better food than Woodstock, GA, this is simply the wrong time of year to pull that one off. Have you noticed that you can’t go to to the dentist, or to buy a pair of shoes or attend a funeral this time of year without somebody trying to give you a few tomatoes. It’s the most amazing display of generosity on earth. If those starving children in China my mom was always telling me about as a kid lived here, they would be on the street begging, “No, please…I couldn’t possibly eat another beefsteak!”
Photo by Jennifer Carter
Let me say, for the record, I don’t like tomatoes. (There will be a brief pause for you to say, as you are obligated to do, “You don’t like tomatoes?) Oh, they’re fine for Ketchup, the occasional spaghetti sauce, or as a base for a fine vegetable soup, but I’m just not a fan of putting them right on top of a perfectly good hamburger or eating them as a side dish. And the problem with fried green tomatoes is that underneath it all is a tomato.
Now, I realize that I am in the minority in my views on tomatoes. If I were any more of an outcast, I could get some government money. But, as it is, I spend about three months out of every year fending off the good intentions of tomato pushers that are perfectly pleasant to be around the rest of the year. You try going into a diner and ordering “a BLT, hold the T.” It is a burden I have to carry.
But, all hope is not lost, my well-meaning friends. We can negotiate on your kindness. While I may not want tomatoes, I notice you have a lot of other delicacies in your garden. I would be happy to take some of that okra, corn, squash or eggplant off of your hands. And ,what is that? A cow? I’d love some of that, thank you.
Photo by Jennifer Carter
See what I mean? We can all live in harmony at harvest time. At least we’re not living in New York City, where we’d have to actually pay for food.
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