Foodies: Angela and Me

I don't like to say we're "food snobs". I prefer the term "foodies".

Friday night, Angela and I went to one of our favorite restaurants: Fireside Pies. It's not your typical pizza pie, and for the price they charge it better not be. It was another dinner where Angela and I failed to eat vegetarian, but it was worth it. Laura Currey -- again showing how well she knows Angela and me -- called us "food snobs". We copped up to it, but, thinking about it, the term "foodie" suits us much better. A "foodie" by my definition is one who is very picky about the food he or she ingests. A foodie isn't picky like a child because foodies love all kinds of food. The difference is that a foodie hates food that is poorly made or made of poor quality.

Sometimes it's mental. For example, we avoid high fructose corn syrup like it's the plague. The Dublin Dr. Pepper made with pure can sugar, to me, tastes better than the high fructose corn syrup version. I think it has a cleaner aftertaste. Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm crazy. Either way, I wrote a letter to Blue Bell Homemade Ice Cream suggesting that they do the same thing as Snapple by making a "natural" version of their ice cream. Unfortunately, they responded very defensively with a letter and articles about how high fructose corn syrup is the same as real sugar. Of course, both articles were funded by the corn industry.

Whatever we eat, we try to make sure it is good when it hits our tongue as well as when it is sitting in our bellies. Nobody likes the I-knew-I-shouldn't've-eaten-that feeling. When Angela and I do our budget, we know that we will spend more than Larry Burkett recommends on food, but we want the good stuff. As people who try to be vegans with a sprinkle of cheese (but who still love the taste of meat too much), we want to spend more up front rather than in the long run on our health care costs.

As a result, we feel like we are encouraging others to stand up and say cheap food is not worth the price you pay. We want to taste our food, feel good about it, and make sure the future has plenty of good food left.

I always feel like I should leave a challenge for the reader in the blog. I guess my challenge this time is for you to stay away from the cheapest, fastest food (i.e., McD's, Burger King, Taco Bell, etc.). If you want something quick, take a step up a level: Go to In-N-Out, Chipotle, Which Wich. I'm not telling you to give it up (even though we should). I just want you to do as Which Wich said in the email they sent to me: "Eating healthy at[a place with good food] is like doing pilates for your tongue."