Day 10 - During Which I Get Back In The Kitchen

There's a reason why McDonald's is so popular. Oh, I know what you're thinking, "Dave, McDonald's is really bad for you!" Yea, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about. I'm talking about popularity, like back in high school where there was that one girl, and that one guy, who were adored by all. Yea, it turned out that they were total douche bags, and likely are working at McDonald's serving up fries these days, but still, back then, everyone loved them.

McDonald's is pretty much the same thing, but it remains popular. Why? I mean after all, their products pretty much suck, and everyone knows it, right?

Well, that's why they're so popular. Because their product sucks, and everyone knows it. I mean EVERYONE.

Now normally that would lead to a company loosing market share, but it works for McDonald's because they have such brand recognition and everyone has eaten their product at some point in time, and likely still does. Listen here: people lie about McDonald's. They will tell you they don't eat there, but literally everyone does.

I do this exercise with my students where I ask them how many have eaten McDonald's in the last month and out of a room of 40 students, maybe 5 will raise their hands. So then I say, "Let's do this like in the third grade. Everyone put their heads down on the desk, don't look, and you don't even have to raise your hand way up. Just make a slight gesture such that I can notice it. Now, how many people have eaten at McDonald's in the last month?" This time there will only be about 2 or 3 who don't raise their hands. (Those people are vegetarians.) This is what's called Social Conformity Bias. That's when people tell you they do one thing, but really do another, because they're embarrassed about what they actually do. If you think it's not a real thing, you only have to look at Brexit, the FARC vote, or the recent U.S. election of the World's largest Cheeto. People will lie to you about things they're ashamed of, and from what I've seen, almost everyone is ashamed of eating at McDonald's.

So why do they do?

Well, the reason is simple: the burger sucks. It's bad. You know it's bad, but you also know exactly how bad it is. It's all about expectations, and when you're hungry you don't care nearly as much that it is bad, so much as that it is not worse than you expect it to be. McDonald's serves up pure, unadulterated, disappointment, and in doing so, they never fail to meet, or exceed, expectations. Seriously, if you go to McDonald's, and order a burger, and it's not bad, you'll be surprised, and feel like they did a great job. They set the bar so low, that they can't fail to meet it. That is an amazing business model.

Also, it's cheap. REALLY cheap. A Bacon Cheddar McChicken gives you 480 calories/$1. That's some serious bang for your buck.

Anyway, why am I writing about McDonald's? To illustrate the problem with salads. They're stupidly expensive. Those Subway salads I ate, are pretty much just a pile of chopped iceberg lettuce with some spinach, and a few other things, and they run me about $7.50 each.

For Salad #10, I decided to do it up and make a really delicious salad. Let's take a look at the elements:




What we've got there is charred Belgian endive, roasted cauliflower, miso broth, aged gruyere, blistered tomatoes, sautéed mushrooms, toasted pistachios, and caramelized onion. How much did that all cost? $38.50! Now, in fairness, I have left over pistachios and miso, so let's just remove those two wholesale from the equation... $22.50.

With that food I was able to serve my wife and myself, one salad each, and I had left over mushrooms, gruyere, and endive, which I turned into a snack later. That's it. Two salads, and snack. $22.50!

Oh, I can hear you ranting now, "But Dave, you picked really expensive ingredients." Yea, I know, but come on, $10/each for a salad? That's fucking ridiculous, and even if I did choose fancy ingredients which cost more, let's be honest and at least admit that $10 for a salad is fucking insanity.

Do you have any idea how much food I can produce with $22.50? Oh My God!!! Rice and beans just to start with. Fuck! I could feed my family for a week on $22.50, so I'm comfortable with the fact that I spent a lot on expensive ingredients, but damn!

This is what the finished product looked like:



By the way, it was really good, but I swear if there was one thing I didn't think of when I committed to eating salads for a year, it was cost. I figured I'd be saving money, and I know I can, but the haters are ravage me if I do.

See, if I crank out cheap ass iceberg salads I'll get, "Iceberg doesn't have any nutritional value," but if I role with expensive lettuces, like Belgian endive, I'll get crap for that too. I think I'm just gonna have to move on from the haters and do my own thing... And it's going to need to be cheaper.

So, the next time I get in the kitchen, you're gonna be looking at something along the lines of a roasted root vegetable salad... A rice and beans salad, Louisiana style, with andouille sausage just to really mess with your brain. Curried kale salad with purple cauliflower steak. Ancient grain "risotto" salad with marinated tofu. Seriously, I'll do it.

Which one of those ideas would you like to see? Tell me in the comments section here on the blog, and I'll add it to the roster. Let's get weird.

Day 9 - Wherein I Troll The Haters.

Oh what a reaction I've gotten in regards to the Subway salads. I mean, I know some people are just razzing me, and that's cool, I really don't mind. Mainly because if people yank my chain then I've got something to write about.

So, you know, I figured I'd head back on over and gets myself another... Here it is:



That's the chicken, bacon, ranch, sub made into a chopped salad, with spinach, black olives, banana peppers, cukes, and of course, ranch dressing. It was a pretty serious salad, and I actually didn't finish it. I wanted to troll the haters, but in the end, I trolled myself. It only took three, but I'm already bored of the Subway salad, and let me tell you, I was previously rather excited. I do a lot of work right across the street from Subway, and it's very easy to walk over there, but there are not a lot of vegetable options, nor is much of a selection when it comes to dressings. They are kind of boring, but they're easy, and easy goes a long way because making salad yourself is a total pain in the ass.

I'll get to that in detail in the next post.

Until then, which will be in about 30 mins, peace out!

Day 8 - Where I Just Eat a Dumb Salad

There's not much to say about this salad, other than it sucked. Let's take a look, shall we?

Here it is:



There's nothing special about it, and I'm sure people who like salads might actually enjoy it. It's just some mixed greens, with my standard balsamic vinaigrette, a little crumbled bacon, and a chopped hard cooked egg.

The egg is of particular interest, as you'll note that the yolk is a vivid, dark, yellow, indicating that it is VERY fresh. How fresh? Like our awesome across the street neighbor dropped it off the day before from her very own chickens. So, yea, didn't suck. In fact, it was pretty much the only redeeming thing about this salad, and that's saying a lot when you consider that there's bacon on their.

I know it's shocking to hear me say something negative about bacon, but this was low sodium bacon, and it just didn't have much flavor at all.

There is a thing about this salad that matters though: I ate it at about eight at night, when I would normally be getting into a round of fatty, later night snacks. There was a conscious decision to forego my usual treats, and eat a salad. Yep, it's small. It probably didn't have more than 150 calories to it... But that's what I ate instead of a pile of cheese and Triscuits. That's a good choice.

Also, after I ate all the dumb lettuce, I did enjoy the egg, bacon, and dressing, at the bottom of the bowl.

Day 7 - Where I Make it a Week, and the Haters Hate.

I knew the second I stepped through the door of the Subway, with plans to order one of their subs turned into a salad, that as soon as I posted the photo the haters would come out of the woodwork. It absolutly blows my mind that everyone has an opinion, and the first thing they're going to go for is to put you down for your choices, no matter that the choice you're making is a good one.

But first, let's start with the good news: I made it through an entire week of my New Year's Resolution. I mean seriously, what percentage of other fat Americans can say that? We, the fat fucks that we are, have no will power, and lest there be any confusion, fat is actually addictive. You can read about it right here at Scientific American, and you know it's got to be true, because the magazine has the word "Scientific" right there in its name!

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/addicted-to-fat-eating/

That's how science works folks. Just like art, if you say it is, then it is, and Scientific American says they're science, so we can trust this article's veracity to the end of time. That doesn't matter to me anyway, as I don't need no stinking science to tell me what I already know. I'm like George W. Bush on this score... I know it in my gut. Literarily. I can take a look at my gut and know damn well I've been eating too much fat, and yet I still want it the same way a junkie wants the needle. So, I made it a week, and that's no small thing, and I'm sure that a very high percentage of other fat Americans can't make the same claim.

What did I have to honor this auspicious occasion? Another Subway salad of course! It's right across the street from the library, where I was again working on my dissertation, and since there was already hate on the first Subway salad, I was sure that a second would just rile up the haters, and if you haven't guessed by now, I love to stir the pot.

Here it is:



That is a turkey and guacamole chopped salad. Nothing special about it. Nothing wrong with it. It's a pile of greens and spinach, chopped with black olives, banana peppers, turkey, cucumbers, and topped with guacamole. That's number 7, representing a whole week of success, and I was sure that the roughly 100 people who read this blog every day were going to jump right on with a great big, "Good job Dave!" some ataboys, and healthy dose of pats on the back.

Who the fuck am I kidding? I knew there would be screams about Subway, and how their food is shit, and that I was picking bad salads, and sure enough they did. The Facebook post was riddled with condemnation of my choice, so again a little reminder of what I would have eaten. This isn't a culinary blog. This is a guy altering his choices. It's a blog about choices. If I went to any other local restaurant and ordered a chopped salad, where it came out on a nice plate, where a cook had fluffed it up to make it look pretty, these haters would have had nothing but positive things to say. Because it's in a plastic bowl though, and the woman who made it actively pushed it down so the lid would fit, I get hate. But what would I have eaten? Oh, for fuck's sake, I would have gone to town on a foot long meatball sub, with extra cheese, no vegetables, and I would have ordered it on the bread they have that's covered in more cheese. Instead, I ate mostly lettuce, skipped the soda in favor of a bottle of water, and enjoyed the every living shit out of the guacamole.

My big thing though, is this: What's to hate about that salad, and why on Earth would anyone care to attack me for that choice given that I'm a 300 pound lard ass? Is this salad not a good choice, given the available options? I think it is, and wonder why anyone would care to attack it.

What is it? It is just a salad. Nothing special. It's lettuce, spinach, banana peppers, cucumbers, avocado, tomatoes, and just a couple deli slices of turkey with some dressing. I even asked the lady making it to go a little light on the dressing. It's Caesar dressing, which is high in fat, but not the kind of fat I would have gotten from that giant meatball sub. Oh, did I mention that the chopped salads are made with the amount of meat that goes on a 6 inch sub? So, it's already half of what I would have eaten, less calories because the turkey is way leaner than the meatballs, with much, much, much, less cheese. It's mostly vegetables.

All my life people have said to me, "Dave, you need to eat more vegetables," "Your diet is really unhealthy," "You're going to die if you keep eating like that," and so I eat some vegetables, and I get, "You eat a lot of fast food salads." No I don't. I've eaten two!

That's a real post. I'm copying and pasting.

Here's another:

"Subway, and every crumb of food that has ever issued or will ever issue from any of its franchised locations, is depressing as hell."

Really? A salad is depressing? That one got some sub-thread comments of "Preach, brother," and "Amen." Seriously? That's salad #7, which represents an accomplishment. How about a "Wow man, you're really doing it. Good job!" But no... Hate on the salad.

The thing we need to get straight is this: I like fast food. I eat it all the time. I eat fancy French food all the time too. The same goes for Italian, Chinese, and the oh so precious New American... But still, I like fast food and I mean really like it! When I was younger I used to go to Wendy's with my friends and I'd order a Triple Bacon Cheeseburger, with Triple Bacon, Triple Cheese, Ketchup and Mayonnaise only. That was in the late 80's and early 90's when I could eat anything ant not get fat. In those days I was a competitive cyclist, rail thin, but with monstrous thighs, and had an appetite that couldn't be satiated. I needed those calories then, and even if need is a bit bold, I knew I'd burn them off. Sometimes we'd hop across the street to Krispy Kreme and order up a dozen glazed and eat them all in one sitting as a dessert. (Mind you, we only did that if the "Hot Doughnuts Now" sign was on... We're not animals, after all. Even in those days we had high standards. I mean seriously, who eats them cold? Monsters! That's who!) I swear to God that Wendy's owes me money for that burger because it's on their menu now, and they call it the Baconator. Guess who loves that burger? This guy! I should, after all I invented it.

Wendy's says it looks like this:



But really, it looks like this:



The DailyBeast ranks it #1 on its list of the 40 Deadliest Fast Food Meals. That burger is 1330 calories, with 38 grams of saturated fat, 345 milligrams of cholesterol, and get this... 3150 milligrams of sodium! Holy shit!!! Add to that a big old cherry Coke - god I love cherry Coke! - and that thing is fucking deadly, but sure, hate on my salad.

If I slide into a Wendy's this afternoon - and I just might to make the point - and wouldn't order that. I'd probably order the Full Sized BBQ Ranch Chicken Salad, and oh how you readers would hate on that bad boy. It looks like this:



Well, that's how Wendy's says it looks, but in reality it's a pretty ugly mess of yuck, looking much more like this:



I mean honestly, I don't think I'd order it twice, but I'd order it one time just to yank some chains and rattle some cages. You know, that salad has 590 calories, 135 milligrams of cholesterol, 10 grams of saturated fat, 1340 milligrams of sodium. To be sure, it's not "good for you," but it's WAY better for you than a triple Baconator.

What's it add up to? With the cherry Coke, the burger lunch would shake out to 1630 calories. I don't really eat French fries unless they're really good, cooked in duck fat, and come with some insane house made aioli, but I like a little something fried on the side, so I would most likely also order a six piece chicken nuggets. Yea, I know, I know... it's fucking gross. But I didn't get to be this fat by making the right choices. So, with the nuggets, that's another 230 calories, and so much more fat and bad for you everything... Plus I like to have some sauce with my nuggets, usually two ranch dippers, at 200 calories each, bringing us to a grand total of: 2260 calories. That's what I normally call lunch. I would probably eat it by myself, or I might wrangle a friend into joining me by acting like this was a one off kind of thing that we were doing as a lark. "Hey man, did you hear Wendy's has a Truffle burger? Ha! Ha! Ha! We should try that out though, right? It'll be fun."

Normally though, I would sit at a particular table, by the front window, all by myself. I have a procedure. A process. A routine. I take the items off of the tray, because I want to feel fancy, you know... I unwrap the burger, and smooth out the paper so I can dump my nuggets beside the burger. I open up one of the ranch dippers, take the lid off the cherry Coke, because I'm fancy and don't use a straw, place a napkin in my lap, pull out my phone and look at Facebook or the news. Then, I start eating.

By myself.

Occasionally using the napkin to wipe the grease off the cell phone's screen.

And someone thinks my Subway salad was depressing. By the way, that salad? 392 calories, so you know, Bite Me!

Day 6 - Where I Discover Fast Food Salad

I'm going to keep this one VERY short because I've got a bunch of school work to do, and this is pretty simple. Subway, the sandwich fast food chain, will make any sub they offer into a chopped salad. I was working at the local library when I learned this, and there just happened to be be a Subway directly across the street, so I decided to check it out.

Here it is:



That what they call an Italian BMT sub, turned into a salad. It's pretty much an antipasto salad, as it contains Italian cold cuts like salami, mixed up with some black olives, banana peppers, and some cheese. I had it with Caesar dressing, and you know what? It was pretty good.

OK, let the haters come at me now with their bullshit about "Subway sucks..." I'm ready for you.

Day 5 - Wherein I Conform To Your Close-minded Definitions.

I didn't arrive where I am today by what one would call a direct route. I have wandered, swerved, taken the long way, and driven down more than my fair share of dead ends, but all of that is what makes me the guy I am today. This way of living has given me a different thought process than most people - after all, most people will choose the cubical and live and die in it. I'm a creative guy. I think out of the box - whatever the fuck that means. I like thinking about what things mean. I can write you a song, and sing the fuck out of it, on stage, with zero fear. See:



That's me, playing songs, on a stage with no fear.

I can make pretty food. See:



That's a pretty plate.

Hell, I can paint you a pretty painting. See:



That there is a pretty painting.

Sometimes when I'm getting serious about cooking I look like this:



That's me, looking serious.

And other times I look like this:



That pig has wings, and they flap if you pull a string.

The point is that the one thing you can count on from me is that I am likely to surprise you. That's not always a good thing, but sometimes it is, and when it is, it's a hell of a lot of fun. When it's not, well... Things tend to go sideways and people get hurt. That's why I have kind of polarizing personality where people either really like me, or really don't, and in the end I'm sorry when they don't, but being sorry is not the same thing as giving a fuck.

I do like to tease people though, and it's fun for me to get a rise, which I why one of the things I'm enjoying about this salad project is that I get to post pictures of crazy as things and ask if it's salad or not. Some people seem to get the joke, but others seem to really be either confused or actually mad at some of my suggestions.

I'll post a frittata and ask if it's salad. "Salad?" Folks don't always like it. Others think it's hilarious and point out that chopped egg and broccoli with some cheese could very easily fit the description of salad. And you've got to know I'm just straight up trolling you when I post this, and ask if it's salad:



That's my five year old's afternoon snack, or at least what's left of it, but you know, some people seem to take the suggestion seriously. But what if I made a salad of wheat berries with parmesan tuiles, and coupled it with pears - which were originally on the plate. Would that not be salad? So, perhaps my son's snacks can serve as inspiration for future salads, because there's a long way to go on this stupid project, and I'm going to get weirder and weirder.

You've been forewarned.

The weirdness will come, but today is not the day for it. I figured it might be a good idea to let you all know that I do, actually, know how to make a salad. Here it is:



That's a proper salad, and no one can argue that it isn't. That's mixed greens, sautéed mushrooms, shaved carrots, avocado, blue cheese powder, and my ass kicking, balsamic, soy, sesame, vinaigrette.

I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll say it many more times in the coming year, hater's gonna hate. But they can't hate on that. You could put that sucker on any menu, anywhere, and it would stand up to muster by anyone's book. You might get some questions about the blue cheese powder, but it's easily explained. So, I will.

I buy smoked blue cheese - Moody Blue, to be exact - and I store it in the freezer. By the time you get to the end of a container there is just a frozen powder left, so that's what that is. Still, if I wanted to, I could make an actual blue cheese powder, and so could you. VERY easily. In fact it's one of the easiest of the so called "molecular" recipes. Want to impress your friends? Do this: go to Modernist Pantry - tell them I sent you, they're great people - and buy yourself some N-Zorbit-M. Don't be afraid, that's just a trade name. I don't know why they do that as it just scares the hell out of people when they use weird names, but all you're buying is maltodextrin. Still scared? That's just tapioca starch, but the food world likes crazy names. You've been eating this stuff for years. It's how we turn cheeses into powders to put on things like chips. Get it? You're gonna love it.

Don't be afraid of the weights. You're going to think, "What? Seven bucks for 50 grams???" But this stuff is VERY light. Like snow, in Colorado, in January, at the top of a 14,000 foot peak, light, and a little goes a long way. You buy it right here: http://www.modernistpantry.com/tapioca-maltodextrin.html

Start off easy with pure fat. Make some bacon, and save the grease, then put some of it in a bowl. Not much, like a tablespoon's worth. Then put some of the maltodextrin into the bowl and mix it around with the grease. Keep adding the powder until the stuff turns into a texture like sand, then add some more, and rub it between your hands. It will turn into a powder that when you put it on your tongue will instantly disappear leaving only the pure taste of bacon! How cool is that? You're a vegetarian? Use a really nice olive oil, and you'll get Olive Oil Powder! It's very fun.

So, to make blue cheese powder, start by melting some blue cheese powder in some cream. Once you've done that, repeat all the steps above, only this time with the blue cheese cream. At the end you'll have blue cheese powder.

OK then, I've made a salad which no one can refute as anything other than a salad. I ate it for lunch, and it was, OK, but we're all going to need to get on the same page if this is going to last the year. We're going to need to get weird together. We're going to need to think outside of the box, and push the envelope, and seek out synergistic alignments of non-traditional food pairings, or whatever the hell you want to call it.

Let's all try our best to think of what the good Dr. Hunter S. Thompson would do when put in a situation like this. No, I'm not saying we should cut up a box of grapefruits and pour a vial of LSD on them! I'm just sayin' that's the guy who said, "When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

I'm a pro, and you're gonna get a full dose of that this year.

Day 4 - In Which I Make Myself a Fucking Salad!

If you've read the first post of this blog, you'll know that I like to toot my own horn about what an of so great chef I am, and it must make people just want to vomit when some guy goes on like that. Then after having said all that annoying shit, the blog delivers up three days in a row of questionable salads bought from restaurants. The truth is, one of the reasons for that is that I don't like making salads. I mean I don't even like salads, so it stands to reason that I wouldn't enjoy making them either. Still, when you're a chef you do have to make things, and come up with ideas, and keep things fresh, and you know, the same thing goes for being a husband... So I figured I'd make a salad that my wife would really enjoy, and then I'd share it with you folks so you can see what we eat at home, when we don't go out to eat. Which seems like all the time.

So, Salad #4



That's my kind of salad. It doesn't even have any worthless lettuce on it, so you know it's got to be good.

That bad boy right there is made with sautéed shaved Brussels sprouts, pan blistered heirloom tomatoes, alfalfa sprouts, marinated baby bella mushrooms, smoked blue cheese, flat iron steak, and a Balsamic, soy, sesame, vinaigrette.

Let's talk about it a bit, but not too long, because I don't have anything to wax philosophic on today, and after all, that's just a fucking salad. There's no so much we can say.

There is one thing: given that I don't like salad, and many other people don't like it either, this could perhaps turn into a good blog with ideas for people who don't like salad.

First of all, it's got meat on it, so you know it's going to be good. I used flat iron because it's what they had at the store, but what I really prefer is marinated outside skirt steak. This is the stuff that gets mostly used in fajitas, but it makes a good marinating and grilling or sautéing meat too. But they didn't have it so I bought the most over-rated flat iron because it had some good looking fat on it, and it was, just OK.

The other thing going on here is the marinated mushrooms. I marinated these in soy sauce, balsamic vinegar, garlic, red wine, salt, pepper, and a touch of smoked paprika. Then, I sauté them and add to the salad while they're still warm. They have a great meaty flavor that compliments the Brussels sprouts very nicely.

The heirloom tomatoes are small cherry tomato size and this time of year you don't get really good tomatoes, even if they are flown in from half way around the world, so I like to toss them in a screaming hot pan so they blister, and start to pop when the juices stream from the inside out. This results in the tomato being a touch sweeter, but the acid is still there, and nice against the richness of the meat.

Smoked blue cheese is just a gift from above - if you believe in that kind of thing - and I suggest putting it on everything. Hell, I'd eat my own stinky gym sneakers if you put enough smoked blue cheese on them. Seriously, the stuff's that good.

My dressing is pretty much the mushroom marinade, so let me tell you how to make it. There are no measurements to this dressing, and it will help you to understand how simple this shit really is. All these fucking cookbooks go on and on about the precise measurements, to the point where all the top chefs are not trotting out these books with the measurements in grams! Fucking grams people??!!! I mean, if the chef is from a metric system country then, sure, I get it, and of course almost all of them are, but when the chef is an American what they're telling you is, "I'm very precise in my measurements, and you should be too, otherwise your shoemaker and can't play at my level." What pretentious bullshit. Just cook the food Thomas, we are all already suitably impressed by your badassary.

Get a Tupperware container, or something that looks like it that has a good sealing lid. Put into the container some Balsamic vinegar, and some mustard, preferably who grain, or Dijon, but seriously if all you've got is French's Yellow Mustard, that's fine. Also, go buy some decent mustard for Christ's sake, you look like a country bumpkin who eats four hot dogs a day, and we're all judging you. Yes, judging you, and before you ask, "Who are you to judge me?" the answer is, "I'm fucking me!!! I'm no different than anyone else... " We're all judging people all day long. It's like my father always said when I got ready to do something really stupid, "People will talk." Oh I didn't care at the time, and I thought it was insane, but you know what I don't have any tattoos; there are no pictures of me wearing parachute pants; I don't have any piercings; and overall I've turned out just fine.

Of course, people still talk.

Anyway, after you put the vinegar and mustard into the container, add some sesame oil, soy sauce, minced garlic... Wait hang on... We need to talk about garlic.

You can totally buy the pre-minced shit in a jar at the store. Anyone who tells you otherwise can get bent! Yes, it's weaker than fresh garlic, so you know what? Just use more! It's fine, and it also has the added bonus of having liquid garlic juice you can pour into things to jack up the flavor. Seriously, that liquid that the garlic is in, is pure gold! We'd have to get deep into a science lesson to get to the bottom of it, but if you pour that shit into anything savory it will jack the flavor beyond comprehension. It's like MSG... Wait, it's not like MSG, it pretty much is. Which is to say it's packed full of glutamates. (Don't start with me an MSG... If you've got something bad to say, I promise there will be a blog post about it, and you will be made to look silly.)

So, the vinegar, mustard, sesame oil, soy sauce, garlic... How much of each? It doesn't matter. Do it to your taste, but I suggest using your noise rather than mouth because before the oil goes in, you're talking about a lot of vinegar.

So, this is the only ratio you need to know... 1:3 That's vinegar to oil. You can use olive oil, or whatever suits you, but you need a 1:3 ratio of vinegar to oil. That's 25% vinegar, 75% oil. How much of each depends on how big of a batch you want to make. So do that... Add the oil. Then put the lid on the container and shake the ever living shit out of it until it turns a light brown color. Then, salt and pepper to taste - this time you can use your mouth hole to taste it - and spoon it over your favorite salad, or whatever. It makes a great marinade too. Heck it's so good, you might even be able to get away with making a savory cocktail with it. If you do, let me know.

So that folks, is how you make a vinaigrette. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

Day 3 - The Hedonic Treadmill

Only 3 days in and I already hate this project. This is what happened last time, and it's the reason for the unrelenting demand of requiring myself to eat a salad every day. There can be no exceptions, because given the opportunity to skip a day I most certainly will, and one day leads to another, and before you know it, I've blown the whole plan. This time there will be none of that because there will be salad.

Try to picture that being said by Daniel Day Lewis. "There will be salad!"



It's a whole different thing coming out of that guy's pie hole, right?

Anyway, the point is that I'm not exactly the kind of guy who likes to stick to things that I don't like. You can ask almost anyone that knows me, if I don't like a thing, I'm just not going to fucking do it. This salad thing falls into the land of paradox on that score, because while I hate salads, I like being alive. The Salad Paradox is what this is. Yep, it's a scientific discovery. We'll call this whole wrongheaded and misguided walk down the road research. Maybe I can turn it into a degree?

Speaking of research, want to learn about something cool that is actually related to all this business? Behold ladies and gentleman, The Hedonic Treadmill! Well, there's not a picture to go with it, but it's a thing, and it has everything to do with why I like to eat the things I like to eat. It also has to do with why we buy cars, T.Vs. and well, anything, in an effort to keep up with the Jones'. It's also called Hedonic Adaptation, but I like the Treadmill part so I use that name and this is what it is: regardless of how good or a bad a thing is that happens to any one of us, in a short amount of time we will return to a relative level of happiness. Good things, bad things, big things, and little things, all push us and pull us towards joy and sorrow, but after a pretty short amount of time, we slide right back to where we normally are in terms of happiness. If you really want a new car, and you get one, you will be very happy about it for some period of time - that amount of time depends on the individual, but it's really not that long... like 10 days - and then we'll go back to how we felt before. Worse yet, you'll want a better car.

A few years ago I didn't give a shit about cars. I drove whatever. Sometimes I took out loans to buy decent cars, but I always bought used, because cars were not a thing I cared about in terms of my own self-identity. Sometimes I bought $1500 junkers because really, who cares, right? Just so long as it ran well and had four wheel drive, I was fine with whatever.

Then I saw the Ford Fusion, with the very cool Aston Martin looking grill, and I really wanted it. I mean just look at this thing:



That's a damn good looking car, and I really wanted it. So, you know, I bought it. I bought the "Titanium" spec, which means it's got all the bells and whistles. I had some students who were recently raving about all the things the new Testla cars can do, and as they were rattling them off I was thinking, "My car does all those thing..." Like? It has a thing called "Lane Keeping," and when you turn it on, a camera on the front of the car can see the lines on the road and if you start to go over a line it will steer itself back to the middle of the lane! Yea, it drives itself... Kind of. It gets mad if you take your hands off the wheel for too long. Yea, it knows when you've taken your hands off the wheel. It has adaptive cruise control and impact avoidance. So, if I set the cruise control, it knows if someone is going slower than me up ahead and slows down, and then speeds up when they're gone. If I come up on them too fast, it flashes a red light on the windshield and hits the breaks for me! It knows when it's raining and turns on the wipers; can see ahead and dims the brights so I don't have to think about that; it's got voice recognition so I can just tell it what I want it to do, and unlike my wife's Toyota, the voice recognition actually works. Here's the thing that blows my mind: it parks itself! There's a button you can push, and when you do, and if you're driving on a road with cars parked parallel to the road, it will use its radar to see when there's a big enough space to pull into. Then it tells you. Then... Then!!! Seriously... THEN... It pulls in for you! How fucking cool is that? You put the car in reverse, take your hands off the wheel, and let off the brake and it backs into the spot.

Honestly though, it's the grill that I care about. The other stuff is just gravy. Why? Because it looks so much like this grill.




Which is attached to this piece of, "Oh my god, I'm so full of want!"



Can you stand it??? Perhaps you're not into sedans, and want a coupe? OK, I get that. Folks, here's the Aston Martin Vanquish.



Just take a moment to admire that beautiful piece of British machinery.

See? The Hedonic Treadmill.

I don't care about cars. Never really have. I got the Fusion, and the next thing you know, I'm off on flights of fancy about how I want a fucking Aston Martin.

The Fusion cost $36,000. The Aston Martin Vanquish? $287,000!

Now, I don't come from the kind of family that buys cars, or things like cars, in the realm of extravagance. We're sensible people. My parents have a second home - which is sensible because unlike cars, homes appreciate, rather than depreciate - and at this second home they keep a third car, so they can fly to the second home and still have a car. My parents are not the richest people you've ever met, but they're comfortable, and if they wanted to they could splurge and buy something flashy, but they don't. They never have. It's not something they would ever do. The car they have at the second home is a Volkswagen Beatle. I think it's something like 10 years old now. They think it's fun - and it is - they like that it's easy to park - which it is - and I'm sure they've enjoyed that it's pretty low maintenance - which it has been. The point is, those are the people I come from. We don't buy Aston Martins because they're selfish. Why are they selfish? Because for the same kind of money you could buy a beach house, which will gain in value over time, and you can share with your family and friends, and bring enjoyment to others whilst not having thrown money away on a stupidly expensive car. See? Sensible. Don't talk to me about 2008, we think on 20 year time cycles.

Still, "Oh God, I want it so bad!!!!"

Which brings us to the question on everyone's mind: "What the fuck does this have to do with salad?"

Aston Martins, and for that matter any car, are a big purchase. These are things that fall into the realm of what economists refer to as "durable goods." Meaning they should last a long time and are a serious expenses. These are things that one does not buy lightly, but the Hedonic Treadmill - remember the Hedonic Treadmill? This is a post about the Hedonic Treadmill - is not just about big events. So, food is part of it. You know this, because Hedonic is coming from Hedonism, and we all know what that is.

Sure, we think of hedonism as sexual, but it's not. Well, it is, but it's not ONLY sexual. It's about pleasure and how we respond to it. For me food is a great pleasure. I've been called, particularly with regards to food, a bon vivant, so the impact of food on my life might be greater than it is on yours, so that issue of hedonic adaptation may play harder in my brain, but I think it's a thing.

I want MORE.

Most people want a steak. I want an A1 Kobe Steak. I want more cheese. I want more foie gras - don't judge me, the stories you've heard are wrong. They don't force feed them anymore, it's fine! While I'm having more in terms of upping the quality, I also want more quantity. Yes, I want three orders of the duck fat fries with house made aioli. I just want it all!

But, I didn't start out like this.

My hedonism has grown over time, and my wants and desires, and expectations have grown, to the point where very little satisfies. When it comes to food, I eat with gusto, and it is indeed a part of the very fabric of my self-identity, so when I had my salad today it was a gut punch to my personal reality.

It's not so much that I have a problem with the salad. It was tasty enough - particularly after I smothered that bad boy in blue cheese dressing - but I ate it at a pizza joint where I LOVE their pizza. They had meatball pizza by the slice today, which means I could have had it instantly. You know what I mean? When the pizza is already made, and they reheat it? When that happens I only want it just warmed up so I don't have to deal with the insufferable wait for it to cool from molten hot. (I mean, let's be honest, that's why we like pizza delivery so much, right? Because by the time it gets to us it's the exact right temperature to just nom nom nom that whole damn pie!)

So I passed on one of my favorites, and I ate this:



It was good enough, I suppose, but I wanted that meatball slice so bad. By the time I was done eating this, and I didn't finish it, I was just kind of holding the fork, dangling from my fingers like a man staring into the abyss.

I know I'm fighting with monsters. I know I've already become the monster. That salad though, and in particular that salad, is the abyss, and I can tell you friends, it stared back.

***Leave a comment if you picked up on the Alice's Restaurant reference.

Day 2 - In Which I Tell You What The Fuck A Salad Is

Now let's get something straight, I'll tell you what a salad is, not the other way around. Why? Because I'm the chef here, and while some of you might also be chefs, or have fooled around in a professional kitchen back in your younger days, or might be damn good bartenders, with few exceptions those of you reading this don't operate at the level I do. What level is that you ask? I'm glad you did, because there is naturally going to be some amount of dick measuring anytime someone makes some kind of subjective statement like I just did. So where have been? What kitchens have I been in charge of? Did they have any accolades? How's six AAA Four Diamonds; Three New York Times Four Stars; One Zagat Top Ten; and recently a Relais and Chateaux property. Along the way you can include a massive number of locally awarded and respected joints ranging from food carts and ice cream parlors, up to high volume tourist destinations, a ski resort, and much more than I don't even care to get into. Beyond that, I've got a master's degree in hospitality and tourism management, with a focus on restaurants; taught all the hospitality and tourism courses at Greenfield Community College; and was Lecturer of Food Production Management at The University of Massachusetts, Amherst, the #4 hospitality and tourism program in the country. I'll tell ya', I didn't get this fat by not being VERY into food.

So, I hope that serves to the settle the, "How full of shit is he," question that popped into your head after I made claims to operating at a very high level, and in doing so, positing the case that I am uniquely qualified to refute your intrinsic concepts of what is, and what is not, a salad.

To that end, let's talk about todays "salad."

Here it is in all it's glory...



Oh, I can hear you already. "Dave, that's not a salad. That's a cheese plate." Some of you might get all fancy and say, "Dave, that's charcuterie." Hell some of you may even know how to pronounce that word, but fuck that! That my friends, is a salad. Look closely there. See that green shit? That's frisee, which is a kind of chicory, which is a biter lettuce Sure, there's only a small amount, but it's not the only vegetable on the plate. That's right... Look closely and you'll see pickled carrots - the fancy tri-colored kind, with the tops on that let you know you're going to pay out the nose for this lunch - pickled cauliflower - what can I say, the fancy chefs are pickling everything these days, and frankly it's getting anoying AF, but it is what it is - and even some cornichon, which are fancy little pickles. There was another thing in there which I could not identify, nor could I chew it, which I think was some kind of really old turnip. (Hey, if I was trying to offload that on the post holiday lunch crowd I would have called it, "House Aged Gilfeather Turnip," so I get that the B-Team lunch cooks were trying to stick some garbage on my plate and call it food, but whatever, I digress.)

"But come on Dave, it's mostly meat, cheese, and bread..." 

OK, that's fair, but let's talk about bread and salad. Ever hear of a panzanella salad? Here's a picture of one, just so we can all be on the same page. 



That's a bread salad! It's MOSTLY bread. This thing is supposed to be made with capers, olives, tomatoes, basil, oil, good vinegar, fresh mozzarella cheese, and yea... bread! The fuckers who made the version in this picture just decided to skip out on most of the good stuff and make the thing with bread and some cherry tomatoes. That picture comes from a YouTube video, and they've got 171,000 hits! I've got a couple of YouTube videos of my band playing and the most we've got is a little over 300 hits, and we're not half bad. In relative comparison, we're a shit ton better than that pathetic excuse for a panzanella salad! Here's a link, you can judge for yourself. It's not a good video, and I look like a fool, but we rocked the hell out of that St. Paddy's Day show! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bARKEq67wM

There's room for interpretation here, is what I'm getting at, but let's look at from the other side. A side where I show you something very pretty, perfectly executed, and yet inexplicably named something that you wouldn't typically think it was... An antipasto salad.

Here's what you would normally think of...



This is the kind of thing that comes from a pizza joint, or a chain "Italian" restaurant, and it's got the usual suspects: rolled cold cuts, bad mozzarella, some olives, the requisite pepperoncini, a pile of lettuce, and some kind of dressing. You pick.

I recently worked on a project with a woman who I think might be the best chef in Vermont, and we did a wine dinner together. She put an antipasto salad on her menu as well, only it didn't look like that slop above. Here's her's.



It's beautiful. Simple. Very thoughtful in flavor pairings, and is not a pile of lettuce and meat. In fact, it's three small pieces of Vermont Smoke and Cure pepporoni, local heirloom tomatoes, very thin sliced local fontina, garden basil, flowers, and pickled peppers. (I told you about the pickling thing, right? She's good, but since she's in the thick of the whole what's hot now thing, she had to pickle everything in sight. I don't hold it against her. She's a bad ass!)

The thing about that salad is this: is it really an antipasto salad? I mean, there's not a lot of meat on there. Where are the cold cuts? In reality it could just as easily be called an heirloom tomato salad, and one could argue that would be more accurate of a description. But no, she called it antipasto, and antipasto it shall be, because why? Because fuck you is why! You get good enough to play at her level and you can argue about what she calls what, but until then you're just going to have to take it from the pros as to what's called what.

Get it? Got it? Good.

Now, back to today's lunch salad. It's got the meats, and enough vegetables to fit the description of an antipasto salad, so if you like, think of it that way. The ratio of bread might argue for it being a panzanella salad. So, if that suits you go for it. Indeed, it was menued as charcuterie, but I'm gonna call it a salad, because... I can. I've worked hard in the industry long enough that I can take these liberties, and also, because it being a salad, or not, is not the point. 

The point is what I would have eaten. Remember that from the first post? Yea, I'm making choices that are about substituting one thing over another thing. Here are some of the things that I DIDN'T eat when I made the choice to eat the salad I ended up ordering... 

Appetizers

French Fries with Bone Marrow Mayonnaise. Seriously!!! Come on! I didn't eat this today!

Au Gratin Potato Bites. Oh that seems simple enough, right? Did I mention the description included Foie Gras Mousseline and Black Truffles? Fuck! I'm dying here. I can't believe I didn't eat this. 

Smoked Pig's Ears, with IPA Cheddar Fondue and Collard Greens. FONDUE!!!! I turned down cheese fondue. Don't read this and then hate on my interpretation of salad. No way!

Bone Marrow Poutine. Full Stop. I had salad. Don't judge me!

Scotch Quail Eggs. Look, do you even know what a Scotch Egg is? It's a hard cooked egg, wrapped in sausage, breaded, and deep fried. Can you stand how good that sounds??? If you've never had one, you're missing out on a huge part of what it means to be a human on this planet, and I didn't order them!

Those were just the appetizers. What pray tell might the entrees have included?

Well that had a burger with foie gras on it... Yea, they call it the Fancy Burger, and it comes with foie gras and truffle aioli. Someone may have ordered this burger today, but it wasn't me, and that's a serious accomplishment. Suck it haters! 

Braised Pork Short Rib Gnocchi. Oh, that sounds pretty damn good, if I don't say so myself, but they just kept on going. The description included cured pork cheek and pork belly. That's three kinds of awesome swine in one dish, and have I mentioned how much I like eating pigs?

Smoked Maple Braised Duck Cassoulet! I mean come on people, it was made with wild boar bacon, one of my favorite things on Earth, and I DIDN'T EAT IT!!

Instead, I ate a salad. Sure, it might not be what you're accustomed to calling a salad, but names just words, and the culinary world is no longer ruled by the likes of Escoffier so it does as it pleases.

In relative comparison to the options put before me, I think I chose wisely, but you know, haters gonna hate.

Day 1 - Checking back in With Salads and our friends at 99 Restaurant.

As so many of you know, a couple of years ago I started a blog called 100 Salads. The idea was that I would, over the course of a year, eat 100 salads, replacing 100 meals that would otherwise have continued to make me fat... Interestingly, it got a lot of traction, with many people following. Well, about a hundred, but for me that's a big deal, and I was excited to write about my experience, but I let it drop off. Honestly, I don't like salads, but I know that I need to try to eat more healthily, and one way to do that is to eat more salads.

I got a lot of heat for some of the salads I would choose - like a Cobb Salad at 99 Restaurant - but I wasn't clear in the original post that the point was to replace something I would have eaten with a salad, so I had to explain about that Cobb Salad. It was simply once I broke it down, and people seemed to really respond to the concept.

It goes like this... The Cobb Salad was something like 800 calories. Many argued it was just as bad as whatever else I would've eaten. No, it was just as bad as whatever else they would've eaten. See, I know this because I know what I chose that salad over: the Chicken and Sausage Al Forno, would clocked in at 1600 calories. I would have eaten the hell out of that dish, and would have eaten every last bite. So, I saved 800 calories by choosing the Cobb Salad. To me it makes perfect sense, and it seems like a way that I can fill up on food - because I like that feeling - but take in less calories. Further, there's no denying that the lettuce, asparagus, and tomatoes, are good for me, and get some fiber into me, so there are upsides as well. Sure, the bacon, egg, and blue cheese dressing I choose are not great, but they're an excellent change from the giant pasta dish I would have had. I get flavor and cut 800 calories.

So, I'm going to try it again, but this time I'm not fucking around. Last time, with the 100 salad concept, I had room to say, "Nah, I'm gonna eat what I want today," and "today" became so many days that I gave up. This time around... EVERY DAY. There's no escape pod... If I don't eat a salad every day I've failed, and my completion of this project will become January 2nd, 2018, rather than the first. That's the way it will go... Always nipping at my heals.

So, why do this at all? Well, because I'm a fat fucker, but I like to eat, and I don't want to stop eating, and I don't want to feel like I can't go to town on a 32 ounce, bone-in, cowboy ribeye, because that's how I fucking roll!

I ate a salad today... For old time's sake I went with the Cobb Salad at 99, but I did something else differently, I had water with my salad, instead of a Coke, which I would have had a refill of as well. Do you have any idea how many calories are in a Coke? A single Coke at 99 has 300 calories in it, and I would have had two. So, now I've saved 1400 calories! Fuck-n-A! That's insanity!

I would have had a 2200 calorie lunch, but instead I had an 800 calorie lunch... So feeling pretty good about that choice I add on a crock of French Onion Soup at 270 calories, and rounded out my meal at 1,070 calories. I didn't eat breakfast - I usually don't - so that's where I'm at here on Day 1.

So what's all of this mean?

I currently weight 300 lbs.!!! That's up from the 256 I got down to a year ago. I used the Weight Calculator at http://www.precisionnutrition.com/weight-loss-calculator and found that in order to reach my goal weight in 365 days, I need to consume 2,019 calories a day. If I wanted to stay 300 lbs. I would need to consume 3,296 calories a day. My goal weight is 225, a weight at which I look very good because I'm 6'4". I told the calculator that I am very sedentary, which I am, but it gave me options to up my activity level, and it would factor that into the calculation. I left those blank, and will revisit exercise when it's not 20 degrees. When it warms up, if I get out on the handy bike my wife got for me last year, I'll lose weight faster. Once I get to 225, the calculator says I can eat more and maintain my weight. How much more? At 225 I'll be able to eat 2,732 calories a day and maintain my weight, and that's without a lick of exercise!

Now, I know a bunch of you fitness nuts are going to get on me about this choice, but I like that. I want to argue with you, and debate the relative merits of the decisions I'm making. That kind of thing will motivate me to prove you wrong, and that's good for me! (Yea, I can be selfish like that.)

You're going to see me eating salads that are covered in meat, creamy dressings, cheeses, and all the things you think are bad for us. At times, you're going to question my very definition of the word salad, but I don't care. I will try to explain my choices, and also lay my choice against the alternative, which will help to clarify what a great choice the salad was, no matter how unhealthy you may think it is.

For example, as I talked about above, I ate a Cobb Salad today. It looked like this:



Damn! That can't be healthy at all, right? Look at that meat, cheese, dressing! That's bad for you. Well, it might be bad for you, but it's good for me. Why? Because...



That's what I would have eaten.

A friend of mine once asked me the very simple question, "How many people do you know who are both 60 years old and 300 pounds?" So wish me luck!








300