Drunken Lies

Today was a pretty typical Monday, which is bad enough in itself, but I also stayed up until 4:00am the night before to finish a paper that I learned later that day would only be a rough draft for peer review...

But there's always lunch as a quick pick-me up! What wonders would the world of cafeteria dining hold for me today? A quick look at the menu online had me deciding between pork loin and drunken noodles. Normally pork loin is a good thing, but when you've had to use pints of mustard to add any semblance of moisture to the cut of meat you become wary of it as a food option. I also have a crippling weakness for Asian food regardless of quality. Seriously, if soy sauce is a reasonable topping I will indulge. And so, the decision was made.

I get to the cafeteria and there is the wonderful Trudy waiting to serve me the Asian goodness. Trudy does nothing but smile and ask you how your day was, a mom away from mom. Automatic +1 pepper points for whatever meal she serves.

She spoons a pile of vegetables and shaved pork onto my plate covered in an indistinguishable brown sauce (which she'd later reveal as ginger sauce accompanied by a wink). Upon sitting down I looked at my meal: zucchini, squash, carrot, pork, a few other assorted vegetables.... but no noodles!

My head reeling from the lies I had been fed, I struggled to piece together the shambles of my lunch in a meaningful  way. That's when my friend, as if by divine intervention, revealed a gateway to salvation: bread. By putting the saucy stir-fried subject into a slice of ciabatta, a half decent sandwich would result. All was well.

I should mention that I also got curried lentils, but it was more of a lentil paste. When I tried dipping the bread, what resulted was what I imagine the slop medieval peasants in movies ate. I guess that was kind of a cool experience in that light?

The Ratings:

• Taste: 4/7 - The ginger sauce (wink) was kinda tasty but really starchy the pork was kind of sketchy, definitely leftover from some other dish
• Presentation: 4/7 - The shredded veggies really managed to fool me into thinking I was actually getting drunken noodles... Crafty mofos
• Creativity: 6/7 - Some of the greatest innovations are made under times of great stress, such as finding out your drunken noodles has no noodles
• Choice Criteria of the Day = Cultural Diversity: 7/7 - Drunken noodles + Ciabatta + Curried Lentils = Multiple slighted cultures in a single fell swoop
• Overall: 5.25/7 - It was definitely food.

"The Fish Broke"

It was a long Friday. Thursday night was a good one, but the following morning was not good to me.I made my 9 am, but figured my 11 am class would only be detrimental to my mental health (or my presence would be detrimental to the spirit of the class). So I took respite in my cafeteria, munching occasionally and doing homework for another class. By 11:30 I was pretty hungry and figured lunch was called for, so I treated myself to the special of our cafeterias at this time of year, "Fish Fry Friday". I approached the counter where the women stood eager to provide me with the finest of freshly defrosted and battered seafood.

But before I go further I should clarify: I love fish. Seafood is one of my favorite foods. And most fried things are good. Thus fried fish is pretty great in my eyes. I've had my school's fried fish before (albeit from a different dining hall) and been happy as a pea in a community where he can finally be accepted for being who he is.

The Fish-ening:
"I'll take some Fish and some broccoli, please", a naively optimistic Kiyan said.

I could only watch as the woman reached for a piece of fish with her tongs and lifted it onto my plate. As she was doing so, the fish fell apart, the batter hanging around it like a battered tapestry. It was a pile of fish draped in beige... breadish stuff. This was really where things got crazy. I can only imagine what was going through the cafeteria lady's mindset: she had done this a million times before with a million pieces of fish and all had gone well. Why was this one different. Maybe he won't notice?
She was unprepared for such a catastrophe, but she did the most reasonable thing she could think of.

She gave me another piece. Plopped it right on top of the existing pile of fish.

"The first fish broke, so I gave you another one" She justified.

I got some tartar sauce or as I like to call it, "Mayonnaise adorned with pickle shards" along with a hearty serving of vinegar and sat down, contemplating what was on my plate.

You can see the shattered fish peeking out from under the whole one

The fish was... well it was fish. The batter was crispy on some parts and soft in others, the contrast in mouth feels really creating a novel experience that I didn't think I would be having any time soon. The side of deconstructed fried fish under my fish really added a new dimension to the whole experience. It really forced me to think about the pre-conceived notion I had of what a side-dish should be, and put that on its head. Then shattered it and put a piece of fried fish on top of it. I thought the shattered fish did get more vinegar mixed in though, which is a good thing.

Rating:

• Taste: 4/7 - The vinegar added about 3 points here
• Presentation: 8/7 - The approach to this meal was unorthodox and daring, really something I did not see coming. It provoked me in a way I did not think fried fish could
• Creativity:1/7 - Any dish that has a day named after it ("Fish Fry-day") could be doing more
• Choice Criteria of the day = Profundity: 6/7 - Aren't we all just fish on top of a pile of broken fish. We only are put into this world because the fish under us shattered... Think about it

Overall: 4.75/7. Pretty Meh.

Honourable mention: The broccoli, cantaloupe, orange, and honeydew melon salad. How'd it taste? Do you think I would actually try that? 

First Official Post

Today there is free Chinese food being offered at a movie viewing, so I won't be eating dinner at my college dining halls.
And so I will give you the tail of my lunch today:

The Quest to Make a Tuna Sandwich

One of our cafeterias has started to keep good bread in stock. And by good I mean loaves that bear resemblance to baguettes. Whether that resemblance goes any further than their oblong shape is up for debate. Regardless, it's an improvement I'm grateful for.
So as I was sitting in my 11:00am philosophy class, pondering how I should handle my next meal as I am keen to do, I was struck by a divine vision: a glorious tuna sandwich on relatively glorious bread.

After class let out, I embarked to our cafeteria specializing in this bread and got to work. The baguettes were looking perfectly decent, so I cut myself a piece. That step went well, but that's about all that went smoothly.
At the sandwich bar, I was greeted, not by tuna salad, but by our cafeteria's dreaded specialty, Turkey salad, or "Turkey a la paste" as I like to call it. To the untrained eye, the two would look similar: both are beige and have the consistency of cat food. But I had made that mistake before and lord knows I won't make it again. But I already had my bread, so I was in too deep to turn back at this point, a sandwich was going to happen whether it wanted to or not.
"I can just settle for normal cold-cut turkey, I suppose", The optimist in me said.
As though to punish me for slandering its salad-ified cousin, a girl slides right in as I'm contemplating meating my sandwich and takes the last of the Turkey. Leaving crumpled ham (sketchy), squares of mortadella (sketchier), and bologna (?) (sketchiest).

I was forced to think quick, lest I look like a fool with bread in his hand but no plan for it. I was frantically searching for an answer when it hit me, I knew what I had to do. The cafeteria across campus was sure to have tuna salad still! But was I really willing to go that lengths to make a sandwich that would surely turn out no more than a step above decent?

Yes. Yes I was.

So I filled the portion of baguette with a dollop of mustard (the increment of mustard I work in), lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and cheese, and wrapped it all in napkins to take with me as though I was in some sort of actual rush and not just obsessive when it comes to sandwiches.

When I got to the other cafeteria, I was greeted by tuna salad with an unethical amount of mayo in it, but I had come so far that it was no matter. I pulled out my ready to fill shell of a sandwich and put that tuna salad right in. Haters in the sandwich line were trying to front like I was crazy, but I really knew they were jealous.

And boy, let me tell you, that sandwich was pretty damned average.

Rating:

• Taste: 5/7 peppers - the mustard did a lot of heavy lifting for this one
• Presentation: 3/7 - the tuna salad spilling out the sides of the baguette was a bit too 'in your face' for me.
• Creativity: 7/7 - The lengths gone to create this sandwich are previously unheard of. Stellar and ground-breaking performance by myself.
• Choice Criteria of the day = Degradation: 7/7- The same lengths I had gone to create this sandwich also made me question a lot of my priorities.

for an overall rating of 5.5/7 peppers!!