Please — No More Restaurant Food!

December 15th, 2008 Posted in Miscellaneous

It’s been a week since I’ve cooked anything, close to a record for me. Chicago was great fun — it was bracing to be in such cold weather (low teens much of the time), my day-long walks throughout the city were spectacular, and I really needed a week off to unplug and read a bunch of books (I was bowled over by Roth’s Exit Ghost, and mesmerized by Gary Greenberg’s The Noble Lie).

I really enjoyed and needed the break, but eating restaurant food every day, no matter how good it is, starts to be a real drag after a few consecutive meals. I found myself peering into kitchens, like a plant positioning itself toward the light, just to get a glimpse of ingredients and cooks! Food just isn’t as satisfying when you don’t make it yourself, so you tend to eat more of it in pursuit of satiation, and get uncomfortably full (the large quantities of fat most restaurants use don’t exactly help, either).

Does anyone else share my longing to get back in the kitchen after some time away? I feel like cooking a week’s worth of food, just to catch up! Today: preserved lemons, bread, cabbage soup, and a big-ass, vegetable-centric dinner. Gotta get the kimchee experiment up and running soon, too!

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  1. 10 Responses to “Please — No More Restaurant Food!”

  2. By Karena on Dec 15, 2008

    I totally understand. When I come home after business trips, the thing I look forward to the most (after seeing my husband and being able to sleep in my own bed) is a trip to the farmers’ market. It’s almost a relief to get my hands on “real” food–bunches of greens, sweet meyer lemons, unshelled walnuts. I usually have to spend a few days getting my equilibrium back.

    So tell us more about the kimchee experiment. And if I may offer some advice, get Delia’s written consent first. :) It can get, um, ripe.

  3. By Em on Dec 15, 2008

    I know exactly how you feel, too. I crave the simplest, comfort food after eating out so many meals in a row. Cabbage soup definitely fits in that category of foods.

    By the way, it’s a very nice shot. Did you take it?

  4. By jan in nagasaki on Dec 16, 2008

    i made kimchee once… i think it turned out pretty well. my husband is very picky about his kimchee and prefers and will only eat the korean stuff, and not the japanese stuff. so he didn’t really give mine a chance.

    i like that you said “big ass” i understand looking forward to home cooking and vegetable-centric meals. when we are not home, the vegetarian options are FEW and I have to live on white rice…and fluffy bread….

  5. By Autumn on Dec 17, 2008

    I didn’t see your “I’m going to Chicago” post until after you left, but I hope you went to the Chicago Diner for at least one meal. I have dreams about their vegan reuben…

    I, too, quickly tire of eating out when traveling. It’s nice to have someone else doing the cooking occasionally, but not at the expense of knowing and controlling every ingredient used. And though vegetarian/vegan options are appearing more frequently, they are still exceedingly (and surprisingly) rare, even in large cities. Why is it that in any given city I can find 13 steakhouses but only 1 place that serves anything vegetarian. *If* I’m lucky. Our relationship with food is so strangely skewed in this century – I hope we can sort it out soon.

  6. By Stephanie on Dec 17, 2008

    The funny thing about San Francisco is that I *could* eat out every day and be perfectly happy. But that’s not true for most everywhere else.

    Every time I come home from a trip I’m either making “the sauce” aka my home made Italian tomato sauce, which is ridiculously simple. Or it’s a big, lusciously fresh, dinner salad. Crunch crunch!

  7. By Deno on Dec 18, 2008

    I’m always looking in the kitchen when I can. I love the open kitchens with counter seats so I can really indulge. It just like the theatre…

    I make my own kimchee with napa cabbage and chipotles in adobo. It’s wonderful stuff on it’s own or over brown rice.

  8. By Eric on Dec 22, 2008

    Finally back after a little hiatus.

    Kimchee experiment: Karena, you must a be an exceptional marriage counselor, because getting written permission is surely wonderful advice! I do fear that I will stink up the entire downstairs, so I’m thinking hard about a relatively non-stinky kimchee (I know its heresy, but I think there will be little, if any, garlic in it; whether we can still call it kimchee is another matter). Full-blown gory details soon.

    And now I’m very intrigued by deno’s Mexican kimchee — I imagine the adobo would be a great addition to the world of Korean kimchee!

  9. By W on Dec 22, 2008

    Did you take that picture of the Chicago restaurant? It is one of the most beautiful pictures I have ever seen.

  10. By Eric on Dec 23, 2008

    Alas, I did not take that photo (and now I see that em asked that question as well) — it was from an “I’m feeling lucky” image search for Chicago restaurants on Google. I couldn’t find a way to determine who took it, it was a random site that I haven’t been able to find again, which distresses me because I’d like to be able to give attribution! I’m glad you both like it as much as I do.

  11. By matt wright on Feb 4, 2009

    One of the great things about coming home from a trip is being able to cook again. To much restaurant food just bogs you down.

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