BULGARIA TWICE SLANDERED IN THE NYTimes!

I don’t understand it! In today’s paper there is a suggestion that Bulgaria perhaps doesn’t quite measure up—in the foods it puts on grocery shelves, and in the vacation opportunities it provides. The article is about the former East Germany, but if you read it carefully, you’ll come across these two phrases:

1. (in reference to a museum of ubiquitous items found in the former East Germany) “About 10,000 people a year come to look at Mikki transistor radios, jars of Bulgarian plums, schoolbooks, plastic water glasses that never seemed to come in the right colors” – the implication being that Bulgarian plums are merely quaint relics of former life under Communist rule. As in, no one in their right mind would otherwise contemplate selling/buying/eating/enjoying Bulgarian plums. Ho hum. I’m sure they were fantastic (albeit sweet, but then try an English chocolate cake if you want a sugar overdose).

2. (there appears to be these days a) “post-mortem feeling that maybe the East had its good aspects after all, especially a certain economic security and stability, even if your best vacation option was Bulgaria.” This must have been put in by a spokesperson for the Greek Island Tourism Board. I’m sure Americans will now think twice about booking a week at a Bulgarian Black Sea resort. Yes, I’m defensive, and it has nothing to do with the fact that I myself spent my first holiday abroad in 1959 in...Bulgaria. I remember it as being a perfectly warm and… warm place. Really, if I were Bulgaria, I’d sue.

Eating Real Food

I neglected to do a persuasive pitch (yet again? --some might ask) for sustainable agriculture by linking to two, yes TWO stories in the NYT Sunday Magazine that open the door for a discussion of why organic/free range/regional food isn't gracing our collective tables yet. I’ve been accused of not liking simple American food (as opposed to high-end American cuisine which I do think is good). I would be a total disciple were it served as it is in the Farmers' Diner described in the second article.

One way to get quality food to appear more often, it seems, would be to ask grocers, restauranteurs, etc. where their food came from. I did that a couple of weeks ago at a local burger joint. They serve good burgers for those who like burgers, and though I’m not a crusader on this point, I do think that we should be especially inquisitive about the processing of meat in this country. I haven't trusted or eaten a burger of unknonw origins in years and thought that my dinner companions deserved to know about the beef they were about to order. I'm not sure they shared my enthusiasm for sourcing their food, but they let me fire away at the smiling (at this point) server.

So I asked, and the friendly waitress laughed and then I laughed, and to make her less uncomfortable (she clearly had no idea) I said that I’m sure it was meat from cows that grazed pastures, and this threw her even more and she laughed harder and scurried off, thinking that Mad Cow is nothing compared to this mad woman asking bizarre Qs on a Saturday night out.

Still, it would be good if many people routinely asked.