Picky Grouchy Non-Cook FAQs and not so FAQs
WHAT BECOMES OF THE
CHILDHOOD PICKY EATER?
WHAT BECOMES OF THE
CHILDHOOD PICKY EATER?
An interview with
Ayun Halliday!
Ayun Halliday!
Ayun Halliday is the creator of the long running zine The East Village Inky and the author of Always Lots of Heinies at the Zoo, a picture book for kids. Her books for grownups include The Zinester's Guide to New York, No Touch Monkey [and other travel lessons learned too late], Job Hopper: the checkered career of a down-market dilettante, The Big Rumpus: a mother's tale from the trenches, and Dirty Sugar Cookies: culinary observations, questionable taste. Visit her at www.ayunhalliday.com.
In Dirty Sugar Cookies, which is about Ayun's relationship with cooking and various foods, she writes about having been a picky eater as a child, and having changed. Although it is not the focus of the book, it is a captivating feature. And while it is not the custom of PGN-C to feature food or cookbook writers, here we have a happy exception!
Ayun answered PGN-C questions about her history with pickiness and where she stands on that now.
In Dirty Sugar Cookies, which is about Ayun's relationship with cooking and various foods, she writes about having been a picky eater as a child, and having changed. Although it is not the focus of the book, it is a captivating feature. And while it is not the custom of PGN-C to feature food or cookbook writers, here we have a happy exception!
Ayun answered PGN-C questions about her history with pickiness and where she stands on that now.
Picky Grouchy Non-Cook: In your path from picky eater to enthusiastic eater, good cook, and author of Dirty Sugar Cookies, did you spend any time as a non-cook? Did you ever identify as a non-cook?
Ayun Halliday: No, I always liked to cook, even when I didn't like to eat. When I was really little, my grandmother would set me up with some scraps of dough and I'd be the big shot with the rolling pin. Then when I was about 8 years old, I went to Acorn Farm Day Camp, which had an outdoor beehive oven. Judy, the counselor in charge of the Cooking activity was my favorite, and I signed up to do that pretty much every day. PGN-C: Could you describe your change from picky to not picky? How did that feel? What propelled you away from picky toward cook? Ayun Halliday: I think it coincided with wanting and getting more freedom. My time at Gnawbone Camp was the first time I'd lived away from family. I think Fred, the director, was onto something by letting us eat or not eat whatever we wanted. As mentioned in the book, I spent a lot of meals pouring sugar on white bread and thinking it was the grandest thing in the world. Possibly because there was no pressure, I did start eating things I was on record as not liking, notably bacon and eggs. Then when I was a little older, my friends and I would go to restaurants without our parents and that felt very sophisticated, although please keep in mind we're talking about an Indiana mall in the late 70's and early 80's... the Magic Pan and Houlihan's - lots of ferns, lots of brass, faux Tiffany shades. I think on some level, I was ordering based on what I thought a young woman out on her own might order, my vision of a leotard and peasant skirt wearing, sex having, Greenwich Village dwelling New York City actress/dancer. French onion soup, right? Even when I was picky, I liked the idea of being a cook. Once I was open to eating more things, I was able to branch out from baking. The first meal I prepared for my parents and grandparents was a tandoori chicken with ginger peas from Seventeen magazine. As you may imagine, these were not the most authentic recipes in the world. Dessert was Bananas En Croute, which if memory serves were bananas rolled in Pilsbury crescent roll dough and sprinkled with cinnamon. I did not want to cook the same things as my mother and grandmother. I wanted to lay claim to recipes they would never touch, like spanakopita and chocolate mousse. PGN-C: Has your childhood pickiness about food been displaced onto some other pickiness in your adult life? Ayun Halliday: Perhaps reverse pickiness. I have very little patience with adults who are squeamish about eating in Chinatown, or sushi, or in some ramshackle little dive (possibly on wheels) that has something truly delicious for sale for so much less than you'd pay for a burger at Applebees. It's particularly shocking when this resistance presents itself in someone who lives in a metropolitan area on either coast. I'm like shut up and eat, a variation on the old slogan of my table-waiting days (Eat and get out). PGN-C: Do you have any sympathy for the picky eater? Does any of your former pickiness remain? Ayun Halliday: See above. I do have some sympathy toward picky children - they're missing out, and complicating their parents' lives, and most mealtimes are agony for them, but picky adults, no sympathy. It feels like cultural closed mindedness. That said, I read somewhere that everyone has 5 edible things they're allowed to not like, no reasons required. I stand by that. Especially were someone to try to serve me beef stroganoff. Or pasta, which I truly loathe, except in this one recipe where it's served with squash and red onions and rosemary. (I differentiate between pasta and noodles prepared in an Asian manner. Those I like!) PGN-C: I loved Dirty Sugar Cookies because it is a book about food that's fun to read, even for a non-cook. It doesn't necessarily imply cooking as much as it suggests thinking about food in a personal way. Even the recipes are fun to read, and I would normally skip recipes. Can you recommend any other books that might work for the non-cook? Or for the picky eater? Ayun Halliday: Hey, thanks! I really loved A Cook's Tour by Anthony Bourdain. This was before his television show became such big news (I still haven't watched it). I adore Dana Crumb's cookbooks Eat It and Still Eatin' It. They're both illustrated by her ex-husband, R Crumb and are written in this earthy, funny, opinionated style that would probably freeze the Rocky Mountain Oysters off many an uptight foodie. Likewise, the Alice's Restaurant Cookbook, which is one of the best gifts my mother ever gave me - something that's so much my taste and not at all hers. She bought it over the phone from Kitchen Arts & Letters, a store that specializes in used cookbooks here in NYC. It came with a flexi-disc of Arlo Guthrie singing the famous song - you know those records that used to come on the back of cereal boxes in the 70s? It has great, evocative photos. She's not above tossing in a bunch of Jiffy Mix (my grandmother's cornbread go to) and I love her advice about potlucks, when guests bring guests and other folks drop by unannounced -if you run out of plates, just use hubcaps. And finally, I am a huge fan of Jeffrey Alford and Naomi Duguid, world travelers and authors of beautifully photographed, compelling anecdotal cookbooks, each concentrating on a different region. My favorite is Hot Sour Salty Sweet, which covers the Mekong region. It is imminently coffee table worthy, but my copy is of course sentimental, which is to say stained with soy sauce, and ruffled from all the hard time logged on a wet kitchen counter. One thing I particularly like about their cookbooks is they don't require many beyond-the-pale ingredients that you'll use for one recipe and never again. If you have fish sauce, lemongrass, some dried peppers and a few other items, you're pretty much good to go. May I recommend the Quick and Tasty Yunnanese Potatoes and also, the Yunnan Greens? |