It’s hard to remember what eating was like before we began worshipping Food like some ancient god. Thanks to this new religion, we can now be assured of locating a perfect baguette, say, within ten minutes of arriving in Dallas, or get sushi—fatty tuna included—in any good-size town between St. Augustine, Florida and Boise, Idaho. It wasn’t always thus. Return with me now to the days before the Age of Foodism descended on us like a great edible glacier. I was a student in Madison, Wisconsin during the late 1970s. It was a fine small city to live in, girded by lakes and lavishly planted with pine and honeysuckle. The range of dining opportunities, however, left something to be desired. There were pizzerias, a couple of places that served pallid, chile-free Tex-Mex, and the first Greek gyro had recently arrived on State Street, causing a sensation. And on East Washington, right near the capitol, was a sole Chinese restaurant. It had undoubtedly been a diner decades earlier, because the premises were a mix of beveled mirrors and greenish Formica counters, with booths around the periphery. The food was bland, of the chop suey and chow mein sort, dishes that had been adapted for American tastes over the decades by cunning Chinese restaurateurs. We loved it, and we squirted plenty of soy sauce onto it from clear plastic blister packets. One of the oddest things about the place was the fact that no rice was ever served. Instead, one received a small plate with two slices of white bread upon it at the start of the meal. While the cook—who continually peered myopically through the kitchen window into the dining room—was clearly Chinese, the waitress wasn’t. She was Caucasian, and she was a little strange. Rumor had it that she was on work release from the mental asylum on the other side of Lake Mendota. When she wasn’t ranting to herself under her breath, she could be wonderfully attentive, though a little on the gruff side. She was our first ambassador into the world of Asian food, and, as such, we shall never forget her. I can still hear the loud clunk as she flung the bread on the counter, and demanded, “What’ll it be today?”
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