Matter Anti-Matter

Uncanny.

foodinreallife:

This week’s reader submission comes from wring, who photographed this food that I did not know existed:

“Star Trek Eggo waffles don’t taste much different from your usual Eggo waffles. A little carboard-ey and has a lot of air inside. It’s good if you have nothing else to eat for breakfast. 2 out of 5 (versus real waffles)”

Here’s a picture of how they’re advertised:

One of the more nebulous fronts of forecasting the future rests in the category of food. In Star Trek, for example, the advent of the replicator makes it completely unnecessary to cook ever again.  However, as the Alice Waters devotees of the present can attest, there is more to food than just eating.  This philosophy of consumption carries over into many episodes of TNG, Voyager, and DS9, where moments of REAL cooking evoke memories of childhood, connections to community or family, and ties to the lands from which specific ingredients were grown or harvested.  Captain Sisko’s devotion to cooking and insistence on making things from scratch firmly establishes this philosophy, perhaps more so than in any of the previous Star Treks.  In the ST universe, real food is directly connected to humanity, despite the utopian bounty promised by food replicators.

The importance of food as more than mere sustenance, but an experience that brings people together is also central in the Firefly universe.  Almost all important decisions and discussions get played out over family-style meals at the dining table (complete with bickering and awkward moments), and Shepherd Book’s bounty of fresh strawberries and fruit hold more weight than good old fashioned currency.  Again, a clear emphasis on food as communal experience persists, especially in this world of imagined scarcity.

Food culture is at somewhat of a crossroads.  Do we continue down the path of simplicity and ease, where dinner consists of removing a frozen tray from a box and microwaving it?  Or do we return to a more pastoral version of eating, where ingredients are locally sourced and meals are carefully prepared from scratch?  In other words, do we embrace the replicator (cheap, fast) or do we ignore the replicator in favor of the communal experience of cooking and sharing a meal with others (more costly, slow)?

One business model suggests that we can have it both ways.  There is an atrocious looking storefront in a strip mall that I occasionally pass by called “My Menu.”  Out of morbid curiosity, I decided to find out what this place is all about.  My Menu is a frozen food franchise that specializes in providing customers with complete meals that bear the resemblance of a home-cooked meal, but with none of the onerous effort.  If you glance through their online menu, you’ll find pre-cooked grilled chicken breasts, apple butter pork tenderloin, fresh fruit cups, bacon-wrapped filet mignon, and deep dish apple pie.  All frozen, all ready to be thawed/heated and served.  Sounds nice, and easy—right?

My Menu’s main selling point is that they make it completely unnecessary for customers to ever go to a grocery store again—“hundreds of meal ideas in one aisle.” Cooking is reduced to its most literal component: The act of heating something to a food-safe temperature.  They even provide you with “recipes” for “cooking” at home, which primarily involves taking 2-3 different meals from their menu and combining them.  But here’s my favorite My Menu item:

Diced Onions.

That’s right, diced onions.  For $2.99, you can buy frozen, pre-diced onions.  The intolerable act of dicing an onion is pretty much a thing of the past.  I’m wondering if they’ll add buttered toast to the menu, or grapes.  Think of all the time we’ll save!  If My Menu is one company’s foray into providing fast food for the present, I fear we may quickly be headed down a dark path where the only time people pick up knives is to rob convenience stores.

What do you think?  Is My Menu a culinary savior for the working classes, or a potentially humanity-sucking precursor to the food replicator?  I think it’s pretty clear what I think.  Freezer section be damned!

Wondering what to bring to that Fourth of July potluck/picnic/bbq you’re going to?  Skip that red-white-and-blue dessert thing made from jello, cool whip, and berries. Seriously, have you looked at what cool whip is made of?  Not normal. Instead, how about a delicious platter of Hasperat!  I’m one of those people who gets hungry when I see a cartoon drawing of an ice-cream cone.  So imagine my delight when I first learned of this exciting dish called Hasperat while watching TNG.  When Ensign Ro rediscovered her Bajoran roots eating Hasperat, I wished more than ever that I had a food replicator that could turn fictional food into reality!  Well, an enterprising individual named Lolo over at veganyumyum.com has kindly created a recipe for this savory dish, which I’ll reproduce for you here. Enjoy!

Hasperat
For Two

2 10″ Wheat Tortillas
1/2 Cup Hummus (Any flavor, plain or horseradish is nice)
1 Small Cucumber, sliced very thin (about 1/2 cup)
1 Carrot, shredded (about 1/3 cup)
1 1/2 Tbs Tamari (or regular soy sauce)
1 1/2 Tbs Rice Vinegar
Black Pepper
2 Small Handfuls Baby Spinach
Hot Chili Sauce/Tabasco, optional

Using a mandoline, or your food processor, or a sharp knife, slice the cucumber very thinly and place in a large bowl. Add the carrot. Add tamari and rice vinegar and toss. Let marinate 5-10 minutes (or longer, if desired).

Warm your tortillas so they’re pliable. You can microwave them for a few seconds with a damp paper towel, heat them in a dry skillet, or (my favorite) hold them directly over the flame of your gas burning stove.

Spread the tortillas with hummus, 3-4 Tbs each, making sure you cover the entire surface. This will help the sandwich stick together. Arrange the cucumber slices in one layer, slightly overlapping. Add carrot, and sprinkle some fresh pepper over the top. Add a layer of baby spinach.

Roll up the wrap, tucking in the ends, and place on a hot grill pan to slightly warm and create pretty grill marks. You can do this in a regular pan if you don’t have a grill pan. Slice and eat immediately.

Learn more about the chef here. She’s cute as a button!