Food thoughts

Dane dane me likha hai khane wale ka naam. Goes an oft used Hindi proverb. On each grain is written the name of the eater.

Cryptically sexy.

Evocative too.

It suggests having one’s name calligraphically engraved on a long grain of Basmati rice, to check out for spelling mistakes on which would be like reading the fine print of an important document. Wouldn’t it be a rather long drawn process to sort out the grains which are to be mine? thus goes my rather linear thinking at first. Then there are other related questions too. Who does the engraving and on what basis? More on it later, I tell myself, as always when confronted with unanswerable questions. Let me first visualize and substantiate the possibilities.
Chill, says the voice of reason from within, it is only a pithy proverb. A profound one though. The aforesaid grain is like the algebraic factor X. It can stand for anything from grains of rice to BT brinjal...from genuine melting-in-mouth dates from Muscat to fake Chinese milk powder. It simply suggests that everything in life comes earmarked. Or that ears lend themselves to a palmistry of their own.
Thinking of it, while I may not actually engrave the eater’s name on each grain of rice, don’t I automatically earmark food for my family members on the basis of their preference-and the availability factor? potato fries for the daughter, carrots for son, crispies for the husband. Or, Crackle for daughter, figs for son, diet crackers for husband etc. Compartmentalizing tastes prevent competition and aids budgeting. However, when supply exceeds demand, or when the domestic market is down, doesn’t that small papaya look orphaned? Like someone forgot to give it a destiny-or engrave the eater’s name on it. I am taken back to the apprentice years of marriage when many of my by-the-recipe-book delicacies meant to find my way to the new spouse’s heart ended up elsewhere: the brown doggie who visited the garbage bin outside our home. So it is all about the end-user, understands my mind.
The rows and rows of glittering products on supermarket shelves have so much marked on them: the name, brand, the exclusive qualities of the products, the freebies, the name of the manufacturers…and written all over, though not in ink, in brackets, the name of the consumer: child or adult, lower class or well to do, men or women, working women, housewives. Did the author of the proverb have target marketing in mind?
Destiny as food or food as destiny is best seen in the nation’s granaries…Fat rats eat up the bottom layers of the food stored in it; middle men eat up the middle and the rest is spirited away by spirits-often across states. I heard that stones of special caliber and carats casually replace grainlessness. The proverb must suggest permutations and combinations.
On the other hand destiny is seen as a box of suspenseful chocolates, and you never know what you are going to get. You may drool for the liqueur filled one while it is only the caramel and raisin which reach your palate, after a certain somebody raided the fridge in your absence. Perhaps just a roundabout way of saying that on each empty chocolate wrapper is engraved the name of the eater (along with that of the manufacturer).

One man’s food, it is said, can be another’s poison. Or allergy. Live in Chocolate Land and be chocolate incompatible. Watch with envy the neighbour’s child munch the chips even as your own obesity-prone kid must thwart her eyes from it. Not yet 20 and already declared insulin resistant? And they say it is part genetic and part lifestyle. The proverb now begins to assume graver tones. Like the author thereof had had a crash course in crystal ball gazing or biotechnology.
Nature, the greatest food engraver has a smart plan to keep its species from killing each other over food. Killing AS food for each other appeals better to her sensibilities. Like the famed Russian dolls which telescope into each other, creatures from planktons and krills inaugurate the food chain. All creation has a go at it, in an orderly way, standing in a queue.
There-what I thought was substantial food for thought has tamely ended in nature’s orderliness.
Orderliness my foot, guffaws a voice from behind. It is all about the new world order also called globalization. Who eats what is now also about smart choices, means and menus. What illustrates this better than the fabled crow and fox pair? the piece of Kraft cheese in the crow’s beak no doubt had another name scribbled over it. FOX. Or simply SMARTNESS. Street smartness too. So does it mean that the writing on the grain is also about qualities of the consumer: gullibility, cunningness, alertness, aggressiveness, savoir faire.…and what you, the individual, the society, the country, get is only the karmic result of tossing those around?
There you go..grins the fox …this proverb is like one of those eye catching optical illusions in which you see what you choose to see. I saw not a piece of cheese but OPPORTUNITY in the crow’s beak. Each grain comes not inscribed but with the potential to be inscribed upon. Change places and see the difference. Don’t spend a lifetime scrutinizing each grain to see if your name is on it. Just make a dash for it, annex what you want and write your name on it. Use technology if profitable.
Perhaps all one needs to do is to get that prohibitively priced durian, or what seemed prohibitive, with a bottle of genuine French champagne and say ‘this is my menu for the day’…