Top 5 Things You Should Be a Food Snob About

I like to think I am very open-minded when it comes to food. I do enjoy fine dining for sure, but some of the best things I have ever eaten include street food items that probably should have given me trichinosis. I revel in discovering great cheap eats and awesome dives. I also love finding delicious treats that hail from half way around the world whose name I need to repeat multiple times to get the pronunciation right, only I am sure to still get it wrong. And perhaps the best evidence of how unpretentious I am about food, I have an unabashed adoration of fish sticks.

All that said, there are some things I am not only a food snob about, but will go as far as to say you should be too.

1. The absolute number one food offender in my book is the spicy tuna roll. Sushi is served raw my friends. This is so you can taste the delicate flavor of the fish unadorned by things as overpowering, inappropriate and uncouth as mayonnaise with attitude. Would you put ketchup on top of caviar? Furthermore, because this sauce is so intense, sushi chefs tend to use the worst left-over tendon-ridden odds and ends to make these rolls because it really doesn’t matter. You could mash up bits of sewer rat underneath that muck and not be able to tell the difference. The pain on the face of one of my favorite sushi chefs whenever he has to make one of those monstrosities is more heart tugging than a Save the Children commercial. While I don’t patronize his restaurant often, I applaud Sasabune’s Chef Takahashi for posting a sign on the wall that reads “No Spicy Tuna.”

2. Next on my hit list is over cooked meat. An animal died so you could eat that, the least you can do in his honor is allow your food to retain some flavor so that he can look down at you from upstairs and think “Wow, look how delicious I am.” Overcooked meat, whatever its origin, all tastes the same. I defy you to tell the difference between well done beef, duck, lamb, prairie dog or whack-a-mole. If you simply do not enjoy a properly prepared medium rare piece of meat, please slide your plate over and order the vegetarian special.

3. Bad pizza. It never fails to surprise me but there are people out there who eat this stuff, plastic-y layers of cheese on top of third tier store brand tomato sauce and all. I admit in some parts of the country people may not have many options but in New York City, the thin crust pizza capital of America, there is no excuse. Let’s remember, pizza is not health food. It’s loaded with high fat cheese and customarily served on top of white flour based dough. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat it, but that when you do you should love it. It should be amazing and comforting and never leave you with that “Wow, I really didn’t need to eat that” feeling. It should be worth every last calorie. Some people say “sex is like pizza, even when it’s bad it’s good.” I disagree, on both counts.

4. Subway sandwiches. No self-respecting New Yorker should ever eat one of these. Ever. The New York deli sandwich is as old as that joke about a priest and a rabbi in a row boat. Put a different way, a New Yorker eating a Subway sandwich is like an Italian grabbing lunch at the Olive Garden. (Don’t get me started on chain restaurants!) I don’t care what the commercials say or the wonders Subway has done for Jared’s social calendar, the ingredients don’t taste fresh and no one there will take enough pride in his craft to deliver you a sandwich worth eating. One should buy lumber by the foot-long, not lunch.

5. Ketchup on hotdogs. This mockery is simply un-American. Interestingly, ketchup on hotdogs is a hotly debated topic on the Internet; there are even books on the subject. But to me there is nothing to argue about. You’re either with us, or you put ketchup on hotdogs. There is even a Facebook group called Ketchup on Hotdogs with 19 nihilist fans flaunting their support for what is tantamount to food anarchy. For the greater public good, I hope the powers that be are keeping a watchful eye on these condiment extremists.

So there’s my Top 5. I am sure I have stirred the proverbial pot a bit so agree or disagree, let everyone hear it in the comments section. Just don’t do it while snacking on a slice of individually wrapped bright orange American Cheese.