學(xué)會(huì)來者不拒

Ｊｅｆｆｒｅｙ?。樱簦澹椋睿纾幔颍簦澹?/p>

"I wanted to fall upon the cook," wrote Edmondo de Amicis, a 19th-century traveler. "In an instant I understood perfectly how a race who ate such food must necessarily believe in another God and hold essentially different views of human life from our own... There was a suggestion of soap, wax, pomatum, of unguents, dyes, cosmetics; of everything, in short, most unsuited to enter a human mouth."

“我真想揍那個(gè)廚師”，19世紀(jì)的旅行家埃得蒙多?德?亞米契斯寫道?！拔伊⒓慈焕斫饬藶槭裁闯赃@種食物的種族必須得信仰另一個(gè)上帝，以及對人生持有一種根本不同于我們的觀點(diǎn)……這些食物的味道像肥皂、蠟、潤發(fā)油、軟膏、染料、化妝品，總之什么都有，大多數(shù)都難以入口?！?/p>

Though de Amicis was describing his feelings about Moroccan cuisine, this is precisely how I felt about desserts in Indian restaurants until 1989, the year that I was appointed food critic of Vogue magazine. As I contemplated the heavy responsibilities of my new post, I realized how inadequate I was to the honor, for I, like everybody I knew, suffered from a set of strong and arbitrary likes and dislikes regarding food. I feared that I was no better than an art critic who becomes nauseated by the color yellow, or suffers from red-green color blindness.

盡管德?亞米契斯描述的是他對摩洛哥美食的體會(huì)，但這與我在1989年被聘為時(shí)尚雜志《Vogue》的美食評論家之前對印度餐館的甜點(diǎn)的體會(huì)一個(gè)樣。當(dāng)我預(yù)想新工作責(zé)任重大的時(shí)候，我意識到自己真的難以勝任，因?yàn)槲?，與我知道的每個(gè)人一樣，就食物有很多強(qiáng)烈而又不理性的喜愛與厭惡之情。我擔(dān)心自己無異于因黃顏色感到惡心或是紅綠不分的色盲藝術(shù)評論家。

It went even deeper than that. Humans were designed to be omnivores. Blessed with all-purpose dentition and digestive systems, we are ready for anything. Unlike those of most other animals, our genes do not tell us what foods we should find tasty or repulsive. We enter the world with a yen for sweets and an aversion to bitterness. (Newborns, it has recently been discovered, can even distinguish among glucose, fructose, lactose, and sucrose - but little else.) After four months, we develop an innate fondness for salt. And that's about it.

原因不僅僅如此。人類生來本不偏食。托多功能牙齒和消化系統(tǒng)的福，我們什么都可以吃。與大多數(shù)其它動(dòng)物不一樣，我們的基因不會(huì)告訴我們哪些食物是美味的，哪些是惡心的。但我們是帶著對甜味的渴望與對苦味的厭惡來到世上。（最近發(fā)現(xiàn)，新生兒居然能夠區(qū)分葡萄糖、果糖、乳糖和蔗糖——但其它的就無能為力了。）長到四個(gè)月后，我們便由衷地喜愛咸味。就是這樣。

The nifty thing about being omnivores is that we can take nourishment from an endless variety of sources and easily adapt to a changing food world - crop failures, droughts, herd migrations, restaurant closings, and the like. Cows will starve in a steakhouse and wolves in a salad bar, but not we.

不偏食者的好處是我們可以吸收各種食物的營養(yǎng)，很容易適應(yīng)不斷發(fā)生變化的食物世界——作物歉收、干旱、牛群遷徙、飯店關(guān)門等等。母牛在牛排餐廳會(huì)餓死，狼在沙拉吧也會(huì)餓死，但是我們不會(huì)。

The tricky part about being omnivorous is that we are always in danger of poisoning ourselves. That is why the most potent cause of food aversions is an attack of nausea after eating. Just one illness will do the trick - even if the food we ate did not actually cause the problem, and even if we know it didn't. Hives or rashes may make us rationally avoid a given food in the future, but only a stomachache will result in a lasting, irrational, lifelong sense of disgust. Otherwise, psychologists know very little about the host of powerful likes and dislikes - let's lump them all under the term "food phobias" - that children carry into adulthood.

對于不偏食的人來說嚴(yán)峻的一面是，我們經(jīng)常會(huì)有中毒的危險(xiǎn)。這就是為什么導(dǎo)致食物厭惡情緒的最大因素是吃了食物之后感到的反胃惡心。只要出現(xiàn)一次癥狀便會(huì)成功地讓我們厭惡它們——即使實(shí)際上并不是我們吃下的食物造成的后果，或即使我們知道它未曾導(dǎo)致這樣的后果。蕁麻疹或皮疹可能使我們今后理性地避開某些食物，但是一次胃痛便會(huì)給我們留下持久的、不理性的、終身的厭惡感。若不是這個(gè)道理，心理學(xué)家就不太理解許多強(qiáng)烈的喜愛與厭惡等情感——讓我們統(tǒng)統(tǒng)將它們歸納為“食物恐懼”——孩子們成年后，依然沒有擺脫它們。

By shutting ourselves off from the bounties of nature, we become failed omnivores. We let the omnivore team down.

拒絕了大自然的慷慨資源，我們便是失敗的不偏食者。我們讓不偏食者群體失望了。

People should be ashamed of the irrational food phobias that keep them from sharing food with each other. Instead, they have become proud and arrogant and aggressively misinformed. But not me. When I donned the heavy mantle of food critic, I sketched out a six-step program to rid myself of all puissant and crippling likes and dislikes.

人們本應(yīng)對阻礙他們互相分享食物的不理性的食物恐懼癥感到慚愧。相反，他們變得驕傲、自大，還固執(zhí)地給別人強(qiáng)加錯(cuò)誤的信息。但我不會(huì)這樣。當(dāng)我披上美食評論家厚重的外衣時(shí)，我草擬了一份六步計(jì)劃來使自己擺脫所有強(qiáng)烈與具有阻礙性的喜愛與厭惡。

Step one was to list my food phobias, which ranged from mild to psychotic. They included dill, kimchi (the national pickle of Korea), swordfish, miso, mocha, chutney, raw sea urchins, cinnamon, California chardonnay, falafel (those hard, dry, fried little balls of chickpea flour unaccountably enjoyed in Middle Eastern countries), chickpeas generally, cranberries, kidneys, okra, millet, coffee ice cream, refried beans, and most forms of yogurt.

第一步是列出我厭惡的食物，指從略微厭惡到極度討厭的。包括小茴香、泡菜（韓國招牌泡菜）、箭魚、日本豆面醬、摩卡、酸辣醬、生海膽、桂皮、加州霞多麗、香炸豆丸（那些又硬又干、莫名地受到中東國家人們的喜愛的鷹嘴豆口味油炸面團(tuán)小丸子）、普通的鷹嘴豆、蔓越莓、動(dòng)物腎臟、黃秋葵、黍、咖啡冰激凌、炸豆泥以及大多數(shù)酸奶食品。

I was also convinced that Greek cuisine was an oxymoron. Nations are like people. Some are good at cooking, while others have a talent for music or baseball or manufacturing VCRs. The Greeks are really good at both pre-Socratic philosophy and white sculpture. They have not been good cooks since the fifth century B.C., when Siracusa in Sicily was the gastronomic capital of the world. Typical of the Greeks' modern cuisine are feta cheese and retsina wine. Any country that pickles its national cheese in brine and adulterates its national wine with pine pitch should order dinner at the local Chinese place and save its energies for other things. The British go to Greece for the food, which says volumes to me. You would probably think twice before buying a Russian or Algerian television set. I had thought for 10 years before buying my last Greek meal.

我還深信希臘美食是一個(gè)矛盾。國家就像人一樣。有些善于烹飪，而有些則具有音樂或橄欖球或制造錄像機(jī)的天賦。希臘確實(shí)既擅長前蘇格拉底哲學(xué)又擅長白色雕塑。自公元前5世紀(jì)起他們就不擅長烹飪，當(dāng)時(shí)西西里島的錫拉庫扎是世界的美食之都。具有代表性的希臘現(xiàn)代美食是菲達(dá)奶酪和松香味希臘葡萄酒。任何將本國奶酪腌泡在鹵水中以及將本國葡萄酒與松焦油瀝青摻和在一起的國家都應(yīng)該在當(dāng)?shù)氐娜A人餐館點(diǎn)餐，以便節(jié)省精力干別的事情。英國人前往希臘品嘗食物，這充分說明英國人的品味很差，希臘菜更是糟糕透頂。在購買一臺俄羅斯或阿爾及利亞產(chǎn)的電視機(jī)之前，你得三思。上次吃希臘菜之前，我考慮了十年。

This had to stop.

這些都必須結(jié)束。

Exposure was the only answer. Researchers have found that eating moderate amounts of a novel or hated food at moderate intervals is nearly guaranteed to work. The reason is that omnivores are born with neophobia, a fear of new foods that accompanies our biological need to explore for them - an ambivalence that protects us from unbridled banqueting. Most parents give up trying out novel foods on their weanlings after two or three attempts, and then complain to the pediatrician; this may be the most frequent cause of finicky eaters, of omnivores manqués. Most babies will accept nearly anything after eight or 10 tries.

解決問題的唯一辦法是接觸你厭惡的食物。研究人員發(fā)現(xiàn)定期定量地吃一種新式或討厭的食物相當(dāng)有效。因?yàn)殡s食者天生就有新奇恐懼癥，害怕新奇的食物，而自身的生理需求又驅(qū)使我們嘗試新食物，這種矛盾使我們不敢無節(jié)制地大吃大喝。大多數(shù)家長嘗試了兩到三次之后便放棄給剛斷奶的孩子喂新的食物，然后便向兒科醫(yī)師抱怨，這也許就是導(dǎo)致挑食者形成及雜食者稀缺最常見的原因。其實(shí)大多數(shù)嬰兒在嘗試八到十次后，任何食物他們都會(huì)接受。

I immediately made eight or 10 reservations at Korean restaurants, purchased eight or 10 anchovies, searched the Zagat guide for eight or 10 restaurants with the names "Parthenon" or "Olympia" (which I believe are required by statute for Greek restaurants), and brought a pot of water to the boil for cooking eight or 10 chickpeas.

我立即在一些韓國餐館安排了八到十個(gè)預(yù)約，買了八或十條鳳尾魚，在《Zagat》餐飲指南雜志中搜尋了八到十家名叫“帕臺農(nóng)神廟”或“奧林匹亞”（這些名字我覺得是法律對希臘餐館的規(guī)定）的餐館，并為烹煮八到十道鷹嘴豆燒開一壺水。

I dedicated the next six months to this effort, and by the time I had finished, nearly every food aversion (along with every positive preference that had kept me from exploring freely) was gone. Now I yearn for miso and am a noted connoisseur of anchovies. Try to find those packed in salt rather than in oil.

在接下來的六個(gè)月里，我專注于這項(xiàng)試驗(yàn)，當(dāng)我完成了的時(shí)候，幾乎所有的食物厭惡癥（此外還包括所有阻止我自由地探索其它美食的對某些食物的偏愛）都消失了?，F(xiàn)在我渴望日本豆面醬，并成為一名知名的鳳尾魚鑒賞家。嘗試那些腌在鹽里的而不是泡在油里的鳳尾魚。

For my final exam and graduation ceremony. I was in Paris, France - a city that my professional duties frequently compel me to visit. I was trying a nice new restaurant, and when the waiter brought the menu, I found myself in a state unlike any I had ever attained - call it Zen-like if you wish. Everything on the menu, every appetizer, hot and cold, every salad, every fish, every bird, and every meat was terrifically alluring, but none more than any other. I had absolutely no way of choosing. Though blissful at the prospect of eating, I was completely unable to order dinner.

為了測試一下我的努力成果，我當(dāng)時(shí)在法國巴黎——我的職業(yè)責(zé)任經(jīng)常迫使我前往的城市。我正嘗試一家很不錯(cuò)的新餐館，當(dāng)服務(wù)員拿來菜單的時(shí)候，我發(fā)現(xiàn)自己有種從未有過的狀態(tài)——如果愿意的話你可以稱之為類似禪宗的東西。菜單上的所有食物，每道開胃菜，熱菜冷盤，每道色拉、魚、禽和肉都異常誘人，但是它們彼此毫不遜色。我完全無法選擇。雖然想象品嘗它們的時(shí)刻一定很幸福，但我根本決定不了點(diǎn)什么菜。

I would have starved - if my companion had not saved the day by ordering for both of us. I believe I had a composed salad with slivers of foie gras, a perfect sole meunière, and sweetbreads. Everything was delicious.

如果那天不是我的同伴出手相助，分別為我們點(diǎn)菜的話，我可能已經(jīng)餓死了。我確信我吃了一份碎鵝肝沙拉，一份絕佳的法式黃油炸魚和法式雜碎。所有的食物都很美味。

Links

1. crippling

cripple的意思是“跛子”，crippling在這里指的是對食物的厭惡或喜愛之情阻礙你嘗試新的食物。

2. the British go to Greece for the food

作者是美國人，美國人認(rèn)為英國人的飲食品味低級，既然英國人為了品嘗食物前往希臘，那么希臘的食物一定很糟糕。