Food: A Love Story (6 page)

PEARL GUY:
I’ll tell you what. Why don’t I take the rare jewel and you can have the snot from the rock.

NON—PEARL GUY:
Um, okay. What am I supposed to do with that?

PEARL GUY:
You can tell people it’s an aphrodisiac.

NON—PEARL GUY:
Deal.

Maryland Is for Crabs

Maryland is for crabs. Not for “crabby people,” although that would make the state more appealing to me, but for actual crabs. This slogan was initially a parody of neighboring Virginia’s state tourism slogan, “Virginia is for lovers,” but it pretty much sums up Maryland’s attitude toward crabs. Those Marylanders just love them some crab. Maryland is for crabs. And by
for
, I mean rooting for. The University of Maryland’s team may be called the Terrapins, the state’s football and baseball teams might be respectively named the Ravens and the
Orioles, but I think the people of Maryland would have preferred it if all the teams were simply named “the Crabs.” You just enter the state of Maryland, and the incessant crab sell commences. “You should get some crab! Are you going to have steamed crab? Why don’t you get a crab cake?” I usually politely ask if I can just pay my toll. There is a fascination with the crab that goes way beyond the fact that it is an important industry and export for Maryland. Once Jeannie and I were out to dinner at a crab restaurant on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, and a stranger, not even a waiter, approached our table and addressed me directly: “I couldn’t help but notice you aren’t eating crab. Is there a reason?” I didn’t know how to respond. After a moment of stunned disbelief, I just was honest. “I thought I’d order what I want.” I didn’t have the courage to tell the guy I wasn’t really in the mood for bug meat.

I feel the same way, Patrick.

The crab is embedded deeply in Maryland culture. It is common knowledge that every Maryland vacation home must have an image of a crab in every room. Images of crabs even appear in kitchens on potholders, towels, and bowls, where one would
think any logical person would never want to see the image of a bug. “Ooh! There’s a bug at the bottom of my soup!” I do not exaggerate. I have seen this crab obsession firsthand. Every summer I attend a weeklong family reunion hosted by my amazingly generous Aunt Katie on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. The climax of the reunion is a gathering at my aunt’s house, where picnic tables are covered with newspaper. Wooden mallets and sharp knives are arranged neatly in empty wooden bowls, and a crate of steamed crabs is placed like a treasure chest as the centerpiece of the table. There are even oyster crackers shaped like crabs. The irony! Over the course of hours, relatives sit down to experience the ritual of eating crab. From a distance it may appear as if a pinewood derby car is being constructed as the wooden mallets crash to the table, and the pounding and hammering is deafening. The conversation is light and convivial. It’s like a coed knitting circle, except people are eating bug meat.

Giving little kids a hammer is always a good idea.

Aunt Katie hosting her annual “Find the Bug Meat” party.

I don’t participate. Being the father of five young children, my time is normally spent stopping any given member of my basketball team from drowning in the nearby pool. Well, that’s my excuse. Even if I were kid-free, I wouldn’t partake in this barbaric bug-smashing ritual. Is any meal worth that much work? Are we really supposed to be eating these things? Isn’t it a red flag that you need a hammer to eat a crab?

WAITRESS:
Oh, you’re having the crab? Let me get you some tools so you can crack open the bug shell and get that half a bite of bug meat.

Crab is like the pistachio of shellfish. In my estimation, there is too much effort for too little reward. An experienced crab eater can find “plenty of meat” in other parts of the crab
during the culinary autopsy. The most crabmeat is found in the claw or the pincer of the crab.
Pincer
? That does not sound very appetizing. Let’s go with
claw
. Who wouldn’t want to eat a “claw”? It seems to me that the term
claw
should actually
discourage
people from eating crab. The oversize claw is the crab’s natural form of defense, its only weapon against attack. If you’ve picked up a live crab, it will, with great confidence, try to snip off your finger. “Snip, snip.” The crab must think,
Nobody is going to get me because I have these claws
. More irony. It’s like carrying around a gun and thinking,
Nobody is going to mess with me while I have this.… Why is someone eating my gun?

There is also that nasty part of the crab that you are not supposed to eat. I think it’s called ALL OF IT. Because they are
crabs
, as in the sexually transmitted disease that has the same name because it’s the same exact thing. I honestly don’t know how people even order crabs with a straight face. I imagine a couple on a romantic date, with the man trying to impress his lady by ordering for her. “Yes, my wife and I will have the crabs. No, actually, I’ll get crabs and give her some.” Whispering to the waiter, “Don’t tell her. I want it be a surprise.” Apart from its ill-fated name and frightening body, everything about the crab as a creature is creepy. It only moves sideways. To the right and then jerking to the left. It always looks like it’s trying to avoid an awkward situation. “Uh-oh. I owe that guy money,” as he sidesteps away.

I’m sure God is up in heaven looking down completely bewildered. “What do I have to do to stop these humans from eating the crabs? I gave it a rock-hard shell! I put it on the bottom of the ocean! I named a
disease
after it! I knew I should have covered it in needles! (
over shoulder
) Jesus, you’re going to have to go back down there!”

Lobsters, oysters, and crabs. Oh my!

I’m not just freaked out by shellfish. Seafood in general gives me the willies. With most seafood, I don’t understand the appeal. Like anchovies. What is the difference between an anchovy and a sweaty eyebrow? Whenever I see an anchovy I think,
Someone has attacked Tom Selleck. Why would you want to put that on a pizza?
Octopus? Really?
Octo
, meaning “eight”;
pus
meaning … really? “Yup, the pus part’s my favorite. Them suction cups remind me we need a new bathtub mat.” The octopus is really the epitome of the sea monster. Initially delighting people as the frightening subject of seafarers’ folklore, now the octopus delights people as high-end cuisine. Eaten, of course, after carefully boiling the octopus properly to rid it of slime, smell, and residual ink. Yum.

Many of these odd and unappealing food items are considered delicacies, which is a food term meaning “unjustifiably expensive.” I suppose each culture has its own definition of what a delicacy might be. Things that are presently considered a delicacy in Western culture mystify me. I understand how you can rationalize some seafood as delicacies, such as fish eggs that were from their mother’s womb untimely ripped, but snails? “Snails are a delicacy.” Compared with what? Barnacles? Slugs? What would you have to be eating on a regular basis to make snails a
delicacy
? “I normally eat just mud and worms, so when I get a snail I’m like, SCORE!” “Snails are hard to come by.” Really? Give me a shovel and twenty minutes. I think everyone is aware how disgusting snails are, and that’s why they are served in a bowl of wine and butter and called “escargots,” which is a French word loosely translated as “denial.” Initially, they were probably called “snails” and served in a bucket of sludge. For some reason, no one ordered them.

I think the answer to the perplexing riddle of why we are eating any of these questionable items boils down to a simple fact: humans will eat
anything
, given the chance. Certainly, I
can relate to this concept to an extent, but with some of these “edibles,” I think we are taking this whole top-of-the-food-chain idea a bit too far. Take the squid. Are we really eating the swimming sea spider? “But I like fried calamari!” Sure, but you could deep-fry a rubber hose and it would taste good. “You know, with a little cocktail sauce, this is good hose!” You ever order calamari? There’s always that piece that looks like a deep-fried tarantula. “You can have that one. I’ll just stick with the garden hose.”

The itsy-bitsy spider went into my big mouth.

EATING BBQLAND

Each city in the southeastern part of the United States has its own unique type of specialty food that can be found only in that city, and it all happens to be called “barbecue.” “Oh, we do it different here.” Of course, “barbecue” is not exclusively a southern cuisine. As you can see from the map, “eating barbecue” goes as far north as Kansas City, and I’ve had amazing barbecue in Champaign, Illinois, and in Syracuse, New York, but truly the heart of barbecue is in the South.

Touring around the South doing stand-up often feels more like an “Eating Barbecue Tour.” There is a pride in each city’s unique recipe for barbecue. It seems in every southern city you encounter the same guy who brags about the same two things: that a president ate at their famous barbecue place and that people have it shipped around the world. “Obama ate there, and you can get it shipped anywhere you want.” There is such pride in the fact that their local food is mailed to people. I never have the nerve to point out that Spam is also delivered all around the world. The subtext of all their boasting seems to be “You know we got the best barbecue, and you’re a fat guy … 
so you should get some shipped to yourself.” Lest I be considered rude, I always oblige.