Happy eating

The essential elements that we need to survive are clean air and water, food shelter and clothing. Food nourishes us and satisfies our energy requirements and inner psychological need.

For the gourmet, good food is the raison d’etre. He loves to eat. Taste and presentation matter.

Our food preferences and the manner of eating reveal much about ourselves, our culture, social background, personality and eccentricities.

Filipinos love to eat. Many of our activities — business, social, or family — revolve around oral gratification. A Freudian theory is evident in the amount of meals and snacks that we take.

We nibble when we are happy. We binge when we are sad, frustrated, or anxious and stressed. Or the reverse depending on one’s emotional profile.

Psychologists have said that our physical appetite and emotional needs are interrelated. There is an irresistible craving for chocolate when one is feeling low. It contains a chemical (serotonin) that approximates the feeling of elation and being in love.

We celebrate contract signings, inauguration, trade exhibits over lunch, or cocktails. Visiting firemen from the international head office are deluged by genuine Filipino hospitality. They are treated to an inexhaustible round of parties and restaurant hopping.

Baptisms, débuts, engagements, and wedding feasts happen in every part of the country. Wakes, funerals, and novenas are like parties with music and Tivoli lights. Recently, the soigne set have added annulments and divorces to the list of celebrations.

On a socio-chronological scale, it is amusing to observe how each generation’s food profile varies. There is a discernible pattern among the urbanites. People are classified according to age, epicurean taste, and diet.

The Baby Boomers were raised on high-protein meals.

Not surprisingly, they crave for and enjoy the perilous pleasure of fine dining, haute cuisine — foie gras and chorizo pintxos, rare wagyu beef, aromatic cheese with star rated wine. Bountiful buffets with carvings. These gourmets (especially those who hate exercise) now feel the symptoms of heart disease, hypertension, gout, diabetes.

The Flower Children and martial law babies share an affinity for high-energy carbohydrates — pasta plus fresh seafood and leafy greens. With occasional cravings for high-cholesterol delicacies, the Millennials are blessed to have enlightened parents who serve high-fiber health foods, cereal, milk, fruits, veggies, salads and sushi. The new generation plays sports and do cross training exercises in the gym and pool. So we have taller, leaner smarter specimens of fitness and wellness. They are, however, IT savvy that they tend to play with their gadgets and focus on social media instead of interacting with their parents.

We can classify the well-preserved pre-war (WWI and WWII) and Liberation folks (our parents and grandparents) as the Spam gen. They liked the US military mess, specifically, the processed food packed in tins with sodium and preservatives — i.e. bacon, corned beef, sausages, pork and beans, hot dogs, Vienna sausages, canned milk, PX chocolate bars. Like the soldiers and By Scouts, the Spam gen survived and liked the no-fuss instant food that can be fried. The junk comfort food still appeals to all generations — salty chips, greasy peanuts, peanut butter.

Those who are children of the Spam gen, the dietary habits have an eclectic flavor combining the best and the worst in nutrition. We were force-fed carrots, spinach, avocados, monggo, and other unpalatable veggies.

The sinful treats were cholesterol-rich fried eggs, canned food and frozen TV dinners, white bread and snack delights like canned peaches in syrup, fruit cocktail with whipped cream, churros. Canned powder milk provided calcium requirements. Dietary deficiencies ere offset by multivitamins and capsules as big as marbles.

Sometimes we crave for unhealthy food because we had been programmed since childhood to sing from one extreme to the other.

Although many of us are considered enlightened and aware of good health habits we still tread the food tightrope of pleasure and pain, We manifest traces of the old colonial mentality and hanker for the canned goods with the words “lite, low-fat, low sodium, sugar-free.” Studies show that the long-term use of sugar substitutes is harmful.

The balikbayan boxes are filled with appliances, accessories, cosmetics, and canned goods. Some seniors crave for the sodium nitrate fix the way smokers yearn for the nicotine fix, as well.

Food tastes are evolving now to healthy levels. Fibrous muesli. Bran, whole wheat bread, oats, brown and red rice, tofu veggies, fruits, fish and white chicken meat have replaced the dangerous processed meat and bacon and sugar coated flakes.

Fiber and organic are the “in” words. Preservatives are out — except for embalmers and unscrupulous farmers.

People travel more frequently and they are acquiring diverse culinary preferences through exposure to different cultures. They can savor exotic specialties such as Beluga caviar, Scandinavian reindeer, Mongolian lam, Greek souvlaki and couscous, Persian baklava, horse milk, rabbit, tasty vegetarian dishes, Basque pintxos, Shanghai crabs. It is a shift to the global taste.

An epicurean adventure requires a sense of risk, love of novelty, and allergic immunity. Exploration on a culinary level connects people and diffuses generational gaps.

Bon Appetit!

Maria Victoria Rufino is an artist, writer and businesswoman. She is president and executive producer of Maverick Productions.

mavrufino@gmail.com