When I was young and thin and had the metabolism of a hummingbird, I worked for a few months in a place that sold, among other things, ice cream. I was in heaven. All the ice cream I could eat!
Well, that lasted, at most, a couple weeks. I took such advantage of that perk that it got to the point where I didn’t care if I ever saw ice cream again. And the secret they don’t tell you is that if you have a booming business, those ice cream scoops can give you a nasty case of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. Ice cream jockeys really earn their tips.
There really can be too much of a good thing. We Americans have an exceptionally hard time accepting that fact. We don’t just go out to dinner. We have to have an all you can eat buffet. We don’t eat, we gorge. Portions at American restaurants are obscenely enormous. If we don’t leave an eatery feeling slightly sick, we feel like we haven’t gotten our money’s worth. I was at a friend’s house the other day, and after stuffing ourselves, we were asked, “Did you get enough?” Actually, I got too much, thank you.
Europeans know how to sample small amounts of a given delicacy, fully confident that they will be able to do so again on another day. Americans act as if every meal will be our last. It’s as if we’re still in the throes of the Great Depression. The problem with that concept is that the rest of the world went through it as well, and yet they seem to have snapped out of their depression era need to grab and gobble.
The other day, in honor of Easter, I bought what at the time seemed like a reasonably sized ham for a single person. But I was apparently looking at it through American eyes, because I suspect I will be eating the damned thing every day for the next two weeks. It sucks to be single. Especially if you’re single and have an American-sized sense of acquisition.
[Image credit: thesun.co.uk]
The View from a Drawbridge 
LOL, I can and have cooked for up to 300. But I find it extremely difficult to cook for two, even with leftovers, there is always way too much. I owe it to my parents advice when I was little. Dad said, “Always look at the Big Picture” (The world as opposed to your own back yard). And Mom, There is always room for one more at the table.” Meaning, No one should ever leave hungry, and should be able to take some home.
Yeah, but there’s a difference between never leaving hungry and leaving feeling sick. lol
I’m making the shift from cooking for a large-ish family with teenager appetites to smaller scale. I still overbuy food all the time. Sigh.
Oh — and leftover ham is freezable. 🙂
Freezable! Why didn’t I think of that? Running joyously into the kitchen…
Just about anything that can be froze before you cook it can be frozen after you cook it. I have three freezers and that is my problem. It is an obsession to keep them full. and my wallet empty.
But Mom will be 94 in a few weeks, Have a 20# ham, all sorts of goodies… Company’s a coming, A Feast is at hand. This is what I live for.
Sounds like fun, Carole. Enjoy! 🙂
Nature’s cruelest joke: Being able to eat anything… and then, not.
Less is definitely more, but we seem to have to learn that over and over again.
I am learning it good.