Indulgence Is A Virtue

I’ve been known to overeat. And down a few too many drinks. And take jokes way too far. But what can I say? I love indulging myself. It just feels good.

In all seriousness, I have a passion for flavor (the joke thing is just one of my downsides.) Not to be confused with connoisseur, or snob, I am simply fascinated by the food palate. I still eat Chinese take-out and have never been able to pick out the black cherry notes from a bottle of syrah, but I do know when something tastes good, and I have a preference for things that taste better than others.

Food is a great thing in that it can be reinvented in an infinite number of ways. Look at the heights that pizza has risen to. From a bread and butter Italian meal to the healthy alternatives of veggie to the gourmet prosciutto and caramelized pineapple in simple syrup. And the sandwich! I would sell my first born child for a gooey tangy cubano on flatbread.

And don’t get me started on booze. I’m starting to border on snobbery when it comes to my precious alcohol. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve drank enough cheap beer to float a battleship, but those days are gone. I am addicted to flavor, and the cheap stuff (when it comes to alcohol) is severely lacking. An India Pale Ale out of Colorado or a small batch bourbon just tickles your tongue in ways that are probably illegal in some parts of the world.

I wish I could say it was because of my upbringing on fine dining, but I didn’t have that kind of childhood. I was a steak and potatoes guy for a very long time. I liked my cheese American, my bread white, and my vegetables to be on someone else’s plate. Hell, I was more of a snob growing up than I am now. It was fried chicken and corn on the cob all day, and I wanted nothing different.

But coming to the city changed that for me. I soon realized my closed-minded outlook on food boiled down to fear of change, and I was attending a liberal arts college now, goddamnit! I had to change. And it was all for the better.

I didn’t start going to Chicago’s premier steakhouses or attending exclusive wine tasting (those can be really snobby,) I just set out experimenting. It was obvious right away Chicago’s ethnic diversity in foods. Lebanese, Algerian, Italian, French, Japanese, Spanish, Greek. There were some occasional modern fusion restaurants, and my eyes started to open up. Flavor. It was everywhere. It was the best thing in the world. It was…incredible.

Alcohol followed the same way. Once I discovered the celebration of microbreweries and distilleries, I was hooked. In a lot of ways, people have been doing what I do forever. With clothes, with music, with art. With variety comes preference, and with preference comes connoisseurship, or, in my case, enthusiasm.