by Jim Gaffigan
I enjoy wine, but I’m certainly not an expert. My knowledge pretty much ends at the difference between red and white. My ignorance is usually hidden from the world until I’m handed a wine list when I go out to dinner. Does anyone really know what they’re looking at when they look at a wine list? Because if you do, I think you’re probably an alcoholic. “Yeah, I had three of these for breakfast.” I pretend to read over the binder of eight thousand wines with an inquisitive look on my face, but I don’t know what I’m looking at. I can never remember the names of the wines I enjoyed in the past, because during those times I was, well, drinking wine.
Occasionally I’ll make the mistake of asking which wine the waiter would suggest. They always seem to point at one of the more expensive wines. “Well, this wine would complement your meal.” I always think to myself, Is there a box of wine you’d recommend? ’Cause that would complement my wallet. Wine intimidates me. At fancy restaurants all the names and types of wine seem infinite. It’s like no wine name can appear on more than one wine list. Every time I open one of those huge wine list books I try to identify one wine that I’ve seen before, but I just end up looking like an idiot. It’s exactly like that nightmare you have before finals in high school where you don’t recognize anything on the test and it all looks like gibberish. When it comes to the fancy wine list, I am 100 percent white-trash hick.
There is an inherent formality with wine. It is absolutely necessary to drink wine out of a wineglass. Drinking wine out of anything else is kind of pathetic. “Hey, can you refill my Yahtzee shaker? Hit this sippy cup too, will ya? Danke.” Wine formality reaches its apex when you are responsible for “tasting” a newly opened bottle of wine when you are out to dinner. A feeling of anxiety always comes over me. All confidence seems to evaporate as I take the sample sip. What does good wine taste like? What does bad wine taste like? I usually just look at the waiter and say, “Yeah, that’s wine, all right. Fill ’er up.”
COFFEELAND
It’s impossible to talk about coffee and not think about the Pacific Northwest. Seattle changed the way we drink coffee. Well, at least what we pay for coffee. Starbucks, Tully’s, Dutch Bros., and Seattle’s Best all come from the upper-left-hand corner of the map. While all have excellent coffee, in a popularity contest, Starbucks wins. Starbucks coffee is everywhere. It’s in malls, hotels, and even in some restrooms of existing Starbucks. It’s insane to think that one day not that long ago John Starbuck asked his wife, “What if we serve strong coffee at three hundred degrees and charge five bucks for it?”
I like to think coffee comes from beans; therefore, it’s a vegetable. Coffee is the only thing most of us have for breakfast—or in my case, when I wake up in the afternoon. Coffee is a staple of our lives. Coffee plays such an important role in my life, I’ve contemplated getting coffee a Christmas present. I was thinking a mug. A mug that says world’s greatest vegetable. I need coffee to get out of bed and get through the day. However, after fifteen cups of coffee I do feel there is a diminishing return. It almost seems as if it starts to have the opposite effect, as processing all that caffeine exhausts my system. At times coffee just feels to me like a sleeping potion with a delayed time release that can only be remedied by additional coffee. Even the person who decided on the spelling of the word coffee seems to have had too much caffeine.
Initially, I was reluctant to pay more than a dollar for a cup of coffee. Coffee shops like Starbucks and their boutique coffee shop competitors seemed annoying to me. Why was everyone so pompous and aloof? I’m here for coffee, not to write the next great American novel. I didn’t understand why the espresso machine was the size of a station wagon or why I should have to wait longer to pay more for a cup of coffee. I thought of coffee as just a caffeine delivery device, but eventually I came to care deeply about the taste. The desire for good-tasting coffee is a secondary step in the coffee addiction. First you get addicted to the crutch of caffeine in coffee and then you find your taste preference. I was seduced by the flavor of good coffee. I like my coffee strong, black, and frequent. “Okay, expensive strong coffee, you win. I’m lost without you. Where do I send all of my money?” At this point, weak coffee angers me, and I believe brewing it like that should be considered a crime.
The wait I encounter in coffee shops still annoys me a little. I hold myself back from barking at the people in line before me, “Just order! You are getting a beverage, not picking a college to attend!” I’m impatient, but I still wait. I am a serious coffee drinker and I have to stand in line with others like me as well as the amateurs. I go to coffee shops for good coffee, and amateurs go for coffee-flavored milkshakes. I find it humorous that adults have found a way to use coffee shops as a means to not look ridiculous by walking around in broad daylight with a huge cup of ice cream with a straw in it. “It’s a Frappuccino! I’m an adult!”
I used to not appreciate the employees in coffee shops. They seemed too snobby and nonchalant. And slow. There is not-being-in-a-hurry slow, and then there is “I work-in-a-boutique-coffee-shop” slow. The coffee shop employees always seem like they could use some caffeine themselves. I remember thinking to myself, Who the hell does that guy think he is? Now I understand that the people who work in coffee shops are entitled to act self-important. After all, they are the first responders of everyone’s day. They are delivering the first fix of caffeine to all us addicts, and they have to take their time or it could become Armageddon. They are heroes, really. Or drug dealers. Either way, they are allowed to be jerks. Thank you, arrogant coffee shop employee.
FOOD ANXIETYLAND
Traveling around doing stand-up, you learn about the uniqueness of certain cities. A stand-up comedian knows they will be competing for an audience with amazing music scenes in Nashville and Austin. In New York, Las Vegas, and Chicago you will contend with an enormous entertainment scene. You’d never schedule a show in any Canadian city if the local hockey team (NHL or minor league) has a game. In New Orleans, it is a different situation. In New Orleans you compete against food. Sure, New Orleans has jazz and binge drinking, but the real competition for live stand-up comedy shows is restaurants and food in general. There is great dining in most large cities, but not like the dining in New Orleans. You don’t just dine in New Orleans. You overeat. Not overeating in New Orleans is like going to Paris and not looking at the Eiffel Tower.
Whenever I’m about to go to New Orleans for a show, I always suffer food anxiety. I’m not being cute here. There is actually an angst that comes over me. There are just too many decisions. Where should I eat? What should I eat? How often can I eat? Did anyone watch all the episodes of Treme? New Orleans is a food mecca. It’s not just the variety; it’s the fact that I have never had bad food in New Orleans. I think it may be against the law. Even getting a hot dog from a street cart in New Orleans is a culinary adventure. Typically, a city or a region of the country is known for a particular dish or a type of food that an overeater can track down in a day by asking a local. That is not the case in New Orleans. The bread, meats, and spices of New Orleans are as fun, unique, and diverse as its inhabitants. The dishes are at once pedestrian and simultaneously exotic. Should I eat Cajun, Creole, fried chicken, beignets? I could go on for a page or two. It’s too much. I never have enough time.
I think the po’boy sandwich was named after a guy who was trying to decide where to eat for his one meal in New Orleans. Settling on a place to eat there is my equivalent of Sophie’s Choice. How do I choose one over the other? It’s painful. To make matters worse, this issue affects me not only for every meal but also for every moment of the day. Sure, for breakfast you need to get a beignet at that tourist-trap place, but what about Cajun-style biscuits and gravy? For lunch you have to get jambalaya, but what about chicken and sausage gumbo? Breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner, late-night dinner, pre-breakfast … it’s all too overwhelming. I understand people plan actual food vacations to New Orleans under the guise of enjoying jazz, but I’m typically in the Big Easy for o
ne night. One night! That translates into only six meals for me. How will I decide? If I had to make a film about my experience in New Orleans, I would definitely get Meryl Streep to play me.
Some gumbo while I figure out what to order.
AT LEAST I DON’T EAT BLUBBER
Every morning I get up at 6:00 a.m. I meditate, do my yoga, drink a protein shake, run six miles, and then commence lying to everyone about what I do every morning. The truth is, I didn’t get a chance to do yoga or jog this morning or any other morning of my life. But those things are more likely to happen than the likelihood of me ever drinking a protein shake. I don’t eat healthy. It’s difficult to eat healthy. At times I make an effort, but I usually fail. I hate when I try to order a salad and my mouth says, “I’ll have a Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese.” It’s like I have autocorrect in my mouth. My heart may be willing, but my brain abdicated to my taste buds long ago. I’m not a healthy eater. I’m like the Dr. Oz of unhealthy eating. I don’t mean this as a criticism of Dr. Oz, who I’m sure is a nice man, but I’m starting to doubt he is really from Australia. Where is your accent, Dr. Oz?
Stages of Eating Healthy
I go through different stages of healthy eating. First it’s the “I’m only eating salads” phase. Then I’ll get to the “I’ve eaten salads for half a day straight—I should treat myself to a hamburger” phase. Finally, I get to the last phase, which I’m in right now, the “I don’t give a phase.”
If you are like me, when you enter this last phase, you begin to justify things. “I’m in a hurry, so it’s just an absolute necessity that I go to McDonald’s. I don’t want to go, it’s just that I have to or it’s possible I could starve to death.” Then all your food choices quickly become an endless stream of irrational rationalizations. “Well, I’ll allow myself to eat that because I had a salad a month ago. Well, I’ve earned that because I took out the garbage. Well, I’m starting my starvation diet tomorrow, so I really should have five hamburgers.”
My favorite rationalization is when the food is free. I have never been able to turn down free food. Maybe it’s because I grew up with five siblings, and food was always a valuable commodity. Maybe the inability to resist free food has its roots in my college years, when I couldn’t afford food and at one point resorted to eating a can of pie filling. Whatever the reason, I just can’t resist it if it’s free. Free food is the temptress that can make me give up my morals and cheat on any diet. My diets always end in divorce.
I’m married to a beautiful woman. I’m not just saying that because Jeannie is helping me write this book and she is sitting right next to me. Well, not right next to me, but chances are she will probably see this page at some point. But anyway, she is beautiful. When we are in public together and strangers find out Jeannie is my wife, there is usually an audible Wow! I used to find this flattering until I realized it was an insult. I’m not a caveman. Anyway, there are so many impressive things about Jeannie besides her beauty and brains. Most noticeable would be that Jeannie has given birth to five healthy babies, and I look like I ate five healthy babies. She is a genetic anomaly. It seems she can eat whatever she wants to and still remain thin and energetic. Jeannie aspires to make everyone in our family healthy eaters, but it’s kind of hard with me around.
Jeannie has gone from wanting us to eat healthy, to wanting us to eat organic, to not buying food. She buys this bread that is made from 100 percent organic tree bark. “Why do you need regular bread when you can lick a tree?” Jeannie likes to buy organic whole foods. Organic is probably the biggest scam of the century. For those of you unfamiliar with it, organic is a grocery term for “more expensive.”
There are people who eat only organic food, and then there are people who don’t have tons of money to waste. You can pretty much find anything made organically these days, including healthy versions of unhealthy food. French fries have been replaced by sweet potato fries, which are the Gardenburger of fries and taste exactly like something terrible. We all know hot dogs are bad for us, so that’s why there is the tofu dog. I’m pretty sure the guy who invented the tofu dog never actually ate a real hot dog. If he had, he never would have invented the tofu dog. Or maybe he tasted a real hot dog after he invented the tofu dog and was then filled with remorse. The tofu dog became his Frankenstein’s monster. “Why? Why did I create the tofu dog? We must stop the tofu dog!”
There are even organic candies, cookies, and chips that fall into another category known as “Whole Junk Food.” These foods fit into my rationalization pattern very nicely: “These potato chips are cooked with avocado oil, so I can eat ten bags. It’s good for me.” Usually the only discernible difference between a regular potato chip and a “healthy chip” is the difficulty in opening the bag. Supposedly there are good fats and bad fats. I like to think of myself as a good fat. It helps my self-esteem when I look in the mirror.
Jeannie loves buying vegetables at the farmers’ market. Can we just settle down with the farmers’ market enthusiasm? Instead of going to a grocery store and getting everything I need, I can stand outside and buy some dirty vegetables on the street from absolute strangers who supposedly live on a farm but are probably serial killers. How do we know that some of the people selling stuff at the farmers’ market didn’t just buy that stuff at the grocery store? Some con artist probably came up with the idea.
CON ARTIST: Psst! C’mere, kid. This is what we’re gonna do, see? We’re gonna go in that grocery store and buy a bunch of unwashed vegetables. Then we’re gonna sell them on the street for ten times the price.
KID: That will never work!
CON ARTIST: Just tell them they’re from the farm, so they taste better, see?
KID: You’re a genius, Mac. A genius! We’re gonna get RICH!
It’s hard to eat healthy. It’s too expensive: Should I have this salad for twelve bucks or these five hamburgers for a dime? I resent when I go out to dinner and they try to sell me the healthy food for the same price as the good food. What a rip-off. Even more infuriating is the way the waiter tries to present the healthy choice on the menu as if it tastes as good as real food. “Tonight were having a delicious entrée of steamed spinach and tofu over a bed of vitamins.” Great. And for dessert why don’t we get our teeth cleaned?
I eat kind of healthy compared to some of the Eskimos up in Alaska. They’re eating blubber up there. Compared to them, I’m practically dieting by eating a Cinnabon. Whale blubber? Isn’t that like eating a fat guy? Actually, it would be healthier to eat a fat guy. I don’t want to appear to insult Eskimos and their culture, even though I’m starting to think they don’t even make those Eskimo Pies. I realize the weather is not great in Alaska, but consuming something called blubber is a little insane. They are actually eating something that is the direct result of eating unhealthy. Isn’t blubber like the fattest part of fat? If fat made a noise, it would be blub-ber. You’d think at some point one of the Eskimos would stand up at a meal and say, “Hey, I love blubber. Who doesn’t like blubber? But I was thinking we could mix in some salads or, maybe, less blubber?” Who knows, maybe the blubber eaters think we eat weird stuff: Those poor bastards down there don’t even eat blubber. If you are eating blubber, what do you consider bad for you? I’m pretty sure drinking liquefied lard might be a healthier choice. On the other hand, maybe we got lucky because of the blubber. It’s possibly the reason why Alaska became part of the United States. Maybe the Canadian explorers made it up to Alaska and saw the Eskimos eating blubber and thought, Oh, the Americans already got here.
I look forward to the day we can walk into health food stores and see organic whale blubber for sale. “Oh look, it’s whole whale blubber. That’s really good for you, right?”
NOBODY REALLY LIKES FRUIT
Recently I saw an apple and for a moment I didn’t recognize it. Just for a second I was like, What is that, a paperweight? Oh that’s an apple! It’s so weird to not see it in a pie. I’m not proud of this, but let’s be honest. Nobody really
wants fruit. We only act like we do. A false desire for fruit is woven into the fabric of our culture. We are told that Adam and Eve were kicked out of paradise for eating an apple. An apple? Would an apple ever really tempt you? I would’ve looked at the serpent, “An apple? Uh, cover it in caramel and come back to me. You got any cake back there?”
