Eat, love, blog about it

These days, it's hard to mention that you love food without being termed a ‘foodie'. It quite sets my teeth on edge. It's fashionable, not only to be a foodie, but just to use this annoyingly cute term.

Food is certainly very fashionable these days. There's high social currency to be dealt when talking about the latest ingredient no one has heard of, or eating the newest culinary mash-up. (Some of these, like Korean-Mexican, well established in Los Angeles, are delicious.)

I was surprised to learn that ‘foodie' isn't a ‘nu-age' creation of a blogging generation, but was coined back in 1981. The Eighties perpetrated many a crime, but thankfully the widespread adoption of this word wasn't one of them.

In the noughties though, with a new breed of people who'd go to trendy restaurants, eat trendy dishes, photograph them with trendy cameras and post them on trendy blogs, ‘foodie' has had quite the revival.

When I think of people who fit the term, I remember diners who are exhausting to have at a dinner table. For them, ordering and eating food is a competitive display — one in which you need to show as much knowledge and sophistication as you can.

As menus are being read, the foodies' ears are pricked, fervently hoping someone won't know a term, so they can instantly define it. Sometimes, a fellow diner will let the foodie down by asking a waiter, but foodies are known to drown out the guy who's actually being paid to answer questions.

Once, I was at a table where someone at the far end asked what a dish was, and my indubitably foodie neighbour all but jumped up, screaming across the table, "It's brie! It's brie! It's cheese! It's good, try it!"

Don't take this the wrong way. I can talk about food from breakfast through dinner and all the way to breakfast again. I love going out with people who love food, who are interested in menus, open to new dishes and voluble about what they're eating. But I hate it when food becomes competition. Food should be about fun, warmth and enjoyment.

But knowing your food has become a marker of sophistication, and keeping up with the nattos, guanciales and kishus is almost a full-time occupation. Sadly, people become afraid to ask questions, thinking they'll appear ignorant.

I've actually sat with vegetarians who've ended up with cured meat on their plate because they assumed, and were too cowed to confirm, that prosciutto was a cheese. Look at it this way, you're paying for something you're going to put into your mouth.
 
You should never be ashamed or embarrassed to ask what it is. Any restaurant that makes you feel bad for asking is not worth going back to. (Unless of course the food's amazing — in the end, good food trumps all.)

But all this is such a small, even superficial, accusation when you see the good aspects of a trend that's creating alert, mindful consumers. Too many people I know who aren't interested in food also eat very badly. Tables full of well-informed, well-eaten customers who are critical of what's set before them, can only drive quality up.

So certainly, if the price of being aware of what you eat, where it's come from and how good it is for you is that there's a little too much competition at the dinner table, it's a small one to pay. Even so, please don't call me a foodie. 

Gautam Raja is a journalist based in the US.