Dear Kitchen Fags: Leave Me Alone

TNG is taking a much needed break from Dec 19-Jan 4. TNG will return with new content on Jan 5. Until then, please enjoy this post from the past year. Original publish date: 5/22/2008.

The above is the original title for this post. Although now I'm thinking "Dear Kitchen Fags: Take Me In! Show Me Your Ways" would be more appropriate.

I'm a busy person. I have a full-time job and a gym habit. I work on this site for an hour or two every evening. I have a social life and I go to shows and have drinks with friends and read books. There are never enough hours in a day, so everyone makes sacrifices to do the things they truly find important. Like staying in on Saturday to study for a test, you have to give some things up things to lead a productive life.

What fell by my personal wayside was cooking. I never really learned how to do it. My boyfriend can whip up a full vegetarian Thanksgiving dinner with a spare half hour and two celery sticks, but when left to my own devices I'll be eating grilled cheese sandwiches or easy variations on pasta or even, god forbid, boxed mac and cheese (though Whole Foods brand. I still have some standards.) And people can be so mean about this.

Every day at work, I eat a turkey sandwich at my desk. It's not the most amazing lunch in the world and it won't appear in Martha Stewart Living. Hell, it might not even appear in Martha Stewart Prison Living. But it accomplishes the task of supplying me with basic nutrients, so I'm happy. However, the other people in my department happen to be intense foodies. While I'm wiping whole wheat crumbs off my face like some sloppy indigent, they're leaning over each other's cubicle walls and discussing the merits of cumin over turmeric, or how long it took to get the vinegar reduction on their chef salad to the exact right level of carmelization.

If I had the time and knowhow, I would have lunches like those of my coworkers (who might be reading this — Hi Greg!) But I don't, so I find myself defending my food a lot. My attitude on such matters is usually to do what I was doing and not alter my path due to criticism. So for a while, turkey sandwiches were my true, righteous path. Judases be damned.

But then something happened. My boyfriend began packing me lunches, so now I sit at my desk eating things like cold sesame noodles or lentil and rice salads with lemon dressing. And my coworkers LOVE this. They inspect my Tupperware, praising the seasoning of a given dish and wondering when I'm going to bring in extra portions for them. It's like gaining entry to a culinary cool kids club that I didn't know existed. Then I started thinking: could all these food naysayers simply have my best interests in mind?

As a gay man, I feel like I have some obligation to eat well. Or, at least, palatably. Last year TNG Ben assembled a group of guys to see "Love's Labour Lost" at the Carter Barron Ampitheatre, and you would not believe the kind of snacks that we all brought to the pre-show picnic. Whole Foods grape leaves. Three varieties of hummus. Blue cheese! Oh, the blue cheese! I was going to just buy some Cooler Ranch Doritos and be done with it, but I had an inkling that this would embarrass me. So I grabbed pita chips instead and fit right in.

But is there any room left in this world for the slovenly homo? I'm only 24, so I can't tell if my gross habits are just an affront to the cultured sodomite or actual anathemas to the behavior of a properly functioning adult. When do I have to stop eating ice cream out of the carton? Is there a magic age one reaches where you can no longer eat the jelly bean that you find under your coffee table? Even if its licorice?

Luckily, right now I'm fortunate enough to be dating someone that makes most of the food decisions for me. I hate to admit it, but I would rather spend two hours doing dishes than one hour cooking. So the system works. For now. But what do you all think? Does the average gay eat better than their straight counterpart? Am I disgusting?