How to Write About Food (with thanks to Adam Platt)

Vada pav

Lately, I’ve found myself writing about Indian food.  It makes for a tasty travel story and also, I’ve been seriously inspired by Fushcia Dunlop’s memoir  Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China. In the early ’90s, Dunlop, an earnest Cambridge girl, went to Chengdu to research a very worthy project on ethnic minorities, only to find her  research impossible… and herself obsessed with tasty delights like fish-flavored eggplant. So she went on to become a worldwide expert in Chinese food.

While this is not my plan, the other day I did find myself in a serious struggle to write an evocative sentence on Vada Pav, the delicious Mumbai street food pictured above.  Crisp – salty – good: all of my adjectives were so trite. Happily, thanks to what can only be the best distributer in the world, I happened to have a copy of the “Where to Eat” issue of New York Magazine. And on a long ride on the local train, I noted the most flavorful of Adam Platt’s foody verbal constructions. So, for fun, here’s how to write about food:

trendy high concept * forking over * imbibe, gobble, and otherwise devour *  finest * deliriously potent, mind-addling * faithful rendering * signature * canoe-size * grandiose, foot-ball size *delectable, magestically unhealthy * old classics * infused * laced with * sizzles * old staples * properly crispy * rib-eye rich * enlivened * sizzles * smooth tangy * stuffs * opulently fatty * debones, simmers and serves * delicately crunchy crust * charred * pricey, unabashedly glittering * clamoring for tastes of * cool * paired with * lustrous tangles of * folded with * upscale * earthy geniality * antic * pretzel-crusted * elegant * quaint * replete with * wapped retrogourmet style with a crunchy layer of thinly sliced taro root * enhanced with * poured with proper ceremony * perfectly crisped * slathered * spiked with * impressively crispy * mounds of * mountains of * concocted * heretical choppings * simpler pleasures * feasting * fresh-charred * freshly whipped * icy, silver-dollar sized * gobble down * hunk of melted * weirdly muffled in * comfort-food delicacy * open kitchen * crunchy * tossed with * reduction finished with paprika * nickels of * crunchy translucent * tanlges of buttery beat-flavored tagliatelle * fluffy, pie-size * finished with *delicately constructed * peach-sweet * tiny-boned segments * dredged in * glazed with * greasy, queasy glory * artery-clogging pseudo-southern * salty, compulsively edible * viscous * coats in * deep fries to a golden-brown perfection * crinkly * crispy-fried * light golden crunchiness * crunchy curiously smooth fried * crunchy-fried * crunchy, miraculously ungreasy coating *tenderized * soaked in * truly grisly * elevated pleasures of * elegantly rendered * impeccable technique * sipped * pyrotechnic * imaginative* mingled * sprinkles with salty shreds * tiny, surprisingly excellent * garlic-crusted *inspired *tucked in * curls of * doused in * constructed of * griddled in * garnishes with * indulging * choice for a quick midnight snack * platter * basket * followed by * crispy, chewy * salty chewy *decorates * dappled with * for a taste of * piled with * fois-gras injected * over a * baked into a quaint * crowns * if you’re in the market for vanished delicacies  * lavish * crunchy, torpedo-size * frothy light version * imposing crunchy-friend * rashers of * framed around *laced with * clouds of deliciously-melting  * toasted * with a bracing dose * butter-soaked * fragrant * compulsively delicious * freshly-made * spooning it * ruinously addictive * golden, salty all-you-can-eat * sticky-sweet, pepper-smothered * I suggest you get in line * delectable * dressed with cucumber * maximum bang * tomato-smothered * rigorously seasonal treats * wood-fired tarts * chars * serves on *a fix of * I hop the train * chaw on * slathered with * sticky, lip-smacking glory

Wheh! After this intensive course of study, in which I learned that nothing can be better than crispiness, I finally came up with a one-line description of Vada Pav that works:

Vada Pav, Mumbai’s 15-cent answer to the burger, is a spiced potato patty fried to a crisp, topped with garlic chutney, and tucked in a bun.

Thank you Adam Platt!