It’s important during any hardship to nourish the many selves dwelling within. Food is but one of many ways to nourish not only the body and mind, but the spirits as well—though perhaps not always all in the same dish or at the same meal. It’s good to eat to be healthy, but it’s also good to eat to be happy. There’s a balance, and understanding the implications of that balance has taken almost ten years of my life. Sometimes the happy pleasure of food is the main event, and there’s little point in discussing the health benefits, or lack thereof. And sometimes food is just a little silly because the spirits needed something a little silly.
But whether you’re eating to be healthy, happy, or silly, please keep in your thoughts all who are working in the food service industry. These people are putting themselves at risk to stock shelves, prepare and deliver food, or disinfect shopping carts and grocery stores—all jobs which by definition cannot be done from home. They’re working in extraordinary circumstances, yet exceptions had to be made under current provincial labour laws to protect the wages for some of these workers if they were to get sick. I do not wish to politicize a public health emergency, but it’s hard not to when an employee in 2020 must choose between their physical or financial well‐being. They are—now more than ever—providing an essential service, and their effort deserves respectful protection and appropriate compensation.
Some time ago a guest in my house happened to catch a glimpse inside one of my kitchen cupboards while it was open.
“Kraft Dinner?” he asked with indigence. I paused and answered with a cocked brow.
“But you’ve been to Paris!” he said. “You know the finer things.”
It’s true. I had been to the Paris. And while there I enjoyed many fine meals, drank many fine wines, viewed many fine works of art, and walked along many fine tree‐lined boulevards, each one bound with many examples of fine French architecture.
I also stepped full stride into one of the many massive piles of sidewalk‐fresh dog shit before dragging my suitcase through the rest of it. With no available means to clean any of it off, what was clung to my thickly treaded new boot and jammed into the wheel of my equally new suitcase joined me for what felt like a not entirely short journey on the crowded and overly warm Paris metro. Upon arrival at the bus station and having zero change in my pocket, I was forced to quickly and stinkily sneak into the stall of a pay toilet to extract whatever I could from the situation before boarding my bus to Brussels. You know—the finer things.
The association of the contents of someone’s cupboard with their potential to appreciate fine things—whatever that highly subjective concept might be—is not the topic for today. And why would it need to be anyway? It amounts to a form of prejudice, and I’m unaware of any situation where prejudice has generally worked out well for all involved. Indeed I felt a certain amount of apprehension in my kitchen back then. Must I choose between my fondness of Kraft Dinner or my many memories of Paris? No—of course not. How silly…
So rather than choose, I’m doubling down. May I present to you: the McPizza.
This tête de cuvée was well represented in the haute cuisine zeitgeist of early 2009. The particular preparation I’m sharing is a modification of an original internet recipe initially discovered by a housemate on a Tuesday night in the rolling suburbs of Don Mills. Local ingredients were subsequently foraged during a February snowstorm from a nearby strip mall.
Step № 1
Procure the following and preheat oven along with a seasoned pizza stone to 450 ℉ or 230 ℃.
• 1x precooked pizza kit with sauce • 1x brick of cheese, mostly grated • 1x large fries • 2x cheeseburgers • 6x chicken nuggets
Step № 2
Assemble pizza kit with sauce and sprinkle with some of the grated cheese.
Step № 3
Slice cheeseburgers into quarter segments.
Step № 4
Adorn centre of pizza with chicken nuggets and surround with cheeseburger segments.
Step № 5
Garnish with french fries.
Step № 6
Finish with the remaining grated cheese, or to taste.
Step № 7
Place on pizza stone and bake until cheese is melted and crust is browning.
Step № 8
Let rest until cheese is semi‐molten.
Step № 9
Cut and serve immediately with plum sauce and cannabis.
Voilà et bon appétit!