Plinky Agonistes II

"List the best meals you've ever had."

That's today's "Plinky prompt." So, yes, after resisting the blandishments of Plinky for 276 entries, the Solipsist feels it is time to give Plinky the honor of his attention.

Previously on "The Solipsist": YNSHC vowed to resist Plinky--a sort of "idea generator" for the stumped blogger--on the grounds that it was an admission of defeat. Why resort to a pre-programmed topic when, with a little bit of effort, Moreover, the prompts themselves were reminiscent of those sort of semi-stoned "What if?" questions one poses at the end of parties when most of the beer is gone and only the true diehards (and hosts) remain. Still, when one comes across a prompt as profound as the one offered above--"List the best meals you've ever had"--how can one resist?

All right, all right, we're just stuck and uninspired. So let's see:

We suppose a great meal is a function of not just food but of fellowship. People tend to default to the Thanksgivings and Christmas hams--or Chanukkah latkes, if you prefer. In some households, where the culinary skill level is less than sublime, the best meals may be those served on Yom Kippur. (For the Gentiles among our readership: Yom Kippur is a day of fasting.) Here, though, we wish to focus only on the comestibles consumed.

Breakfast is our favorite meal of the day. Not a typical weekday breakfast, which tends to consist of coffee, but a weekend breakfast. A leisurely breakfast, eaten out and thus not entailing dishwashing. Give us some properly greasy over-easy eggs, a steak, and some hash browns and coffee and we're happy.

As for more specific repasts, we don't maintain a list--even a mental one--of "great meals." Any meal even remotely worthy of consideration among the best, though, would involve copious amounts of melted cheese--either on a hamburger or a pizza. Let's go with hamburger, as that way we can incorporate bacon. Indeed, a fine meal can be purchased at a local hamburguerie, combining beef, melted cheese, bacon AND a butterscotch milkshake. It doesn't get much better than that.

In the end, though, our attitude towards food is that it is fuel. In the debate between those who eat to live and those who live to eat, we whole-heartedly fall into the former camp. No matter how delicious or memorable a meal may be, in the end it all, quite literally, turns to crap. Why romanticize?

Take that, Plinky!