Serious Eats: New York
Mark Bittman: The Minimalist's Multiple Missions
It was fun to read the New York Observer's fine profile of "Minimalist" Mark Bittman right after he and I had a friendly, just-catching-up lunch at the New York Times cafeteria yesterday. (At one point, he called himself a "daytime vegetarian," so to be in sync with him I ordered some curried chick peas, stewed okra and tomatoes, and a watercress-and-pineapple salad from the Caribbean "international" counter.)
The Observer piece showed Bittman to be very much a multidimensional figure: fiercely independent, remarkably forthright, occasionally persnickety, and a man with multiple interests. His forthcoming book, Food Matters, brings out the political activist side of Bittman, only this time it's food politics—and he's weighing in unapologetically of course. He's on a mission to change the way people look at ingredients.
He thinks the American diet has been largely destroyed by the industrialization of food production and the massive amounts we eat as a result. "There’s a huge change going on in the way people look at food," he said. “I think it's unavoidable, and I want to be a part of that."
As the Observer article says:
Food Matters lays out the case—philosophical and culinary—that Mr. Bittman has been making in print and on video over the past year. Like Mr. Pollan's, it might be boiled down to: Eat less meat. It's a rule he follows dutifully—no eating animals during the day—and to which he attributes much of his weight loss.
Also: Farmers' markets may be a good thing, but they're not going to save the world.
"People buy food in supermarkets,” said Mr. Bittman. “And they’re gonna buy food in supermarkets. So, it doesn’t matter if they buy good meat at the farmers' market or good broccoli; what matters is they go to the supermarket and buy good broccoli—or even bad broccoli!—instead of meat.
As far as cooking in general is concerned, Bittman doesn't mince words:
“I have no interest in helping people becoming chefs,” Mr. Bittman said. “I have an interest in 50 percent of the people in America knowing how to cook. And whether they cook like chefs or not, I don’t care. It’s probably better if they don’t. It would be better if they cook like me, which is adequately.”
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