Free Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant by Jenni Ferrari-Adler

was just how much food could unite or divide two people.
    My husband summed it up in a single question, which I remember him asking while we were standing in that broom-closet-size kitchen on Chambers, shortly after we’d married. And the reason I remember is because I thought it was one of the strangest questions I’d ever heard. Were you raised on canned food ? he said. And I’m telling you, the look, the shudder of disgust that ran up and down his spine as he spoke the word canned— obviously, something was wrong, but I had no idea what. I was just like, babe, you know the can opener’s the one piece of kitchen equipment that I know how to use.
    Seriously, canned food, as opposed to what, not eating? Really, what a bizarre question, I thought, and I almost started laughing, but all I said was, Yes, why? And then he just sort of nodded, like, oh, how in teresting…. We never ate canned food in my house, he said, taking his plate into the other room. It sounds trivial, I know, but it wasn’t—not to me, at least. Not if you knew the guy and knew how much food meant to him, what it said about a person in his eyes. And basically, I just got slagged, whether he meant to or not. So I stood there a moment, feeling confused, then strangely embarrassed of myself, my family…. So of course there was nothing to do but mock him, wrinkling my nose and repeating the comment in my snottiest tone: We never ate canned food in my house….
    Childish, I know: I freely admit that it was completely immature of me. But then again, it did make me feel better, mocking him, much better, actually. And the fact of the matter is that we did eat canned food in my house—and lots of it, too. What, does that make me low class ? Fine. You know what else? Just for the record, I must have been twenty before I learned that Ragu wasn’t spaghetti sauce and iceberg wasn’t lettuce.
    Yes, I was raised on your standard Monday-through-Friday menu of Shake ‘n Bake, Spanish rice, tuna casserole, goulash, and leftovers (aka Fend-for-Yourself Night)—you know, good ol’ bang-for-your-buck cooking. Out of a can, yes. I mean, seriously, what did he think ? I told him we were poor—my family, my mother’s family—I’m sorry, but isn’t it common knowledge that poor means canned, and canned means food in a poor family? And you’re damn glad to have it, too: that’s right. Now shut up and eat.
    That was my mother’s family, at least, which was your basic small-town Catholic lower-middle-class family of ten. In other words, there was no discussion about food, are you kidding? You ate what was put in front of you; you ate everything on your plate; and you never, ever complained. Because any child who complained or refused to eat everything on their plate got their ass beat and sent to bed, hungry. That’s Catholicism in my book: it’s not the number of mouths to feed, it’s the one who’s howling, getting their ass paddled at the kitchen table. And everyone else just keeps eating, absolutely.
    But of course I would say that: one of the only times in my life I was ever spanked was at the dinner table. I was about three, I guess, and one weekend, my mom made this huge pot of chili—another house specialty, chili and Fritos. And because we were broke, she made enough chili to last a week, and it did. So, by Friday night, five nights later, I’d had enough of chili, and I refused to eat my dinner. Even worse, I sassed off right to her face. I hate chili! I said, going so far as to shove the bowl across the table. I mean, it was just your basic bratty kid behavior, right? So I was ordered to sit there until I finished my dinner, which of course I refused to do.
    So I sat at the table. And I sat. And I sat. And from time to time, my mom checked on my progress, but of course there was none. Because I had decided I would rather spend the rest of my life at that table than eat another bite of chili. It was a Mexican standoff, all right, a Knee-high