Take a look at my new favorite meal of all time: the Sweet ‘n’ Savory French Toast at Southport Grocery in Chicago’s Lake View neighborhood. It’s french toast topped with gruyere cheese (whaaa?) and somewhat crispy ham with no fat on it, served with organic maple valley syrup on the side. The syrup came “from the grocery,” which in this place seems to be a very big deal. I was almost afraid to ask for a second little cup of it becuase I thought they might make me buy the whole $14 bottle.

You have no idea how good this breakfast is. It might not sound good to you just written out in words. It didn’t to me, on the menu. I would normally not order french toast in a restaurant, but my dining partner at SG a few weeks prior ordered it then. I sampled a bite so as not to be rude (and because I knew his generosity stemmed from his wanting a bite or more of my egg-laden bruschetta/crostini concoction, which was okay but not something to write in a shitty blog about. I don’t know why we didn’t just switch plates).

Whoa. I spent the rest of that morning jealously salivating over — or shall I say savoring — the memory of that bite. I couldn’t even focus on conversation, much less my own meal, after getting a taste of this miracle. I think the jealousy overcame me to the point where I was downright nasty to the person who had had the good fortune of ordering it for himself. There’s no way of being sure, because I don’t really remember. I was out of my mind. That bite had been with me throughout the past three weeks, lifting me up during sour times, gently calling me back to the Midwest for another round. I made it, Sweet ‘n’ Savory French Toast! I came back to you. Are we in love? Is the feeling mutual? Call or write.
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I often get a very tense feeling when a meal I know I’m going to enjoy more than anything else that day is about to be served to me. It’s almost like I don’t want to receive it. I want to have ordered it, to have waited for it, to have it be on its way, but I don’t actulally want it set down because at that point, it’s practically gone. The food’s there, but the suspense, thrill, and yearning have all vanished by that point. The plate in front of me is just a given. It, too, will go away, and all too quickly. There’s something profoundly sad in that.

I felt this great depression while eating for the second time at Southport Grocery. I wanted to take each bite of the Sweet ‘n’ Savory French Toast, but I also didn’t want to because then whatever little percentage of it that I managed to load onto the fork would be gone forever. I mean, I could come back, but not, like, for the next meal. They’d think I was weird. I’d have to wait at least a few days. Maybe one day. I don’t know. It’s too much to think about.

I always envision a huge, looming, color-coded pie chart when I’m eating one of my favorite things. Like I said above, the moment right before it’s placed in front of me is the happiest moment. At that point, the pie chart is not a chart at all but just a benign, bunny-yellow circle: a big, smiling, hungry face with one of those wagging tongues that looks like it’s about to slurp up something delicious. With each bite, not only do portions of the smiley face get taken over by a different, gloomier color (midnight blue… perhaps thundercloud gray), but the smile slowly but surely turns into a frown. At the meal’s pausing point, usually somewhere right in the middle (also called the “breather,” “timeout,” or “period of solemn reflection”), I imagine the face having a completely horizontal line for a smile. It’s not a grimace — not yet — but there is no joy left. It’s the “look what you’ve done to me” face a sullen teenager might shoot at the parent who never gave him any attention. I almost consider not eating any more so as not to produce the inevitable downwards-drooping smile line. All of this makes it significantly difficult for me to find joy in the eating process.

And then I do anyway!

You know, if I hadn’t taken Tylenol P.M. nearly three hours ago, I would be totally up for creating graphics of the meal-progression pie charts, thundercloud gray and all, but as it is I’m starting to drool and didn’t even notice, and would be surprised if I even stay awake long enough to run upstairs, wait 10 mintues for dial-up to work, and get this posted. Right now I sound like a raving lunatic, so maybe falling asleep for once would not be a bad thing.