People always look at me strangely when I say that I don’t care what I eat. Or drink. I tend to think about two things: the pursuit of gastronomic experiences is not what gives me joy in life. The other is how much easier it is for me not to have to choose.
I eat anything – and I don’t suffer from it
There are a couple of things that I don’t like. For example, butter and margarine. Sour cream and milk. I’m not allergic to them, I don’t have any food intolerances related to them. I simply really don’t like their taste or smell. Apart from that, there are no foods that are on the banned list for me. The canteen doesn’t bother me, I don’t crave fine dining. However, if I end up in a better restaurant and can taste very delicious food there, I don’t protest. This makes it easier for me to adapt when traveling, meeting people, and in relationships. There is no such thing as a bad restaurant or a menu that I can’t choose from. This is a very tangible advantage over people who have to visit 5-6 restaurants before they can decide and stop by one. Or, over those who prefer not to drink coffee during the day, just to be able to consume coffee from who knows where in the world and roasted in a special way on their home-made, fancy coffee machine.
Coffee? Black is enough!
I don’t differentiate between Arabica and Robusta varieties, a traditional coffee maker is just as good as the barista’s masterpiece. I don’t go hunting for specialty coffee, a 3in1 is always good. The liberating effect of this for me is that I don’t get carried away by the “coffee cult”.
Last year I had an experience where they brought me brewed coffee grounds in a restaurant. I swear! I don’t know if it was a direct thing or a coincidence, but the coffee really was like something that would have been brewed from brewed coffee grounds. However, that was too much for me, I wanted to send it back, but at that moment I forgot about it. Then – after I took it out to the restaurant’s terrace – I started drinking it. I immediately felt why I wanted to send it back. But then I decided that since I had brought it out with me, I would drink it. After all, it wasn’t that bad. It was a bit black and the taste reminded me faintly of coffee.
I drive my friends crazy anyway because I make myself a half-cup of instant coffee every morning, then fill the mug with cold water. I like it this way: I can sip for a long time and not have to constantly run out to get it!
Gastronomic simplicity = practical lifestyle
I don’t stress about what I eat – anything is good. This solution is budget-friendly: you don’t need organic, you don’t need designer food that you can take photos of. Fortunately, I don’t have any food intolerances. Or rather, I do. I know because I once had a test done, but it showed such minimal intolerances that I figured out that I wasn’t affected. In my life, eating is a minimalist source of joy: the goal is to be full, not to represent.
I love and can cook, and when it comes to preparing food for others, I usually stick to it. But I really don’t need to prove to myself how good a host I am.
I think that attitude fits in well with my minimalist lifestyle.
Why doesn’t this make me feel inferior?
I’m confronting food snobbery – and it’s liberating. I believe that taste is not a competition. There’s joy not just in food, but in simplicity. In fact, in the kind of unpretentiousness that I can call my own. I think that with this background, I have an advantage in the field that the digital nomad lifestyle will bring me. I often say that if I’m out in Thailand, the first thing I want to try is a fried insect.
Fried Insects
I did a little research on fried insects. Here it is:
Eating fried insects and beetles is a long-standing, regionally varying culinary tradition in Thailand, with mainly rural roots. The custom is rooted in practical, cultural and nutritional reasons, and is now popular as a street food specialty – partly because of tourists.
Historical and cultural background:
- Ancient practice: Insects have long been consumed in parts of Thailand, especially in the northeastern region (Isaan), often as a source of protein and nutrients. They were collected as a natural part of farming communities.
- Traditional survival cuisine: Insects were often eaten in times of scarcity, during droughts or when other resources were scarce.
- Popular dishes: Some insects – such as silkworm larvae, crickets or water beetles – have their own recipes and are considered a “delicacy” by some people.
Ways of consumption:
- Insects are most often fried in oil until crispy and seasoned with salt, pepper or soy sauce.
- Common species: crickets, grasshoppers, silkworms, bamboo worms, water bugs, ant larvae.
- Many people eat them only as snacks, while others eat them as part of the main course.
Modern situation and tourism:
- Although insect consumption is decreasing among locals due to urbanization and modern diets, interest among tourists has increased – they are offered in spectacular displays at many Bangkok markets or night markets.
- More and more startups and businesses are starting to see insects as a sustainable source of protein, and they are also sold in powdered form.
Overall, fried insects in Thailand are both traditional rural food and modern, “exotic” urban specialties that also carry a cultural identity.
I was at the vaccination center even before Cinque Terre, and I didn’t even write about it. I think I’ll make up for it. In any case, there was a mention of the drinking water in Thailand. And the diarrhea associated with it. It will probably be exciting in Thailand when I sit on the toilet all day and then I won’t know whether the experience is from the water or the grasshopper I ate.
The wine
This is a truly characterful piece, showing its Mediterranean past even at the first sniff. It opens in the glass, it is not in a hurry, rather a little headstrong – that is what makes it exciting. The nose simultaneously reveals wet slate, a hint of black olive paste and the scent of pine forest after a woody rain. In the second sniff it is more playful: there is a little dried cranberry hiding there, and a faint hint – maybe balsamic vinegar? Maybe just a memory. In the mouth it is silky, but not smooth. More like an old-fashioned jazz record: crackling, but alive. The tannins are present, but not intrusive – rather they just remind you that this is not a terrace wine, but a conversation partner.
The finish is long, almost philosophical. Give yourself time to think about what you ate with it… or who. This wine does not want to like you – it wants you to discover it.
Once a sommelier brought a wine to our table. He shared a similar line of thought, starting by saying that this wine should actually be served at 17.2 degrees, but unfortunately it is 19 degrees. After I suppressed the question that was rising in my heart – namely, that if he knows what the right temperature is, why doesn’t he serve it at that – I asked him something else. He probably saw through me and the practical usefulness of my questions, because he asked: “You haven’t met a sommelier yet, have you?” With my characteristic reflexive honesty, I immediately answered him: “Thank goodness, no!”
So, my other favorite is wine and the gastronomic blazes associated with it. If someone loves good wine and knows what makes it good, I don’t think it should turn everyone into an expert. The above lines of thought could be left to the experts, the world would be a more relaxed place. I rarely drink good wine, and the main reason for this is that I don’t really like wine, so it’s hard for me to offer something that falls into the good category for me.
I don’t feel bad about my lack of pretensions when it comes to wine either.
Summary
I am happy without taste. I eat anything and I feel good. This is – perhaps – the art of gastronomic minimalism, which I do not think I created. After a non-selective confession, I would even rather say that there is life without culinary art.
In the spirit of freedom of taste, “simple taste, simple life”, and the unselective philosophy of life, I can easily say that the measure of satiety for me is not quality. The watchword could also be coffee, from powder – and that is fine!
Maybe I am the nightmare of gastro snobs. The person who achieves Instant happiness only through powdered soup and capsule coffee. Maybe my attitude towards material tastes, true satisfaction is despicable, and maybe the gastronomic revolution has left me out, but I enjoy my life without taste.