I think it was Pessoa that I read that genius is necessarily simple. I agree, although today I don’t want to talk about creative genius, but about domestic food; You’ll see.
For years I have the privilege of chairing the jury of the Ecotrophélia Spain contest, organized by the Spanish Federation of Food and Beverage Industries (FIAB) with the support of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAPA). It is about choosing the most innovative and sustainable food product prototype designed by a team of students from the best universities to represent this country in the grand European final.
On the jury there are real innovation stars with experience in the main companies in the sector, from whom I learn a lot. Edition after edition, I confirm that they prefer clear, simple ideas that are easy to apply and reproduce over conceptual or technological churriguerismo, no matter how surprising or complex it may seem. It would be like Ockham’s razor peeling the fruit that we are going to eat, to understand each other.
Follow me? No? Patience…
The fact is that the other day I went on TV to preach the legume faith of which, as you already know, a server confesses to being a believer and practitioner because the tasty, healthy, sustainable and economic seeds that the health authorities recommend consuming are born from legumes. a minimum of four times a week.
Not a few people have told me that, after seeing my section dedicated to chickpeas, lentils, beans and peas, they decided to include legumes at lunch the next day. That they actually love them, they add, although they tend to pay little attention to them in their day-to-day lives.
The anecdote leads me to deduce that one of the problems when choosing our daily menus is the lack of foresight. Or if you want, that we no longer have food in our heads. At least not that much. Not the homemade one, the one that you have to buy and cook daily or even minimally.
Preparing the food does not concern us. It does not worry us, but it should, because the attention deficit syndrome in the kitchen that we suffer from is directly related to the increase in diabetes and obesity from a very early age that affects our society. It’s no joke, you have to do something else and do it now.
It occurs to me to propose including in the news a small section dedicated to food suggestions. Without complications or eccentricities, just messages that remind you that some chickpeas with a splash of good oil don’t cost anything and are to die for. Or that opening mussels in the microwave takes three minutes. Or that, starting this week and throughout the summer, tomato salad is essential. Or how about a zucchini omelette for dinner? Or that with the bread that remains dry, the water from boiling the chickpeas, a couple of garlic and some almonds, we prepare a soup worthy of a cardinal in no time. Or that now is the time for peaches, nectarines and Paraguayans. Or that, as my grandmother Mercedes used to say, if you buy watermelon, for two pesetas you eat, drink and wash your face.
One minute on the news would be enough. Before or after time, service information. And as in the meteorological information, it is not about trying to surprise or entertain more than necessary; If today there are clouds and clear ones again, then clouds and clear ones.
“-green beans with potatoes, sardines and melon, the suggestion of the day” that this is not MasterChef nor does it want to be. Not as competitive, but much more important.
What do you like the idea? I give it to him.
What doesn’t seem so creative? That in reality this already exists in some other way in some place, medium or place? For what I charge you will not complain to me now! I do not intend to surprise but to help. This is not going to be original but practical.
I give you the idea and adapt it, change it or use it as you see fit, because to build a better world the most important thing is not so much to be right as to know how to share it.
