Top Ten Food Rules

Rule #1: Microwave ovens are evil. Microwave radiation is useful for transmitting data across long distances, not for heating food. The phrase "nuke it" ought to be a clue.

Rule #2: Butter and margarine are not interchangeable. Butter is a luxuriant, subtly flavored gift to humanity; when Moses spake of "milk" in "the land of milk and honey" he really meant "butter." If butter were more solid, we would eat it with a fork. Margarine is good for lubricating wheel bearings.

Rule #3: Pasta sauce. That red stuff that you put on top of pasta is not called "gravy," it's called "sauce." I don't give a rat's ass what great-uncle Vinnie Baggaducci from Brooklyn says: "Gravy" is thickened meat juice that you drown your mashed potatoes in. "Sauce" is what you put on pasta. And, yes, it's called "pasta," not "macaroni." "Macaroni" is what you put cheese on. Get it right.

Rule #4: Teflon is evil. Teflon is a serendipitous invention resulting from an accident at DuPont. It's a really cool polymer but it does not belong on cookware. Teflon is plastic. Plastic burns when you heat it. Any twelve-year-old boy with a lighter knows that. Save Teflon for waterproofing.

Rule #5: American foods suck. Capitalism is great for the economy, but it's a bitch in the kitchen. Concepts like "buy cheap and sell dear" and "let the buyer beware" do not make for fine cuisine. American bread? Put on a pillowcase and take a nap. American cheese? Nothing says "yum" like the words "pasteurized process cheese product." American beer? Journalist H. Allen Smith brilliantly summed up American beer after he tried his first one when he said: "Put it back in the horse!"

Rule #6: Advertisers are a pack of lying snot-bags. "Home-style" soup from a can. I'm laughing too hard to come up with anything to type for that one.

Rule #7: Stop overcooking meat. Food poisoning is no fun, but apparently the USDA would like us all to eat hockey pucks. Anything beyond medium-rare ought to be illegal.

Rule #8: Aluminum cookware is evil. The only aluminum that belongs in the kitchen is in the form of foil. Two words: cast iron.

Rule #9: Salt is NEVER optional. Eat salt. Your brain needs it. Ancient Romans used to pay their soldiers with it; that's where we get the word "salary." Most importantly, food sucks without it. Stop being a pussy and just use the damn salt!

Rule #10: Coffee is the most important substance on earth. Forget petroleum or penicillin or computers, caffeine is the only reason that we do not live in the Stone Age. Wanna start a war? Disrupt the flow of oil. Wanna start Armageddon? Fuck with coffee.