EATING OUR FEELINGS
evolutionary wiring for maxi- mizing caloric intake when it was hard to do. And I think the same was true of me.” Feldman, who eventually learned to love eating every- thing, exudes a patience with his daughter’s diet that I want to emulate. The focus, for him, is not on Piper’s disinterest in the sable (when I offered some to my daughter, she looked at me like I was selling bibles door to door), but on the food they do share. To the North American Jew, what could be more ritualis- tic than bagels on Sunday morn- ing? It was part of my childhood, too (before and after a period of forced racquetball). For Feldman, eating bagels with Piper is a moment of the week when life slows down. “I grew up as Jewish by default. I’m Jewish because my mother’s Jewish, my father’s Jewish, and I can’t be anything else. There was no practising. No nothing,” he says. “My wife was bat mitz- vahed and was more active in Jewish community. So, eating bagels in Brookline on a Sunday morning means something a lit- tle different for each of us. And I’m increasingly excited for our daughter to be able to decide for herself the level of involvement she wants her religious and eth- nic background to have for her.” The next day in the car, Feld- man’s words echoing in my ear, my daughter says she wishes she was “whole Jewish” instead of half Jewish. I tell her that she gets to decide how Jewish she wants to be. To myself I think, Enjoy your religious freedom, sweetums, but you’d better be- come a food snob, or else.
RECIPE: SABLE SANDWICH Many may only know sable from a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode in which Larry is excited to have a deli sandwich named after him, but hates the ingredients, notably in- cluding sable. His attempt to trade with an unwilling Ted Danson does a disservice to this luxurious fish. If you’re lucky enough to come across sable, buy it immediate- ly. Slice it thin or thick, and layer it over a toasted bagel with cream cheese. I add a few rings of red onion and cucumber for crunch and a note of bitterness, but don’t overthink it. When I last brought sable to a dinner party, another guest, whose family had a long history of fishing and smoking, was mesmerized; she’d never tasted it before. Add slices to a charcuterie board and your guests will demand to know all about it.
Sable goes well with crunchy, slightly bitter accompani- ments like red
(Unlike me, Feldman doesn’t seem bothered by his daughter’s limited palate.) “The foods that you put in front of kids are designed for craveability, and to get into some reptilian part of their brain,” he says. He frames this as not a political viewpoint, but one of biology. “Even before kids can be socially influenced around what to eat, they’re into chick- en fingers and French fries. It’s not like it’s peer pressure.” For tens of thousands of years, our ancestors benefited from the protein, fat, and salt that helped them survive, and our appetites are still shaped by that history. I can’t deny that humans of all ages seem geared to desire sweetness and crispi- ness. “There’s something about the way our brains are wired,” Felman says. “They crave cer- tain things. It goes back to
onion and cucumber.
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FOOD/PROP STYLING/PHOTOGRAPHY MARISA CURATOLO
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