Bruce McGuffin: Bananas
They're the color of sunlight and shaped like a smile,
Delicious in cereal, ice cream, and salads,
The most charming fruit, they are sure to beguile
Gourmets, humble groundlings, and authors of ballads.
You can't eat them ripe if you don't plan ahead.
Most bananas are green when they come from the store.
Or they're black which is fine if you bake them in bread.
Let them sit till they're ripe. That's what pantries are for.
Some students of Freud find bananas suggestive,
Not to mention your typical teenaged smart aleck.
But I won't give up food that's both tasty and festive.
If you slice them up cross-wise they're not at all phallic.
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L. A. Mereoie: Bottoms Up!
Viscount Groundsel, a dotty old peer,
Loved shooting and rather strong beer.
This malign combination
Led to guests’ appellation
Lord Lead In The Head And The Rear.
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Bruce Bennett: Make Room For Pie
(Heading to a Melissa Clark Cooking
Newsletter in the New York Times.)
A burnished turkey may be why
we visit, but the star is pie.
We love our folks, but cannot lie:
the reason that we come is pie.
We eat too much, but then we sigh,
“Of course, I still have room for pie.”
We know we can’t, but still we try,
and somehow find some room for pie.
If I eat more, I’m sure I’ll die!
we think, but then we down more pie.
And when it’s time to say goodbye,
we’re told, “Here, please, do take some pie,”
An offer that we can’t deny.
And so we leave, weighed down by pie.
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Rumi Morkin: Good Taste
Maths, Latin and Physics I waive,
Food and drink are the subjects I crave:
Like a fresh crème brûlée
With a good Cabernet –
To this kind of food I'm a slave!
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Steven Kent A Foodie Lament
Unsalted nuts and decaf coffee,
Low-cal beer, no-sugar toffee,
Bread from sprouts and plant-based meats,
Non-dairy cheese and all such “treats”
Keep far away – though people buy ‘em,
I have no desire to try ‘em.
Walden claims that life’s about
Those things we learn to live without,
But let him not be misconstrued:
Thoreau did not speak here of food,
And while such fare some folk might savor,
I prefer the kind with flavor.
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L. A. Mereoie: Sight Effect
Freddie Whitlow, while waiting for game,
Warmed his feet with a malt of some fame
But, though fine for his toes,
He found the fumes rose
And a four-barrelled gun hard to aim.
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Chris O’ Carroll: Trippy Trend
Please stop licking psychedelic toads,
National Park Service warns
–Washington Post headline
The Colorado River or Sonoran Desert toad
Secretes a milky poison you can scrape off, dry, and smoke –
A shamanistic sacrament that helps your mind explode,
Enabling your soul to throw off every yoke or cloak.
Celebrity endorsements give this high a trendy buzz
And grapevines spread the word that licking toads can do the trick.
The National Park Service finds this troubling because
The critter’s undried toxic ooze can make folks mighty sick.
Another worry is that this hot trend will get so cool,
The over-hunted toads might see their population crash.
Once, Please don’t eat the daisies was the most out-there new rule;
Today we hear, Don’t tongue these toads. They’re not your private stash.
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Margaret Owen Ruckert: Food Fantasia
In thinking of Brussel Sprout tarts
and biscuits from artichoke hearts
there are two things for sure . . .
that the names sound obscure
and, commercially, they’re off the charts.
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Martin Parker: Discomfort Food
To a tin of baked beans add some chilli.
Do not stint; spoon it in willy-nilly
with, should you so please, cloves of garlic in threes
for gilding this culinary lily.
Use that fiercest of chillies, the Naga.
Let it simmer for hours on the Aga
till the reinforced steel of the pan starts to peel.
Then serve with a great deal of lager.
The effect on one’s gut is corrosive,
cathartic, intense and osmosive.
It’s a dish to appeal to a masochist’s zeal
to blow himself up with explosive.
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L. A. Mereoie: Whiff of Napoleon?
General Cinquefoil, who feared their escape,
Left his pheasants in very bad shape,
So riddled, in fact,
Malicious tongues clacked
That he must have been loaded with grape.
