Table Manners
Mum’s the Velveeta
Keep your secret ingredients secret
Dear Helena,
A friend of mine recently refused a dinner invitation, saying he was trying to lose weight. He explained he had just started phase one of the South Beach Diet and was being very strict about it. I offered to make a dinner that met the South Beach requirements. Turned out this meant no starchy food of any sort. I made poached cod with an Italian salsa verde. The salsa turned thin and way too tart, and at the last minute I threw in some bread to thicken it and smooth out the flavors. It was creamy and delicious. I didn’t tell my friend about the bread, but I felt guilty. Is it ever OK to feed someone a dish made with an unexpected ingredient that they wouldn’t be happy to know about? —Dissembling Host
Dear Dissembling Host,
No one wants to hear the cook say, “You’ll never guess what the secret ingredient is.” The answer is usually something you don’t want to know, like mayonnaise or Marshmallow Fluff. This Christmas, for instance, my husband received a gift of some homemade fudge. I was munching on it when he asked me to guess what made it so creamy. I stopped chewing. “Velveeta!” he announced. I immediately flew into a rage. “What kind of sick monster puts Velveeta cheese in fudge?” I screamed. (I later discovered that Kraft Foods came up with the idea.)
Actually, I quite liked the fudge. It tasted like chocolate cupcake frosting. So why was I so angry? Part of it was that I prefer to avoid highly processed foods. But the real reason for my dismay was that when you let someone feed you, it’s an act of trust, and when he or she announces there is something you don’t like in the food, you feel betrayed. You feel infantilized. You feel the way Jessica Seinfeld’s kids must feel when she reveals there are carrots and spinach in their brownies.
That said, I don’t think it’s wrong to hide ingredients in dishes, provided you’re not violating a guest’s religious or ethical beliefs or triggering potentially life-threatening allergies.
I often make penne with winter squash, sage, and brown butter for dinner companions. I’m pretty sure the health-conscious would blanch if they knew it contained a half stick of butter per serving, but I don’t feel guilty about it because everyone loves the dish. Nor should you feel guilty about compromising your friend’s South Beach Diet, even though you explicitly promised not to do so. At the last moment, you had to choose between keeping your promise and a properly emulsified and balanced sauce. You quite rightly chose the latter.
This may sound underhanded, but letting your friend or family member unwittingly consume a little bread hardly constitutes a major betrayal. When you feed someone a dish containing a hidden ingredient, whether it’s tofu or Velveeta, the person usually consumes an insignificant amount (otherwise, you wouldn’t be able to hide it). Keeping quiet about it is no worse than a white lie. As long as you’re not seriously imperiling your guests’ health, what does a little fib matter if it allows them to fully enjoy their meal?
The mistake my husband made was to tell me about the Velveeta. As soon as I learned the truth, I tried to throw the deceptive sweetmeat in the trash. He snatched it away, saying it was wrong to destroy a gift that someone had labored over. We compromised by taking it to a party that night. “Homemade?” our friends asked. “Mm-hmm,” I responded. They gobbled it up. I didn’t ask anyone to guess what made it so creamy.
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Helena, you are way off base on this one. The main point of the friend's diet was to avoid carbs. If the host was forced to violate that, the very least that should have been done was to explain what happened so that the guest could make a choice about how to deal with what was being served.
Agree w/Kaimukiman. You gotta give your guest the choice -- poached cod would've worked well with some lemon, or a quick lemon/butter/wine reduction you could've thrown together.
Helena the hypocrite. Lets see......it's perfectly fine to betray the trust of a friend who has expressly stated food restrictions AND offered to withdraw from the meal in order to stick to dietary preferences? Then you have a hissy-fit when you discover Velveeta is an ingredient in the gift fudge? Wow. Your husband was enjoying the odd fudge..... It isn't as if Velveeta is toxic, just weird and very processed. I'm glad I don't have invitations to eat at your table or exchange holiday food gifts.
I think Helena's really outdone herself with this one: this is by far the worst advice I've heard from this column. If I explicitly told a friend that there was something that I chose not to eat and expressed how important this was to me, and in light of this, they insisted on feeding me, promising to respect my dietary wishes, and I later found out that they broke their promise and violated my trust, I would be absolutely furious. I'm not even sure I would speak to a person who demonstrated so little respect for me again.
Dissembling Host should be ashamed of him/herself, and Helena as well for being an enabler of such dishonesty. To even suggest that taste supercedes truthfulness in friendships tells me a lot about Helena's priorities.
A little bit of bread in some sauce is not significant. I would have done the same thing. It's not like she changed the entree to risotto or something !
The advice given here is so extremely off base I can't even begin to express my disappointment. This is about basic decency and respect. In this case, you are not a chef. You are a friend who promised to do/not do something, then reneged on your word. But more importantly, what kind of person encourages this kind of behavior?! Good thing my friends are people of their word.
So many times that I hear stories like these, it's because the guest is being insanely demanding. 'I don't eat this and that and the other thing, so please make this.' But this guest was doing the right thing -- the polite thing -- by declining to attend so his dietary restrictions wouldn't impact the host's menu.
The host refused his "no" rsvp and said she'd make something that fit his diet. At that point, she accepted responsibility for actually meeting his dietary needs. To hide her transgression and not even give him a choice was unforgivably rude. He could, no doubt, have eaten fish without the salsa verde without impacting anyone else at the table, and still kept to his diet.
Velveeta fudge isn't awful, but the stuff I had (formed in small logs, it was rolled in coconut and looked rather turd-like) was odd and pasty, but not creamy.
Though I don't make Velveeta fudge, I do enjoy revealing surprise ingredients, as long as they are in accordance with their diet/allegies/lifestyle choices. It stirs things up for people.
We live in interesting times. Everyone has a food allergy/intolerance/issues that every hostess is must acknowledge and cook around. I think the fellow who turned down dinner so he could adhere to his diet did the right thing, I also think if he knew his hostess had added bread to his food he would have been (justifiably) as upset at the person who freaked out about the Velveeta in the fudge.
Im not a big fan of Velveeta myself, but I sure do love fudge, and I'd be interested in tasting the combination. I've had plenty of home-cooked food over the years that had secret ingredients and once revealed, I've never STOPPED eating something because I suddenly found out it had something in it I (thought I) didnt like. I would just chalk it up to "well, you sure fooled me -- I like this!"
So basically, it's ok to deceive your friends as to what they are eating if you're too vain to admit you screwed up the "salsa verde." Wow. Super advice.
I've started a thread on this in chow-feedback (I originally had it in site talk, but it was moved... someday I will figure out the board names and criteria)
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/482107
Helena, did you even LOOK at the diet before you gave your advice? In the first phase of the South Beach Diet, it's vital to keep one's carbs under a certain level EVERY DAY so that the body changes the way it fuels itself. By eating the tainted sauce, his body did not make the change, but since he didn't know, he moved on to phase 2 before his body was ready!!
The fact that you equate breaking promises and lying to one's friends with telling someone that her fudge contains Velveta makes me glad I don't know you.
Yes, it's an act of trust and that trust includes not sneaking ingredients that one's guest is avoiding, for whatever reason. Just because you find it irrelevant, silly, or whatever, makes it all the more disrespectful to the friend because it's a clear indication you don't respect the friend.
This is DISGRACEFULLY bad advice. Is this the Bourdain thing at work here, where dismissing people's dietary needs signifies some sort of maverick gonzo cool? It can be amusing, yes, when he jokes about dangling strips of bacon under the noses of the pork-averse, but you'll note that he doesn't force-feed anyone the bacon.
This has got to be the most ridiculous advice that I have ever read!When I was in grad school many years ago, a roomate did something very similar to me; I was a strict vegetarian and she served me a dish that had "hidden" meat product. I was able to detect after just one bite. When I confronted her, she made up some lame excuse and then added, "besides, you look anemic, a little meat isn't going to hurt you". I moved out shortly afterwards ......
What a condescending and twisted sense of irresponsible superiority you display Helena!
Helena, you should be fired regarding this advice.
According to Helena, "But the real reason for my dismay was that when you let someone feed you, it’s an act of trust". Ummm, why does using Velveeta as a "secret" ingredient constitute a betrayal of trust, but adding bread to a FRIEND'S meal (after he explicitly explained his dietary reasons for such avoidance) fall under the "it's okay" category. This advice is so beyond lame--it's giving a seal of approval to lying and dishonesty. We can all thank the heavens that Helena doesn't write a relationships column.
And honestly, who has a meltdown over a little Velveeta in fudge.
My initial response was "eh, it's just a tiny bit of bread, and it sounds like he's on a stupid diet anyway," but I reread the question and changed my mind. This friend tried to avoid inconveniencing his host by declining the invitation, but s/he insisted, and promised to make something appropriate. While "a little bread" doesn't seem so bad to me as a normal-carb-diet person, there are omnivore folks out there, like YumTum's former roommate, who might think that a little meat wouldn't be so bad to feed me, a lifelong vegetarian.
I think Helena's response here has more to do with her own judgment call about the South Beach diet than what's really appropriate. Would she have answered the same way if the person had used beef broth in a soup served to a vegetarian to whom s/he'd promised a meatless meal? I doubt it.
obviously its the morality of the issue that's at stake here...and there are some grey areas. for instance, i dont believe that throwing a bit of bread in with the sauce is exactly tantamount to sneaking meat in a vegetarian's diet...for obvious reasons. the 'south beach' dieter is not averse to bread for any reason other than to lose weight - certainly not for moral or ecological reasons, nor allergies. i do agree that it is a little sneaky - but you also have to look at the whole picture. the chef in this instance literally *framed* the meal around the dietary restrictions of one of his/her friends so that they would be able to be included and enjoy dinner out, even while being on a new diet. I think that actually shows quite a bit of respect. If a little bread got thrown in the sauce as a desperate measure - and, when you think about it, probably less than half a crouton made it onto his plate - this seems to be excusable considering the time and effort that the chef had already made. And if half a crouton will ruin your diet - you should consider yourself a bit high maintenance.
The guest did consider him(her)self "a bit high maintenance", which is why s/he declined the invite to begin with.
Helena fails for this idiotic, hypocritical advise.
...of course i mean "advice"...
cahlinny, I think you're missing the point. Is it up to the host, after assuring the guest that said guest's dietary restrictions/requirements will be adhered to, then decide that "well, it's not that big of a deal."? It IS a big deal, and that's because the host betrayed the guest by misleading him.
cahlinny, perhaps you don't understand the whole premise of a carb controlled diet. it is not a matter of the person being high maintenance, but of the diet being high maintenance. In the early stage of the diet, carb control is everything. Perhaps the amount of bread the guest received was not critical. That is not a decision the host/es or any of the rest of us should make. What matters here is that a specific promise was made. The promise was broken, and for no good reason, other than not wanting to look bad, the host/es could not even manage to let the guest know what the situation was. Had that information been forthcoming, surely good manners would have prevailed, and the guest could have declined the sauce on that one serving, genteelly removed most of the sauce as the meal was being enjoyed, or made an independent decision as to how significant the amount of carbs were. Once the host/es had agreed to take responsibility for the dieters needs, no matter how arbitrary those needs may seem to anyone else, there was an obligation to the dieter. If the obligation could not be met, a simple acknowledgment and apology could have solved the whole issue.
Frankly I sometimes wonder if our Miss Manners is really some sort of a) social scientist conducting a secret survey on manners, offering terrible advice to see how her subjects (us) will respond; b) prankster; c) both. Her advice lacks simple common sense far too often (remember the Dinner's Getting Cold fiasco?).
I kind of see what she means, but I'm not sure if she expresses herself well. I remember one year I fed my red meat-eating family homeade vegetarian lasana, and substituted tofu for ricotta. But I used homeade sauce and real parmegians (Sp?) and they loved it. (And none the wiser) My mom and I keep it as a secret between us. However, I would never serve pork to the muslims in my life and would be upset if someone served me beef, chicken or pork, since I don't eat any of them.
I think she sometimes meant to say, a little white food lie won't really hurt anyone as long as you keep people's best intentions at heart. Also, if someone gives you a food gift you aren't wild about, you don't have to eat it -- just remember to thank them for their generous gift.
But in this case the food lie could have hurt somoene. No, it might not have sent them to the hospital. But it could have done damage to their personal health goals. We aren' talking subbing vinegar for lemon juice in salad dressing or something. And no one is suggesting the food wasnt good. But the guest had no reason to believe s/he shouldn't eat it - since the host/es promised to make it according to the guest's diet plan.
To adventuresinbaking,
You tell the story of your lasagna. Did any of your family members specifically ask you NOT use tofu? And if they did, did you tell them "OK, I won't use tofu."? And then did you use it anyway? In other words, did you promise one thing and do another? It doesn't matter if the small amount of bread didn't do any harm - it's the principle of the matter. The bottom line is that the host shouldn't have lied to the guest.
"At the last moment, you had to choose between keeping your promise and a properly emulsified and balanced sauce. You quite rightly chose the latter."
A promise is more important than the viscosity and creaminess of the sauce. There are other ways to improve a tart and watery sauce without adding carbohydrates.
Are you out of your mind! If someone can't eat something, or tells yu they don't eat something and you PROMISE to be sure they don't, it is lower than low to "sneak it in".
Look, If I go someplace and tell the host, "I can't eat nuts, I'm allergic" and the moron decides that it wouldn't hurt and slips some in, I could DIE! It has happened before.
"Well, it's only a LITTLE nut, and the recipe isn't the same without it."
THEN MAKE SOMETHING ELSE!
For the question asker, it wasn't an allergy issue, but the friend was trying to lose weight and had dedicated them self to following a strict diet, something that takes hard work and determination. the asker then offered to make something to his friends specifications, and then decided, "hey, why bother? _I_ like it with bread, cause it looks like I'm a better cook."
The asker should have, instead, put aside a portion or two without the bread for the guest and then added the bread in.
My advice to the asker? You are a sucky friend. Shame on you. Go buy your former guest, who hopefully doesn't read this board, a dinner out at a place that does South beach OK food. then go learn yourself some proper hosting etiquette.
I just want to comment on most of the comments here. For readers of an etiquette column, most of you are extremely rude.
It is one thing to disagree with Ms. Echlin's advice but to attack her personally? RUDE. One reader saying she is glad she doesn't know Helena. My god.
Another point, RELAX people. Sheesh. Do you not have a sense of humor? Can you not tell that most of these columns are written at least with some tongue in cheek?
I do not know any of you personally so I will not personally attack you but I will say that I hope you are more respectful of people in your lives than you are of Ms. Echin.
And while I might not always agree with Ms. Echlin's advice, I always enjoy it. And I am going to guess that there are probably times where she wouldn't completely follow her own advice but has chosen to give a clever, enjoyable response that those of us with a sense of humor can appreciate.
And I'm not defending Ms. Echlin just because, I swear by this, my mother-in-law fooled me the SAME way with velveeta peanut butter fudge this past Xmas. It was pretty devastating! (but, yes, tasty).
I'm hoping that this was meant to be sarcastic.
It wasn't. But thanks for checking.
Wow. I am amazed at how fired up so many readers got about Ms. Echlin's entertaining advice on this one! Aren;t we all taking things a bit too seriously?
In college I had a skinny friend who would only eat "fat free" foods. On one drunken evening we shared a box of what I told her were "fat free" doghnuts, ridiculously rich and tasty...She never questioned it, just chowed down with me, enjoying every bite. And you know what? She was FINE! Those of us who consider ourselves health conscious don't really want to know why food at a lot of restaurants is SO GOOD (usually because they don't hold back on ingredients like butter, sugar and heavy cream) we just want to ENJOY it. What this high maintenance guy didn't know in this case, I assure you, did not hurt him. I am sure he had a wonderful time and quite enjoyed the menu specially chosen for his needs.
I feel the need to point out that many of the people here who have so rudely and freely attacked Ms. Echlin (have her fired? please!!) have any credibility when weighing in on the issue of manners!
Look, people, you're overreacting. The cook was fully intending to meet her guest's wishes. In what sounds like a last-minute panic, under the pressure of hosting, she reached for the ingredient she knew would make her meal taste good. It would be natural to feel embarrassed about this, and just as natural to guiltily follow one's impulse to omit that information. No, it doesn't seem like the best decision. And yes, I think it would be better to explain the situation and give the guest a choice.<br><br>But personally, I think Helena was trying to be a bit flip and be the defender of what tastes best. You have the right to disagree, but the personal attacks are nonsense. You accuse her of a lack of etiquette and/or judgement, but feel free to make conclusions about her personality and value? Does anyone seriously come here for advice on morality? Disagree and move on.
I'm with you gabliana! There are some mighty rude folks in this column.
For those of you that need the short version from Helena:
"When you feed someone a dish containing a hidden ingredient, whether it’s tofu or Velveeta, the person usually consumes an insignificant amount (otherwise, you wouldn’t be able to hide it). Keeping quiet about it is no worse than a white lie. As long as you’re not seriously imperiling your guests’ health, what does a little fib matter if it allows them to fully enjoy their meal?"
and then
"The mistake my husband made was to tell me about the Velveeta. As soon as I learned the truth, I tried to throw the deceptive sweetmeat in the trash."
In other words, the hostess didn't serve a gargantuan pile of stuffing covered in a bread crust surrounded by spiced crackers - she hid bread in a verde sauce (that they felt was otherwise inedible) to the point where her hyper-carb-conscious guest did not notice. To have told him would have caused unnecessary stress between the two of them.
See the point? Helena's actually pointing out that this is the lesser of the two evils. No evil was intended, no one went into anaphlatic shock, no religious convictions were violated and no vegetarians were forced to eat bacon. A guy on a fad diet probably ate all of 2 grams of carbs and enjoyed his meal (instead of eating a sub-par version that would further remind him how awful this "phase" of his diet is)...yeah, that's totally worth an all-out fight.
Let me preface this by saying that I consider low-or-no carbohydrate diets to be utter stupidity. I've seen them work for major weight loss, yes, but I've never in my life not seen someone bounce back to at least near their original weight from them, especially since Canada / US society is highly carb intensive. That's not to say that I'm completely closed minded about them; I just am extremely skeptical.
That being said, I respect people's rights to indulge in these kinds of diets if they choose personally to do so. Some of my closest friends have given up the carb, and while I disagree with their methods, this takes a lot of willpower and diligence, and I support them all the same.
Gabliana: there certainly is room to incorporate humour into an advice column, but giving blatantly bad advice that enables dishonesty certainly isn't the way to do so. We've all laughed at or with Helena's columns in the past, but this was a very serious breach of trust. The writer had a friend who was attempting to adhere to an extraordinarily strict diet - one which I disagree with - but to thwart that person's attempts to do so is low. Even five year olds understand that making a promise to a friend and then going back on that promise is downright wrong; I don't see how both you and Helena have problems understanding this. I would think that please, thank you, and promises would be the very primary rules of etiquette that one would learn in life, and if one failed to grasp any of these extraordinarily simple concepts, they certainly shouldn't be writing a column on manners.
Linzbo and Stephmo: this certainly would not "hurt" said friend, given that he's not celiac or anything like that, but these carb-free diets follow very specific principles that need to be respected to enter into the state (ketoacidosis?) where the diet becomes effective. Given that, again, this is a huge violation of trust.
Again, I think that no-carb diets are brain-damaged concepts, but I had friends two years back that I wanted to invite for dinner and they were both on carb-free diets. I prepared a meal for them that met both their dietary needs exactly, and while it was certainly not my best work - especially since I'm not well-versed in cooking with no carbs - I followed the guidelines that they presented to me and prepared something better than palatable to both of them. The thought of deceiving them, even if I disagree with their techniques of weight loss, is just incomprehensible to me. True friends would never do this to another person.
As a more severe example, I have Crohn's Disease, and MSG is one of my huge triggers. I have a friend who I recently reconnected with. He wanted to host me and my partner for dinner, and knowing how incredibly complicated it is to cook for me, I refused, insisting instead that we go to a restaurant that I knew would have some safe choices for me. He was absolutely adamant that I eat at his place and requested my dietary restriction list. I supplied him with it and took the risk of eating at his place, only to end up several hours later with severe complications that could have required emergency surgery. Upon asking him, it turned out that one of the sauces that he used in our food preparation contained autolyzed yeast extract, which is one of my forbidden ingredients. I had informed him of this in advance and despite his insistences, he had not taken the necessary precautions while still remaining firm in his word that he would do so. This was a major incident for me and I will never be able to trust him again when it comes to food because of it. Now admittedly, this diet business may not be quite as serious as all that, but it's serious enough that no caring friend, in my opinion, would be so demonstrate such a callous disregard to such a simplistic dietary necessity of one of their friends.
As for Helena, it's clear that there have been a plethora of occasions where people have disagreed with her on the topic of manners. If popular trend differs from her take on issues, perhaps it is time for her to either gracefully step down or for Chow to dismiss her. We need someone running this column that is representative of the readership of this board.
My issue with Helena comes from the ethical problem of slipping something unwanted into her guests meal. It is understandable to make a last minute rescue of the dish, however she had the option of a): removing a portion of fish for the dieting friend BEFORE continuing the sauce -or- b): Confessing the additional ingedient to her guest in order to allow him to determine whether to eat the dish.
To then juxtapose this scenario with her personal affront over being gifted with fudge containing Velveeta makes her seem shallow and self absorbed. She said her husband was eating the fudge and admitted she liked the taste. What is the problem? If she is too precious to deign to eat Velveeta, then what is her intent when she slyly palms the Velveets fudge off on others? Why not just permit her husband enjoy the "sweetmeat" gift ?
My impression from this was that it was ok to do what you want as long as it's part of a "gourmet" type meal....but God forbid anyone sneak a substandard item into your fudge or they'll get twenty lashings with the nearest rubber spatula. A bit of "my way or the highway" here. Or deciding that you know better what is good for a person, than the person themselves.
I wonder Helena, if you control all of your poor husband's food choices? Is he now a closet Velveeta fudge eater?
As a vegetarian, I have been known to not ask the base of a vegetarian looking soup in a restaurant (which was the case recently at a tapas bar when i had the almond soup)...however, if i tell you i'm a vegetarian, and you offer to cook for me, and then knowingly throw some ground anything into a lasagna and try to tell me it's soy....not only will i know the difference, but i may never trust you again. No, i won't die from the "accidental consumption".....however i should hope that's not the cut off here.
As for the tofu in the lasagna above...my sister and one of my close friends....is allergic to soy...i'm assuming none of your guests expressed this need !!
I also felt this way once when someone at my workplace brought in one of those frozen layered cookie/cool whip/ice cream chocolate bar concoctions....and halfway through it, i was told there had been raw eggs in the mixture. I didn't "fly into a rage" however...sure didn't finish the thing...
To those who defend Helena because she was being cute, clever, entertaining, whatever, to you I say "Bunk".
Miss Manners (Judith Martin) is far wittier than Helena and manages to maintain her sense of what she feels is right and wrong. Regardless of whether or not you agree with MM, she somehow is able to entertain without compromising her sense of propriety. Helena's column is titled "Table Manners" and her reply was not mannerly, nor, in my opinion, very funny. I would love to read Miss Manners' reply--my guess it would be quite different, and, yes, amusing.
In this day and age of what I like to call 'food religion' and fad diets, people are a tad too demanding about what they will and won't eat. I've traveled to many places throughout the world, and in most cultures, you eat what is served because you are grateful to be fed. It is a luxury here in the affluent parts of the US to be so picky about how your nutrition is acquired.
A few bread crumbs tossed in to thicken a thin sauce doesn't constitute an ethical slight of hand.
Helena's column has it right, a good host should do what they can to provide a good meal, "provided you’re not violating a guest’s religious or ethical beliefs or triggering potentially life-threatening allergies."
Come on people. What is more important here: sharing a meal with a friend or bread crumbs in a dish.
The host obviously went out of his/her way to prepare a special meal and only modified the meal at the last minute for a tastier dish. This is a natural reaction when you are hosting: you want to prepare a tasty meal for the guests and you want your guests to enjoy it. Yes, the dieter would not be pleased if it was known that a small amount of bread was in the dish, but he should also be grateful that a friend would prepare a special meal ...and it really caused no serious harm him.
The personal attacks on Helena are ridiculous. If you don't agree with her column, don't read it. Don't ruin it for the rest of us with your negative rude vibes. A variety of viewpoints on the topic is interesting to read, but your rude comments are not.
Emilily, agreed in most cases. In this particular case, the guest in question, so far from being demanding, refused the invitation precisely in order to avoid what happened! It was the host who was demanding—and underhanded!
Shoshanna, ditto. As has been stated, the host had various options: setting aside just one portion for her friend without bread, for instance, whom she had insisted come and whom she had promised, in order to have that friend's company, to adhere to his guidelines. At the very least, confessing.
As for Helena's feelings, please. This is a job she's taken and a persona she's constructed. (I'm assuming here she's even a she named Helena.) Not only am I quite sure she's professional enough to expect heated dissent, as I've said before, I have my suspicions she *courts* this sort of controversy, likes to mix things up in her column by throwing us skewed tidbits like this one for us to pounce on.
Helena (or whomever you are), this is fantastic. You obviously hit nerves with your questions. Keep up the great work!
"Oh it's just a little bit, and it won't hurt". I wonder if they have the same cavalier attitude about food safety. Just "throwing in something" undesired shows a lack of respect for the friend, regardless of whether the person agreed with the diet or not.
And why is it that if someone prays to a certain deity and decides not to eat something because that deity "said so", that we are supposed to "respect" that announcement more than a person saying, "I don't eat that"?
When people deliberately do something like this against a person's wishes, it's as if they're saying, "I'm in control of you." And also, "How dare you make me do something for you". It's sort of a secret way of saying "I'll show you! Now eat this!"
Yes, my opinions are harsh. But the world is full of toxic people who seek to hurt others every chance they get.
I must say I am amazed at the emotional hostility from the comments! I agree with emilily that it says a great deal about our culture that we can be so demanding about our food choices. But most of all, it just makes me chuckle that some people forget this is a website FOR FOODIES. Hello! This is not the Atkins support group or PETA.
I've been taught to equate consumption of Velveeta with that of plastic, so yes, I'd be pretty surprised and even horrified to learn that someone would use Velveeta as a fudge ingredient.
And I've been known to prepare additional dishes to suit the needs of my vegan friends, whom I respect and would never try to fool. Yes, a better response might have been to put the sauce on the side for the South Beach friend and let him make his own choice.
But I would certainly not publically vent my anger on a columnist if I disagreed with her. Let's show some respect for other humans, ok?
Very well put, Howdy.
In this instance, the host should have told the truth and revealed what was in the Salsa. It's a matter of trust. If the guest felt it was important enough to decline a dinner invitation, it is imperitive to come clean. Surely, a bit of butter and dill on the Cod would have been fine. The host should be honest and let the guest make the choice. It can also be a serious health matter. While most people will tell you if they have a dietary restriction based on allergies or religious convictions, it's what they may NOT tell you than can cause complications. A guest might have Crohn's Disease or Colitis, they might not be able to eat broad beans because they are taking a drug for mental health, or perhaps grapefruit might interfere with a prescription. Maybe the guest doesn't want you to know that he has a bowel disorder, a nervous condition, or a bad ticker. If a guest makes a request, it should honored. No harm, you say? You don't know that for certain. Tell the truth.
I've got food allergies. And when I'm invited to someone's home for a meal, I make that clear, and offer to bring something that I know I can eat (and share). If my host refuses and says that they will keep my allergies in mind, I expect them to do so. And no, not all of them are life-threatening- just stomach pain inducing.
Helena, for shame. I'm not going to tell my host that I don't eat legumes because they make my small intestine swell like a balloon; I will ask them to please not include them in the menu. If someone sneaks in chickpea flour, I'm doomed with both pain and embarassment. The guest was obviously trying to be cautious and warn his host and doesn't deserved to be punished for that.
Doesn't anybody else find it strange that the majority of Helena's supporters are new posters with no other posts than this one?
I don't read your column, but I have to say this is very bad advice. This is wrong on so many levels. It seems that you are making a judgment about your friend's dietary restrictions and deciding for him what's ok for him to have. It's kind of reminiscent of that scandalous MSG thread (which I believe was deleted) where people knowingly spiked the food with MSG without telling the person). Whatever your friend's reasons are, you need to respect his or her wishes, especially since that person came to you beforehand. You could have prepared two different versions. Problem solved.
Seriously, I think a retraction is in order.
"Doesn't anybody else find it strange that the majority of Helena's supporters are new posters with no other posts than this one?"
OK, here's another post for 'ya.
I've sure learned a lot more about intestinal disorders than I ever thought I would on a Foodie website.
"Doesn't anybody else find it strange that the majority of Helena's supporters are new posters with no other posts than this one?"
Speaking for myself, I am not one of those people who generally post on forums. But I do enjoy Ms. Echlin's column and, for the most part, like reading the differing points of view in the comments. The personal attacks on this one were so insensitive that I felt compelled to respond.
How about food allergies? Suppose the host decided to put "just a few" nuts in her brownies after knowing that one of her guests is violently allergic? I'm sorry but that's not only inconsiderate, it's reprehensible.
Hey, there are lots of takes on this subject, aren't there?
Slipping carbs into an Atkins dieter's food is kinda like slipping some lard into an observant Jew or Muslim's food. Not gonna hurt 'em, but shouldn't be done. A betrayal of trust. Saying that Helena's advice condones a betrayal of trust is just the truth, not an attack per se. The fact that the guest had tried to avoid just this situation is handily ignored by a couple of posters.
The points brought up by posters who have serious dietary health issues that have been ignored by hosts transcend manners. This borders on criminal behavior.
(Look, If I go someplace and tell the host, "I can't eat nuts, I'm allergic" and the moron decides that it wouldn't hurt and slips some in, I could DIE! It has happened before.) Sounds like someone has solved the mystery of resurrection! Care to share it?
Fudge contains sugar and cocoa, already highly processed products, and is in no way a health food. So some Velveeta is going to hurt? If an equivalent "cheese food" made from free-range Charolais milk and priced at 50 bucks a pound, imported from France, had been used, I'm sure Helena would have been fine with it.
Akitist, Thank you and touche.
To be fair, and I've been quite vocal in this thread and one of her detractors on this subject, Helena did say "I don’t think it’s wrong to hide ingredients in dishes, provided you’re not violating a guest’s religious or ethical beliefs or triggering potentially life-threatening allergies." That's as far as my defense will go for two reasons, first, the use of "potentially" because how in hades does the host know what is potentially fatal and what isn't? Seondly, Helena also said "As long as you’re not seriously imperiling your guests’ health, what does a fib matter if it allows them to fully enjoy their meal?"
I would like to know her definition of "seriously." If she doesn't need to call 911 because a guest is in anaphylactic shock?
I'm done with this thread, time to move on.
Rule #1 of Cooking: Don't fucking poison the guests!
Helena Echlin's advice was irresponsible, potentially threatening to her guest's health, and showed a frightening lack of professional judgment.
<< Nor should you feel guilty about compromising your friend’s South Beach Diet, even though you explicitly promised not to do so. At the last moment, you had to choose between keeping your promise and a properly emulsified and balanced sauce. You quite rightly chose the latter. >>
So, Ms. Echlin put more value on a sauce than on a diner's health This is inexcusable! Would Ms. Echlin agree serving spoiled mussels to diners was acceptable provided the mussels added to the quality of a dish? Apparently. Food poisoning traded for flavor.
It's bad enough Ms. Echlin's advice appeared on a public website. It's far worse it appeared on CHOW, a site devoted to good food and good eating. Her advice violates every ethic CHOW ought to stand for.
I understand everyone has differing opinions about food-related issues: Spices, cooking times, wine, meat cuts, etc., but I cannot understand how anyone would think her advice was acceptable to any degree. There are some black-and-white rules of cooking: Don't screw with your guests' health is the big one.
No, Dissembling Host's friend likely wouldn't die from her inclusion of bread into the salsa, but it could have consequences beyond that night and it represents a decision as poor as Ms. Echlin's.
Everyone has an off night. Perhaps this was Ms. Echlin's. I recommend she apologize in this forum for her advice. Not to do so damages her credibility and that of CHOW.
I gotta say that I disagree with most of the Chow columnists, whether it's this one or the one on kitchen equipment. But I still like to read them, if only to see their justification for what I see as their ridiculous recommendations.
Now if you'll excuse me, my Velveeta Spamwich is rapidly coagulating.
The way I read this scenario is that the hostess extended an invite. The friend declined because he knew adhering to his dietary needs would be a pain for him and for her. The hostess browbeats/wears down the friend in order to get him to come, while promising to feed him something that conforms to his efforts to take care of his health. He agrees to come for dinner, where she -- despite her promises -- declines to fix something for her guest that conforms to his dietary/health needs. Instead, she actively undermines her friend's efforts to take care of himself.
What a terrible thing to do to one's "friend!"
I did south beath, and phase one is hard. It takes a lot of will power. This hostess did a real disservice to her "friend" by silently allowing him to compromise a process that takes a lot of fortitude to be successful at. South Beach is about changing one's habits (sometimes drastically), and phase one is meant to break the chemical dependency the body develops on carbs. This hostess sure didn't help that process. You can disagree with the science if you want, or take issue with the diet as a philosophy, but that's not really the point. The point is that this friend believed in this method and was "being strict about it" (doesn't the hostess sound so dismissive here!), and she knowingly led him down the primrose path.
Boo. To the hostess and to Helena's terrible advice.
Normally I think that you're spot on, but this is terrible advice!
If you've got a real weight problem then going on a diet can be as difficult as quitting smoking. I've done both and neither are easy. Controlling your will power enough to be able to break unhealthy emotional ties to unhealthy/too much food *IS* an internal ethical battle.
Just because *you* see his efforts as insignificant, doesn't give you the right to treat his efforts as insignificant, especially when you specifically said that you wouldn't. What effort could it possibly have taken to take a scoop of your salsa verde aside before you added the bread?! As a trained and avid cook, I can understand the want to serve someone the best dish you can, but I also realize that if people impose serious dietary restrictions upon themselves, they're usually not for a laugh. Especially when dealing with people who may be trying to gain control of emotional issues that cause them to eat unhealthily, doing something like this is simply immoral. It's not going to kill him but don't do it again.
So...
secrets about keeping your secret ingredients secret should also be kept secret.
Shhhh...!
There's nothing wrong with breaking a promise you made to a friend, even when that promise was made with the reassurance that you understood his concerns? This person agreed to the meal expressly because the cook said it would meet the requirements of his diet. I think there's something very wrong with this. At least the cook could have explained the sauce dilemma and given the friend the option of eating the fish sans sauce.
Wow ... Anger management training needed here ... Flying into a rage over a bite of fudge because of the secret ingredient??? Scary. This is supposed to be a website for foodies, not neurotics.
As someone currently IN Phase 1 of SBD, I'm appalled. I have declined dinner invites for this reason, and I get so angry thinking a friend would do this to me. Thankfully, none of mine would.
Also....is it me? Who puts bread in salsa to thicken it? Is this commonly done? Never heard of it and it sounds disgusting.
WOW
I think Helena's advice is being picked apart more than the presidents. You guys are getting very bent out of shape because of a small error. I don't agree with Helena but I am not getting so angry that she feels that she has to go into witness protection!
I don't call deliberately deceiving someone about what they're putting in their mouth a "small error". An error means a mistake, this was intentional.
hmmm. I'm not sure about this advise either. I would have opted for full disclosure. At least give my guest the choice - there's always a chance it would be fine, and the guest will appreciate the candor. No matter what the reason, I don't think deceiving your dinner guest is ever a good idea.
I enjoy most meats, but choose not to eat veal. I'm not preachy about it, but my close friends know this. One of these friends has been serving her version of tourtiere (normally a mixture of game meats) every fall for years. I could tell it wasn't totally authentic but she served it with great pride and we always looked forward to it. Last year I finally asked how she made it. Turns out she was using a good amount of veal.
I was appalled of course. I tactfully reminded her that while I don't judge others who do eat veal, I choose not to.
Her response: she felt it shouldn't be a big deal, particularly if I couldn't tell the difference. In other words, what I didn't know shouldn't bother me.
I couldn't believe I had to explain why her deceit upset me. To my amazement, she felt insulted. I guess she expected any meal shared in her home should be accepted gracefully and without question.
Zukeeper, perfect example. It's the deceit from a friend that is the biggest problem here, more than any mouthful of carbs or veal.
Oh dear me.
While the name calling has been a bummer, I have to agree that the advice was off. Instead, keep the sauce on the side and fess up! If a