M. F. K. Fisher on the precept to know your own tastes

    Books are food for thought, and to be asked “What are some of your favorite books of the last year?” and effectively reply, “Whatever,” is an insult to the one who asks. An essential adjunct to Socrates’s “Know thyself” is “Know your tastes in books, in food, in politics -- indeed in all things.” It’s a lesson young M. F. K. Fisher learned, while on a train trip with her Uncle Evans:
   
    One time when he looked at me over his menu and asked me whether I would like something like a fresh mushroom omelet or one with wild asparagus, and I mumbled in my shy ignorance that I really did not care, he put down the big information sheet and for one of the few times in my life with him, he spoke a little sharply. He said, “You should never say that again, dear girl. It is stupid, which you are not. It implies that the attentions of your host are basically wasted on you. So make up your mind, before you open your mouth. Let him believe, even if it is a lie, that you would infinitely prefer the exotic wild asparagus to the banal mushrooms, or vice versa. Let him feel that it matters to you . . . and even that he does!
    “All this,” my uncle added gently, “may someday teach you about the art of seduction, as well as the more important art of knowing yourself.” Then he turned to the waiter and ordered two wild asparagus omelets. I wanted for a minute, I still remember, to leave the dining car and weep a little in the sooty ladies’ room, but instead I stayed there and suddenly felt more secure and much wiser -- always a heady experience but especially so at nineteen. And I don’t believe that since then I have ever said, “I don’t care,” when I am offered a choice of any kind of food and drink. As Uncle Evans pointed out to me, I either care or I’m a dolt, and dolts should not consort with caring people.

    (Quoted from page 2-3 of Love in a Dish . . . and Other Culinary Delights, by M. F. K. Fisher, and selected by Anne Zimmerman. Counterpoint, 2011.)
    For a brief biography of Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher, click here. For images of or relating to Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher, click here. For a question and answer interview of Anne Zimmerman, click here.