It’s Foodie Friday and I can’t think of a more appropriate topic for these times than comfort food. I suppose that what’s considered comfort food varies from person to person. Generally speaking, I always think of it as some food that brings back wonderful memories. It’s the stuff we eat when we’re stressed, and if you’re not stressed even a little bit at the moment you’ve obviously not been paying attention.
I wrote about comfort food way back in 2008, even before Foodie Friday became a thing. I’d actually forgotten that I had done so until I saved the first draft of today’s post and WordPress attached a “2” to the title, to let me know there was already a post of the same name somewhere on the screed.
Anyway, here is what I wrote then. Enjoy it. Please stay home and cook something comforting this weekend.
Everyone has something they eat that evokes happy memories. Something that makes you feel warm and safe even if you don’t quite know why. It could be something your Mom cooked for you when you were sick or down. It could be something you associate with a meaningful experience. But everyone has one or two or maybe more.
One of mine is beef flanken – I know – you never heard of it. Basically, it’s short ribs cut across the ribs instead of in between the ribs and cooked in a mushroom vegetable soup. Butchers would call this “English cut” and it’s also how the Argentines cut their short ribs. One eats the soup and meat separately – I love to slather the boiled meat with horseradish. Hey! I didn’t say YOU had to enjoy it or find it comforting. That’s kind of the point – the unique memories and feelings each of us associate with the item.
Given all the positive feelings evoked by comfort food, the question for me is always how can I get my clients or business partners to feel about me as they do their favorite comfort food? If each of us can click with someone that deeply, we must be doing something right. Implicit in that is that a “one dish fits all” approach won’t work. Every partner is unique. Each one needs to be dealt with on an individual basis according to their tastes. It may not be easy to figure that out, but once you do it’s incredibly rewarding.
What’s your favorite comfort food? Do you have any idea how to become someones? Leave a comment!
Consult Keith 