gusto team
Table of Contents
SPRING 2022 ISSUE 7
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
MANAGING EDITOR FEATURES EDITOR
FEATURES ASSOCIATE EDITOR
Sofia Frias Margaret Kuffner Isabel Wibowo Saamia Bukhari
ESSAYS EDITOR Lauren Blaser Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................##
Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................## MUCHO GUSTO EDITOR Lilly Mathieu Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................## MUCHO GUSTO ASSOCIATE EDITOR
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Emanuel Louime
HEAD CODY EDITOR Gianina DiDonato Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................##
Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................## CREATIVE MANAGERS Maia Rosenbaum, Eileen Shelton Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................## ASSOCIATE CREATIVE MANAGERS
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Sophie Borrmann
MEDIA AND MARKETING MANAGER Adeline Kim Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................##
Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................## BUSINESS MANAGER Lucy Haswell Lorem Ipsum dolor sit..........................## CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
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CONTRIBUTING CREATIVE MEDIA AND MARKETING TEAM COPY EDITOR MEMBERS AT LARGE
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Regina Herrero Ampudia, Jenny Hotchkiss, Antonio Mata, Jane Paulson, Sophie Reineke, Julia Schultze, Maddie Sims, Wenqing (Shelly) Xue Mia Eventoff, Julie Vu, Eric Yu Lulu Arundale, Hannah Caroll, Macy Worrall Audrey Morken, Katie Kitrick Jacqueline Geller, Scott Greenhalgh, Valeria Gutierrez, Prashanti Kodali, Jamie Kim, Meegan Minahan, Gabi Prostko, Logan Soss, Claire Spielmann, Ngan Tran
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Eating Under By Lauren Blaser
Smells like Home By Sofia Frias
The Acoustic Version
By Audrey Morken
A Balancing Act: Employing the Vestibular Sense at The Salty Pig By Scott Greenhalgh
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A Burden That Bites: Finding the Balance in Savory Satisfaction and Climate-Conscious Cuisine By Lilly Mathieu
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Mr. Baklava: From Fine Dining to Smooth Rhyming By Emanuel Louime
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Eating With Your Eyes
By Margaret Kuffner
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Sound Bites
By Saamia Bukhari
The Last Slice By Ngan Tran
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Eating Under
Words By: Lauren Blaser Graphics By: Sophie Borrmann People love to enhance their senses. It’s not enough to serendipitously see, eat, or smell something of intrigue. To walk outside in late May and catch a whiff of a lightly smoking barbecue, to unexpectedly watch a red winter sun rise on a frosty morning. To intentionally alter one’s senses is to deliberately come at life from a fresh angle, and in a predictable manifestation of the human desire for more, most of us will stop at nothing to see what that’s like. Even if
we tried it the evening before. Even if we’re still experiencing residual side effects from the last time we tried it. Food takes on a new likeness in accordance. In these moments, food is our one remaining tether to the earth. Rather than fulfilling a biological hunger, consuming food in this state is a self-affirming act. It’s done for the sole purpose of proving that it’s possible. That we are more than possible.
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As we chew, each movement confirms that we are here, the same, even as the world may appear differently. “Light eating” evokes a world of possibilities. The phrase is championed by diet-forward magazines, lining the lowest rows of grocery register displays. People who peel a banana on the way out the door prefer a light breakfast to a fully prepared meal. Sweltering summer days might make someone crave a snack that feels cool, bright, and light. In the subliminal state of heady consciousness that comes with altered senses, though, no food that could be considered even remotely flimsy (read: light) suits the situation.
A sense of satisfaction more spiritual than physical is needed, and with this in mind people tend to look for options which enlist the help of every sense, muddled (maybe even missing) as they may be. These foods are the opposite of light in that their presence is unmistakable; brightly colored chips and candies, dense combinations of cheese and bread. Food that you can feel when you eat it. It’s a familiar concept. The following scene may be specific, but variations of the same gathering happen every night in every country across the world. Wherever there are people, really. One forty on a Saturday morning. Pitch black, in a sleepy town, or a city in which almost—but not—everyone
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is asleep. At night it’s all the same. A line wraps around a strip of buildings on Philadelphia’s North 63rd Street. Loud voices and heavily scuffed shoes disturb the peace outside the windows of businesses closed for the night. The ever-growing line contains the steadfast clientele of (late night restaurant destination). In this case, Larry’s is known for cheese steaks, steaming and salty, and served until three am. The queue is unbothered by the cold, time ticks by unobserved. Each person is consumed by their recently upended senses. The looming buildings overhead create a private playground of sorts, bound between sunset and sunrise, in which the mundane becomes noteworthy and the noteworthy goes unnoticed. Small quips earn guffaws of laughter, thoughts born softly are spoken aloud. Social hierarchies loosen. We’re all friends here. The magnetism of this family-owned eatery need not be insulted by the fact that people tend to crowd through the door when their world feels a bit shaky. They know Larry’s will steady them. A unique frame of mind slides into place with the realization I must eat now, or else. With it food becomes not just an option but the option. The experience is not unlike our first moments of existence. A newborn is dependent on everyone but themselves, just as a person with distorted senses realizes they are completely subject to food and its imminent consumption. This is simultaneously off-putting and exhilarating. Under these conditions, banal markers which typically guide a person in their selection of what to eat soar out the window. It matters not how hungry a person is, what time of day, or what’s most affordable. They may not even be hungry. It’s not about that. When the human body has the layout of its senses shifted, its attitude toward food’s role in the equation is repositioned as well. A place like Larry’s doesn’t taste the same to a person who is wielding all of their senses in the most routine state. When fuzzy edges harden into lines and goofy smiles straighten out, cheesesteaks resume their role as cheesy sandwiches. Nothing more.
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