From the dawn of time, food has always been that one unnecessary necessity one has to live with. Not more than just live with but actually to cultivate, hunt for, prepare, ingest and hopefully enjoy.

You search back to the oldest people known to man whether that be Adam & Eve or the Cavemen, depending on your spiritual affiliation, you’ll find that food was always at the centre of their existence. They would either forage nature for fruits and vegetables or chase down creatures to their death for meat or both. I would like to think that in those days their food was simple. A plate of some fresh barbequed meat served with a delicate vegetable platter, water to help the process and a sweet endearing fruit for dessert and that they would call dinner. I mean when you live a life based on such simple principles as wake up, go find food, come back home to enjoy it with your family and put that song on repeat till the end of your life there’s not much room for complexity is there? Pretty simple life = pretty simple cuisine right?

Today, 2000 or so years later, the world has become a very complex place. The life people live today has taken its own type of turn and is nowhere close to claiming the simplicity that its forefathers once enjoyed. We no longer live in a set, predetermined system or rather in a natural form of existence with everything around us. Our food comes from high technological facilities, not the earth; our water travels through pipes for kilometres on end before it fills up the depths of our cups; we rarely sit down with other people to enjoy our meals in laughter and merriness.

So to say we’ve detached ourselves from a very natural form of being, so to say we’ve detached ourselves from food itself. I’m not one to criticize growth and development, neither am I one to say it’s a bad thing, NO !!! Humanity has achieved so many great feats over the millennia and that’s commendable to say the least.

One thing that hasn’t change in particular however is the way people plate their food. I visit a lot of people and I notice a lot of things, especially those food related as food has become an active hobby of mine. “Yes, food can be a hobby, I don’t care what you have to say about that.

In the same manner the people of old prepared and served their food is pretty much the same most people do in this day and age. Think of a dish as a clock. Meat at 1, veggies at 3 to 6 and carbs between 7 & 10 o’clock & that’s it. Nothing to write home about really. With all the growth we’ve seen throughout our existence as humans, this still can’t be the way we present our food. If I can be on a video chat with my girlfriend that’s on the other side of the world, actually speaking to her and enjoying that in real-time, surely the way I prepare and plate my food can be just as amazing and sophisticated. This is how I see my reality.

Your plate is your canvas. Feel free to express yourself with everything you have, especially with the food. Spill things around, get creative, focus on the look and feel of the dish – Whenever I make a retro dish and take that extra 5 minutes to plate it well, I always feel 10 times better afterwards. The aesthetic appeal alone waters my mouth; my eyes get full before my stomach even thinks about it. I believe that’s just as important as indulging in the food itself.

I read somewhere once that the eyes are the window to the soul, so if you make it a point to satisfy your eyes before your belly, surely you’re on the right track. I’m just asking for ya’ll to be great when you prepare and plate your food, that’s all !!! I’ll leave ya’ll with a simple quote for Food for thought: “Tell me what you eat, how you eat it, how it’s served to you and I’ll tell you what you are”

Peace, Love & Good Food | KamzThxPxpe