What it's like to be Cuban-American, Part V

You've just gotten out of a pretty long and somewhat arduous meeting somewhere and it's lunchtime. There's a desk full of work waiting for you back at the office and you realize you probably wont have time for a sit down lunch at your favorite cafeteria. There's just too much to do before going home today.

You are starving. For some reason, sitting at some job site trailer for over an hour with the contractors and clients discussing all sorts of what to you are trivial matters has made you incredibly hungry. I need to eat something soon, you say to yourself.

But knowing you have all this work to do back at the office and considering that the lunchtime crowds have already started to develop everywhere, you decide to drop by the local supermarket just down the street from your office and pick something up from the deli. It'll be quicker, you think.

It takes you a few minutes to find a parking space, evidence that when you get inside the store there will be a few people ahead of you in line already at the counter. But you're hungry. If you dont eat something soon you will start to get a headache and then finishing up your remaining tasks at the office will be more of a chore.

You walk into the supermarket and sure enough the deli is packed. It'll be ten, maybe fifteen minutes before your number is even called. Way too much time taken away from your busy schedule. You simply cant wait that long.

You're almost in a bit of a panic. You're hungry, you're in a hurry, you have a lot of work to do. You just remembered that you have yet another meeting in the early afternoon that you have not prepped for.

Then it dawns on you that this particular supermarket has one of those pre-made sandwiches bins at the end of the deli counter. You make your way over there, past the crowd waiting with deli numbers in hand, and when you get to the sandwich area you are disheartened by what you see. Slim pre-made sandwich pickens.

There's a couple of tuna sandwiches, a BLT and a deli meat sandwich. A roast beef on rye that doesnt look all that pleasant and a couple of chicken salad sandwiches. There's a couple of tuna and chicken salads a few fruit cups. A couple of salad platters.

Nothing really calls out to you from the pre-made bin. You've had those sandwiches before and they werent all that great. A salad will only ease the hunger pain a bit. By your next meeting your stomach will be growling again.

Time a is a wasting though, and if you want to eat lunch today, you need to make a decision right now.

Then from out of nowhere you get this wonderful vision in your head. This culinary delight that brings visions of summer camps and school lunches. Memories of those days when you were a kid and would get home from school and your parents were still working and you were the boss and you were more than happy to be your own cook for your merienda.

Oh yes!!! you think to yourself. How could I have been so dumb?The answer to my stomach's pleas for attention have been answered!

You're not all too familiar with this supermarket so you look up at the aisle signs for directions on where to go for your soon to be life saving lunchtime delight.

Personal Hygeine - Cleaning Products - Household Goods. No.

Sodas - Softdrinks - Juices. No.

Cereals - Mixes - Cookies - Crackers. No.

Breads - Chips - Jellies - Jams. No.

Coffee - Teas - Spices - Extracts. No.

Soups - Canned Vegetables - Ethnic foods. No.

Dairy Products - Milk - Cheese. No.

Pasta - Sauces - Rice. YESSSSS!!!

You turn into the Pasta aisle and quickly scan up and own the shelves and up and down both sides of the aisle. There's all sorts of stuff in that aisle. Bags of rice in every size and type. Yellow rice, cajun rice, plain old white rice, dirty rice. Boxes of spaghetti, vermicelli, large shells, little shells, penne, rigatonni, angel hair. There's pasta sauce with mushroom, meat, tomato basil, pesto, three cheese, mushroom-tomato-basil-pesto-three cheese, pizza sauce, plain. There's pack of soup noodles, egg noodles, rice noodles, noodles noodles.

And then you get a glimpse of that familar packaging. The same one you remember from childhood. All lined up, shelved at the end of the aisle.

You hustle up to the area where you lunch sits neatly stacked, can upon can, shelf atop shelf with the same red labels that you will never, ever forget.

CHEF-BOY-YAR-FREAKEN-DEE!!!!!!!!

You feel like a kid in a candy store! Your stomach, it's as if it knows you've found his solace! Chef-Boyardee!!! Oh my word! Im sooo hungryyyy!!!!

And here you are in front of your edible treasure, starving, remembering things like the time you had a ravioli fight with the next door neighbor, or the smell of your school cafeteria on canned spaghetti day. Mesmerized. A bit embarrassed. You look up and down the aisle to make sure no one is watching you. You're a forty year old in a shirt and tie, business attire, choosing a can of pasta! It's best to hide this oh so guilty pleasure.

And there are just so many to choose from. Spaghetti-Os. Alphabet pasta, mini-ravioli with cheese, cheese ravioli, cheesy burger macaroni, beef macaroni, macaroni with cheese, meat ravioli, mini-meat ravioli, mini meat ravioli with mini-meatballs, spaghetti and meatballs, pasta shells with mini-meatballs, deluxe big meatball spaghetti, meat and cheese mini-lasagna. Oh my word, I am going to starve.

And you cant really decide so you say to yourself, I dont have time for this and you look up and down the aisle again, as if you were doing something covert, something sneaky, and you take TWO. You take the two basics: Meat ravioli and Spaghetti with meatballs. Lunch will be served soon!!!

You're still a little embarrassed about being a grown man eating ChefBoyardee, so you try to make your way to the checkout nonchalantly, holding one can in each hand, disguising it. And then, right as you are about to get in line, you think to yourself, Man, can you imagine if I blogged this?

Something in you changes at that very moment. You are thinking about writing this post about your adventure at a local supermarket and your quest for your childhood favorite Chef Boyardee in a can and you realize that the people you really write for, the people you spend hour upon waking hour toiling over news and run-on sentences, the people you do your small part to help, the Cuban people who still live in Cuba, could never imagine what you have just experienced.

Aisle upon aisle, shelves upon shelves of items they could only dream of having. Rows and rows of food, right there, for their consumption.

A supermarket full of choices.

Posted by Val Prieto at June 8, 2005 02:02 PM

Comments

Posted by: Stefania at June 8, 2005 03:36 PM

Posted by: Matt at June 8, 2005 03:42 PM

Posted by: madtom at June 8, 2005 04:26 PM

Posted by: cohetedude at June 8, 2005 10:34 PM

Posted by: Sgt. B. at June 15, 2005 05:20 PM