There was a nice little article in the NY Times the other day (by the so-called “Minimalist”) about how pasta should be served. The bottom line is that a pasta dish, whether at home or in a restaurant, should have a lot more vegetables and a bit less pasta than most of us are used to. The role of pasta in an American meal has gone through some changes over the years. Back in the 1950s, pasta was generally served as a plate of spaghetti with a heavy dose of meat sauce. It was your once-a-week break from meat and potatoes.

Then in the 1980s, pasta became a bit more fashionable, and people re-discovered the various shapes and sizes it came in (rigatoni, capellini, twists, shells, bowties, etc.). Cooking it into a limp paste (just like canned Spaghetti-O’s) became a no-no; al dente became the watchword for the culinary police. Also, the sauce now became a supporting actor; you no longer drowned your noodles, and maybe tried some different twists on the basic marinara or meat ragu. Then came the Atkins diet craze, and carbs became the enemy. So pasta portion sizes shrank, and it was back to overwhelming it with rich, heavy sauces, frequently cream-based (e.g. the popular “vodka” sauce, which doesn’t really have any vodka in it). In recent years, I’ve notices a retro-trend, back to big portions of pasta with lots of heavy sauce.

The “Minimalist” makes a cry for sanity in this long night of pasta madness. The world shouldn’t revolve around heavy sauces. Pasta should indeed be a bit chewy, but it shouldn’t cover the plate; it should almost be looked at as a side dish. And the cheese and oil need to calm down too. The star of your plate should be fresh vegetables, preferably sautéed in a bit of garlic and olive oil. This could be more than one vegetable or mix of veggies; perhaps peppers, tomatoes and onions on one side, and zucchini and mushrooms on the other. For you carnivores out there — fine, add your sausage or chicken strips. As a vegetarian, I’ll stick to the veggies (other than my occasional foray into linguine with clam sauce; clams aren’t really vegetables, but they aren’t sentient animals either).

The bottom line here is that pasta should be a complement to the vegetables, not the other way around. Overcooked noodles are considered “high glycemic”; their calories get digested into the body too quickly. At some point, foods that are high-glycemic might contribute to obesity, diabetes and liver problems (or so I’ve read; I’m not a doctor or an expert on this). Increasing the veggies and reducing the pasta (and keeping it al dente) certainly makes for a healthier meal. Another factor is the protein balance; wheat flour needs vegetables to give a properly balanced protein mix. But, in my opinion, and the Minimalist’s too, the veggie-first, pasta-second philosophy also makes for a nicer, better tasting meal.

That’s my 2 cents; I guess that everyone likes what they like. All I’m saying is that you might want to try it, if you haven’t yet. Bon appetite.

CHEAP-SKATE VEGETARIAN SIDENOTE: As an aging veg-head, I have to take my daily vitamin supplements, to make sure that I’m not missing anything by cutting meat out entirely. About two years ago, my doctor ordered me to take a B-complex every day. And I’m glad that he did, because I’ve been feeling a bit better since then, and haven’t gotten sick as much either. But a good B-complex pill can be relatively expensive. I’ve seen some premium vitamin brands charge as much as $20 per hundred tablets. (Another B-complex problem: their RDA percentages vary a lot; the mix of thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, B-6, B-12, biotin and pantothenic acid vary all over the place.)

I found a pretty good B complex at Whole Foods that goes for about $22 for 180 tablets, or around $12.22 per 100. Given the Whole Foods persona and clientèle, I would assume these pills are of high quality. Then I saw Sundown B-100 going in the local Shop Rite at around $8 for 60 (about $11.67 per 100). They have a bit less biotin, but more of the other stuff in each pill (except for folic acid – just about all B complexes come with 100% of the RDA for folic). Sundown is a Rexall brand, and I would assume that on old-time pharmacy company like Rexall knows to sell a decent if not top-line pill.

Today I picked up a B complex with the same daily values as the Sundown product, but only costing $7 for 100. This was the house brand at the local A&P; it’s called America’s Choice. I’m hoping these are decent vitamins, without any harmful ingredients. I see carnauba wax and polyethylene glycol listed on the bottle, although this article from Better Nutrition hints that such stuff isn’t anything to freak out about. P.E.G. isn’t anti-freeze, which is ethylene glycol, a cousin.

Well, as a cheapskate, I always love a bargain. But as someone concerned about health and nutrition, I think I’ll hedge my bets and buy the Whole Foods brand sometimes; maybe I’ll go 50-50, cheap-o pills and better-made pills (no car wax or quasi anti-freeze) every other day.

An article in this past Sunday’s NY Times Magazine by Michael Pollen almost made me cry. Mr. Pollen’s article is called “Unhappy Meals”, but it actually made me very happy. It’s about something that concerns me a lot – the connection between eating and health. Over the past 10 or 15 years, there has been a lot of confusion about whether we humans, especially those of us here in the rich western world, can live longer and healthier lives by eating the right things in the right amounts. Being a vegetarian and a healthy-eating advocate, I believe that it can be done. Being a rationalist and a son of the Enlightenment, I believe that we can use our brains to turn away from impulsive, immediate – gratification eating habits and learn to shovel the right stuff down our throats. And that we can do it while still maintaining respect for flavor and satisfaction, thus obtaining the best long-term outcome.

Unfortunately, a lot of people don’t think it can be done. Most disappointingly, a lot of scientists have been adding on to this theme lately. Within the past year or two, a bunch of studies have come out implying that nothing works; you can’t prevent cancer or heart disease or anything else by eating more broccoli and fewer bacon and cheese omelets. All the theories regarding the benefits of low-fat, high fiber, highly diverse diets have been cast in doubt. Might as well pile up on the fried chicken and ice cream.

Mr. Pollen acknowledges all of that, and then fires a heavy salvo of common sense back at it. He turns the tide back toward the obvious: Americans generally eat a lousy diet, and are paying the price in poor health. Oh sure, you can come up with all kinds of statistics about how healthy and long-lived Americans are. But that’s because capitalism is so good at coming up with fixes for all the bad stuff we do to our bodies by chowing down on the junk. We have heart by-passes, insulin pumps, statins, chemotherapy, all kinds of stuff to keep our messed-up bodies alive. But is that really the life we want to be living? And isn’t it catching up with us – the rising costs of health care are a big threat to the economic well being of our nation. If things keep going as they are, at some point it’s going to come down to triage; some people are going to get health care, and others are going to be left in the gutter.

Well, me and my little blog here aren’t going to change all of that. But maybe Mr. Pollen has a shot. His article is that good. It’s really worth a read. It reminds me of a line or two from a 1980’s song by Asia: “and now, the tears are in my eyes, the sound you can’t disguise, the truth comes back from lies”. (I think this was from Voice of America). The light of truth is finally reaching the dark recesses of Republican-era dieting fads like Atkins (although Atkins was right about one thing: protein makes you eat less, and eating less is good; however, you can still be a veg-head like me and get enough protein to control your calories).

I might disagree with Mr. Pollen on a couple of points. He says that eating meat in small quantities is OK. Well, it may not have any terrible health consequences if people truly would learn to use meat only as a seasoning and cut out the fat. But there are still lots of social and even moral benefits to going “cold tofu turkey” with meat (e.g., less production of greenhouse gasses). Also, Mr. Pollen says to avoid all processed food, i.e. all modern ménages of food ingredients like Cool Whip or breakfast bars. Well, I mostly agree; however, there may be a good innovation here or there that should not be thrown out. My favorite candidate: soy yogart (unpaid-for plug here for White Wave Silk; I like it, and I think it’s a health food – I want to see it catch on).

But still, the point remains: we know what a good overall mix of foods looks like, and in what amounts. A diet based on such a mix would most likely make a whole lot of people healthier. And it wouldn’t taste all that bad either, although it wouldn’t deliver the immediate gratification that our overly-sweet and salty and fatty fare does today.

Big business has turned America into a nation of junkies for sugar, salt and fat – and for all sorts of medicines and medical treatments. Some folk are getting rich off of this, but a whole lot of people are doing poorly, just as any other sort of junkie does — be they a heroin junkie, a crack junkie, a booze junkie or a cigarette junkie. Mr. Pollen is the voice of culinary reason crying in the wilderness: America, break the habit, and pass the kale and the asparagus.