I don’t eat red meat.
I should have disclosed this before joining the supper club.
Let me back up. At the police department where I worked for thirty years, there was a group of guys who ran a monthly operation they called the supper club. Every month, they descended on the best steakhouses in the Chicagoland area like a pack of very well-dressed wolves. Chicago Cut. Gibsons. Morton’s. These were serious men on a serious mission, and the mission was cow.
One afternoon, two of them appeared in my office doorway. They had the energy of people who knew something you didn’t. One looked at the other and said, “Do you want to tell her, or should I?”
I was growing impatient. Not genuinely impatient, because they were clearly delighted with themselves, which meant this wasn’t bad news. “TELL ME WHAT?”
“We want you to join us.”
I looked around to confirm they meant me.
I was in.
My inaugural outing was Chicago Cut. I ordered the salmon. We had a magnificent time. Next was Keefer’s, where I ordered the Chilean Sea Bass. Magnificent again. Martinis and Manhattans and great conversation. Nobody noticed what I ordered. Or if they did, they were too polite to say so.
That streak ended at Morton’s in Naperville. That’s where the intervention happened.
Why don’t you eat steak?
I explained. When I was a kid, my parents subscribed to the “you will sit at this table until every bite is gone” school of parenting. When steak was served, it left a pool of red on my plate that horrified me. I would chew and chew and the thing would not go down. I eventually learned to hold it in my cheek and feed it to my dog Pepe when no one was watching. Dog loved it. I did not.
I explained this trauma and they all arrived at the same diagnosis: I’d just never had a good steak. A buttery filet would cure me. They were certain. I was apprehensive. When childhood trauma is as thick and marbled as those steaks, it’s hard to cut through. (I’m proud of that metaphor. Let it sit.)
But I agreed to try.
The waiter arrived and I ordered. For those of you who love steak, I suggest you sit down.
“I’ll take the filet with blue cheese.”
“Wonderful. And what temperature?”
“Well done, please.”
The table went silent.
The server cleared his throat and explained that the chef does not recommend a well done preparation. I said that was fine, that’s what I wanted. He tried again. The table tried again. I held firm. He eventually said he needed to consult with the chef.
He needed to consult with the chef. About my steak temperature. We were all cops who had talked people off ledges, notified families of deaths, and worked homicide scenes before breakfast. And the most serious deliberation happening at this table was about the internal temperature of my beef.
He returned and informed me that the chef would reluctantly comply, but I’d need to sign something confirming I could not return the steak if I was dissatisfied.
I signed it. I initialed. I did what had to be done to make the encounter stop.
My supper club guys were crying laughing and explaining that ordering a well done steak at a prestigious steakhouse is considered a cardinal sin. I genuinely did not understand. If it’s a sin, why is it on the temperature menu? Why does the menu offer a choice if the chef is going to require written consent before honoring it?
I choked down that filet to prove to the entire table and the firing squad in the kitchen that I loved it. Yummmmmy. Delicious. Totally worth the litigation.
I think I just don’t like steak.
Fast forward to last week. My wife and I are in Chicago for the summer, eating our way around the city. She ordered parmesan fries with truffle aioli, dipped one in, turned up her nose, and flagged down the server to ask for ketchup.
I pretended not to know her.
“Ma’am, we don’t have ketchup here.” The way he said ketchup, with that particular inflection, suggested she had asked for something truly unhinged. Like ranch dressing on a Picasso.
He disappeared into the kitchen. I’m certain there was a meeting.
He returned. Confirmed they could not fulfill the request. I got the entire cup of truffle aioli to myself. She was unbothered. “I like ketchup,” she said. “What is wrong with that?”
Nothing, my love. Nothing is wrong with that.
And then there’s Louis on Threads, who responded to my post about getting deep dish pizza by informing me that real Chicagoans don’t eat deep dish. I live in Chicago, Louis. Technically I’m more Chicago than you right now since I’m actually here and you’re on your phone being wrong.
Here’s what I’ve figured out. The supper club guys weren’t defending the integrity of the cow. The server wasn’t protecting the truffle. Louis isn’t the keeper of Chicago’s culinary soul.
Every single one of them was protecting something else entirely: the idea that their preferences are the correct preferences. That their taste is a mark of sophistication, and your divergence from it is a personal affront.
We yuck someone else’s yum because it makes us feel like our yum is superior. It’s not about the steak. It’s never about the steak. It’s about the quiet, embarrassing need to have our choices validated by everyone else making the same ones.
Your well done filet isn’t hurting anyone. Her ketchup isn’t hurting anyone. My deep dish is frankly delicious and Louis can find another opinion to have.
The food police don’t have jurisdiction here.
Order what you want. Eat it how you like it. And let the people around you do the same.
That’s it. That’s the whole thing.
