HELSTON: The foodie movement has gone too far

OPINION

The other day I found myself watching a cooking video on Facebook about how to transform the pit of an avocado into an edible delicacy.

First of all, I’m usually too cheap to buy avocados so I don’t know why I watched the thing anyways. Perhaps it was the teaser: ‘Did you know that the seed of an avocado is the most nutrient-dense part of the fruit?’

I guess I just had to know how to tap into this nutritional goodness.

So, here’s the scoop. You dehydrate the golf-ball sized pit for about two hours. Next, you peel off the outer shell — you’re not at that antioxidant-rich gold mine yet! — and dice it. Once you’ve done that, it’s still not time to eat it. Here’s the secret: you put it in a blender, puree it into a fine powder, and sprinkle it onto a nice, flavourful glass of… smoothie.

Sounds delicious, right? Totally worth it for a tiny vial of super-powered fibre and antioxidants.

Don’t get me wrong, I totally support not wasting food. I even leave a little fringe of green on my buttered carrots — but I have to draw the line somewhere and this whole food fetish in general is getting a bit overdone for my taste.

Take these Facebook cooking videos. Sure, they look so quick and easy and impressive, but what they don’t show you is all the prep work and the dirty dishes and the messy counter. I wish someone would do a montage of botched recipes, like they did with these Pinterest project failures. (But if someone wants to make that pull-apart garlic bread studded with brie I’ll totally help you eat it.)

Meanwhile, Facebook ads for a new President’s Choice product called ‘black garlic’ are being shoved down the hatch of my newsfeed. I don’t know exactly what it is, but, apparently it’s aged, so… rotten garlic?

I’m also constantly being reminded of the need to document meals. If the buffet of foodie photos on Pinterest and Instagram aren’t enough, there are now videos instructing you on the ‘magic angle’ at which to photograph the fine-art masterpiece that is your lunch — AKA basic sustenance.

Okay, so I’m supposed to spend two hours converting an avocado pit into foodie fairy dust before finding the best angle at which to photograph it. I’m getting hungry. When do we actually get to eat the food?

Where will it end? We are food-fantasizing ourselves into a food-psychosis.

I celebrated the foodie movement when it first started. I probably talk about food more than I talk about the weather.

But we all know how a little too much salt can spoil a dish.

— Charlotte Helston is the Vernon reporter for iNFOnews.ca.