Laura Angus Yount
As a classical singer who loves to cook, I have often felt that putting together a good recital was very much like putting together a wonderful meal. My recital would have an appetizer, a main course, and a sweet dessert. It also needed to have lots of different sounds, textures, tonalities, moods, and emotions expressed, to satisfy the audience’s (and my own) musical appetite or aesthetic sense of balance and beauty. What it needed was a broad and varied repertoire of many forms of classical vocal music.
Beauty of Food
As I entertained the idea of the aesthetics of food, its elements, its preparation, its presentation, and the experience of eating, I realized that like music, we must draw on a vast array of edible elements to satisfy our appetite. Our palate has an aesthetic that utilizes our sense of sight, taste, texture, and aroma to cause us to crave certain foods at any given moment in time. It is strong enough to propel us to the refrigerator or pantry looking for that unique combination of crunchy and salty, or cold, sweet, and creamy, or perhaps just warm and soothing. Our bodies crave and search for those aromas, textures, temperatures, and eventually tastes that bring comfort and peace to our souls. I am reminded of the following verse from Genesis 9:3, “Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.” Later in Acts 10:9-16 God reveals (in a vision to Peter) that all food is permissible. God our creator has held back nothing to provide us with an amazing banquet of edible and aesthetic satisfaction.
But as with all liberty and an abundance of choices comes great responsibility. “All things are lawful for me”, but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be dominated by anything. (I Corinthians 6:12 ESV) In areas of the world where food is abundant, we suffer from chronic overindulgence in those foods we inadvertently turn into “idols”. As we distort the intended balance of the variety of appropriate foods to sustain our bodies, we see the direct result of our carelessness. The very form of our physical bodies begins to diminish, distorting what God has created. Every cell of our body is affected for good or ill with what we eat. “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (I Corinthians 6:19-20).
If we look at food for its inherent beauty and see it as something to maintain and promote our own beauty (as God’s creation), it may help us moving forward to get a different
perspective. Many of the foods God provided may actually look like the parts of the body for which they are nourishment. Dr. Thind of India has provided a list with illustrations at the following website: https://www.drthindhomeopathy.com/article/17-foods-that-resemble-your-body/ It is almost as if God gave us a road map of how we should care for our bodies with our food choices.
Beauty of Fasting
I decided a while back that I wanted to really experience fasting as it was practiced for centuries long ago and still is practiced by many cultures today. I was qualified for the task--I had ample stores from which my body would be able to draw. What I realized (after my initial fast) was that my entire attitude toward food had changed. My adversarial relationship with food was gone because I knew that I would not die without any of it for a certain amount of time. My cravings were gone, and it took less food to satisfy me. The taste of everything that I gradually added back into my diet was magnified and more intense. I felt terrific, but what really excited me was that I now wanted to take the time to prepare good quality food that looked, smelled, and tasted amazing. The food that I would eat would have to satisfy my aesthetic craving for all the senses to be engaged - a feast for the eyes, the aroma, the feel in the mouth and the taste on the tongue. The scales told me I would have to eat less, but I was now free to make what I eat have more meaning.
To satisfy my adjusted appetite (or what I will call my new aesthetic for food), I needed a pallet of colors, tastes, aromas, and textures. I would limit it to just what God created in its natural form and not processed. I recalled all the things I had heard on the cooking channels, “If it grows together, it goes together”. “Always buy the best quality ingredients you can afford”. “Fresh is best”. “Eat the rainbow”. If I was going to need baked goods, I would have to make them myself. That would ensure that my consumption of those products would be greatly limited. I would put more time to thinking about preparation and presentation. I would concentrate on the social aspects of eating and explore bringing aesthetic thinking into hospitality. After all, my priority should be about people and how to honor them in my home with food to the glory of God.
Beauty of Presentation
Again, I heard the voices of the cooking channels echoing in my ears, “Your plate is a blank canvas for your food creation”. We must ask ourselves the question, “What do we want to see that will make us rejoice and draw us in to enjoy and thank God for what he has provided?”
Every great work of art has the elements of form, scale, color, texture, density, and the combined balance of those elements. As we look at the vast array of foods there is no end to the different combinations we can make. If we consider a balanced meal, a protein (density, texture and often aroma), a starch (density, texture, and often color neutral), and a vegetable (lighter density, abundance of color and texture) we can begin to put those combinations together in very attractive ways. There is nothing more satisfying than having a plate of food placed in front of you that is colorful, smells amazing, and has a variety of elements that make you want to explore every one of them, individually and together, with all your senses.
Fortunately, I was raised in a family of several generations of cooks. The period in which they lived brought challenges for using their food resources prudently. Everything was made from scratch as there were few “processed” or “convenience” foods available. When we assume responsibility for the foods we prepare and present, we can be artists bringing creativity, meaning and ministry (to what many consider the drudgery of cooking) for our families. It is too easy to just fall back on “fast food”, processed foods, and convenience foods, just to get it done and check that task off our list. This is not to say that we can’t resort to those items when situations warrant. But once again, there is a balance to be attained and artistry to be explored as we consider the aesthetics of food.
Beauty of Hospitality
When I think of hospitality, I remember my family. I was fortunate to be among three generations, all living within a 25-mile radius, for much of the time I was growing up. Hospitality generally centered around Sunday dinners after church, family birthdays, anniversary celebrations, and traditional holidays. These were our “feast days”. Special foods would be prepared, the table was set with the “good” dishes, crystal glassware, and sterling silver flatware. With the exceptions of Memorial Day, Independence Day, and Labor Day, we would be “Sunday dressed” for most occasions. These were fond memories growing up, contributing greatly to my desire to my continuing the tradition of hospitality, wherever I found myself, in my adult years. I had wonderful mentors who inspired me to create beauty on the ‘canvas’ of my table. Beauty on the plate combined with appetizing and colorful food.
Today, along with family celebrations and Sunday dinners, I do love to throw dinner parties just to gather people together with some common interests, but also gathering people from different walks in life. The decor of the table does not have to be complicated or elaborate. Recently my table had a single blooming orchid between two candles, white plates, glassware, with stainless steel flatware on a solid color tablecloth--simple. Our attention should be drawn to the food when it comes out on the plates, not the decor. Everyone has a story and many an evening has been spent listening to our guests’ adventures in life.
The beauty of hospitality is in acknowledging and honoring individuals as valuable companions in the wider community. It is also being able to create an environment where the variety, balance, texture, and some commonality in conversation becomes completely engaging. Everyone is at ease and feels comfortable contributing to the dialogue.
Beauty of Meaning
When we take meaning and purpose away from even the banal responsibilities of life, such as daily putting food on the table, we miss an opportunity for creating beauty. We may even consign ourselves to a type of ‘aesthetic starvation’. We fail to observe the many ways in which we could bring simple creativity to bear on occasions for health, welfare, community, and beauty itself, ways that could restore depth of meaning, ways to enhance ordinary life.
Our lives are often too busy, too fast paced, too complicated, unfortunately at the expense of the pursuit of beauty and meaning. My fasting gave me a unique insight and appreciation for food, and its meaning and purpose in life. In the same way, perhaps, the recognition of the potential for food as art will give us a greater awareness of beauty's benefits in providing nourishment to family and friends. Each of us is able, by God’s grace, to redeem what we can of his creation into works of art, and all to his glory.
Laura Angus Yount serves on the faculty of Saint Andrew's Conservatory of Music in Sanford, Florida. Her experience as a classical musician complements her love of beauty expressed in all the ways discussed above.
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