Definition of a Food Pusher

Food pushing is a complex and wonderful art in which a person does everything in their power to get everyone else to eat until they burst.  Not in an evil, trying-to-transform-their-friends-into-Jabba-the-Hut, let's-all-get-really-fat-sort-of-a-way; it's more in a good hostess, make everyone comfortable, have-another-cocktail way.   Common questions include:
   

• Have you eaten enough?
• Do you want to taste this?
• No really, it's great, you should taste it!
• Do you want more of anything?
• Do you want half of my burger/sandwich/steak?
• You're not driving, right, so more wine?
• Dessert, right?
• What do you mean you're too full for dessert?

It seems that there is a need and compulsion shared by the women in my family to make sure everyone around them is well-fed.   Even if it means we won't eat, or eat as much as we'd like, it's okay - so long as everyone else is busting their buttons.    Thank God the men in our family are all eaters with really awesome metabolisms. 

Granted, it helps tremendously with portion control.  It's hard to feel guilty about a bar burger at Louis Basque Corner when I know I'm giving half of it and most of my garlic fries to Red Beard.  One burger and his own order of fries doesn't fill him up.  Red Beard needs his own burgers and fries, PLUS a side salad, PLUS an order of zucchinni sticks, PLUS half of my own burger and fried before he's full.  And then only for a couple of hours before he's digging in freezer for shrimp corndogs. 

Red Beard took a little bit of time to get used to this.  When we were first dating, he was taken aback by my constant pushing.  We'd go out to dinner and I'd keep harping at him to "try this, it's really good!" and there was a constant stream of "I'm full.  Do you want this?" be it a doughnut or half a burger, or pretty much anything that wasn't going to gross him out (like my super runny eggs, squished between my pancakes; Red Beard gets a little wobbly at the sight of runny eggs).

I'm sure he thought that is was just a standard Girl Thing - pretending to be full or not hungry or that I didn't need to consume food ever.  Which I get, I know many females of all ages who like to give the impression that they exist on the dew of a single ginko leaf and the energy of the universe (brownie points to anyone who knows the movie!). 

Perhaps if my 501's weren't so amply filled, I could get away with that, but come on!  Of course I eat - most of the females I know eat, and eat well, and cook well, and don't care who knows it. In my case, I just can't be trusted not to force feed people; and the places Red Beard and I tend to frequent give really large portions so giving half away really didn't leave me feeling deprived.  

And I really did not care much about eating when he and I were first dating (so much so that 20+ lbs just melted right off) because I was too busy being all pink and shiny and floaty and annoying, because dating him was that much fun that I couldn't be bothered with food .. but that's a story for another time.  

It's kind of a match made in heaven:  I cook a lot, and try to force feed him like a prized goose with an oversized liver (foi gras, anyone?) and he's 6ft5 with the metabolism of a ferret.  I highly recommend to my fellow food pushers (you know who you are!) that you try to find this combination.  Because I, for one, would have little patience trying to cook regularly for a bacon-free vegan with a metabolism as slow as molasses in January like mine.  

I don't have a picture that really fits today's topic, so instead here's a picture of my poor Starbucks that closed.  Another of the few perks of our location in Horrible Sparks was this Starbucks, with the drive-through, that was on my way to work and only 5 blocks from my house.  Sniff.  I miss you! If it weren't for the Starbucks that shared a parking lot with my office, and the 456 other Starbucks locations on my drive, I'd need a xanax and probably die of caffeine deprivation.