Blue Eyes Popping

Posted on February 7, 2004 in Eating Encounters

The scene: a salad bar filled with enormous gastronomes, petite soccer moms sneaking in ice cream after their plates heaped with spinach, flat-bellied athletes, and kids who craved pizza and blueberry muffins.

A very difficult night to get food. People milled around the soup line trying to decide between the chowder and the chili. Other folks crowded the soft ice cream. I found myself waiting behind several indecisives who were blocking my access to the cranberry cobbler, the dessert feast of the night.

The encounter: A crew-cut-topped, goateed man maybe in his late thirties. Pressed blue plaid shirt. Pressed everything, for that matter, including his stomach which ran straight from his ribcage to the concavity between his hips. His eyes popped out of his head like he was on speed. He stood between places, not indicating what he wanted. I waited for him to make up his mind while he joked and passed a plate of butter around. Clues about what he was there for seemed beyond him. Finally he moved enough so that I could get in at the cobbler.

“Pardon me,” I said as I inserted myself.

“That’s OK, Stud. It’s busy tonight.”

Blink blink. Had I been reduced to testicles? I needed to be certain.

“Excuse me?”

“That’s OK, Stud. It’s busy tonight.” The eyeballs rolled about, not with any particular emotion in mind, but randomly.

I shook my head. Short, fast strokes. “Excuse me?” I said again.

“That’s OK, Stud. It’s busy tonight.” Then he explained. “It’s really busy here tonight. That’s what I am trying to say.”

“But that’s not what I was saying ‘excuse me’ about”, I replied.

He still didn’t get it, so I left him holding a plate of cornbread and butter.

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Souplantation is a local salad bar chain whose name disturbs me. Images of “darkies” laboring in the red earth under a hot Mississippi sun picking salad greens instead of cotton.

The chain also calls itself Sweet Tomatoes in some locations. A quick check of California franchises reveals that the choice of name depends on where the store is located. Here in Southern California, where the chain locates itself in conservative neighborhoods, it is called Souplantation. Up north, where progressives control more of the political discourse, it calls itself Sweet Tomatoes.

This, in my opinion, is the worst sort of political correctness that money can buy. Instead of standing for or retreating entirely from the plantation metaphor, Souplantation wimps out: it sells one face to the narrow minded whites who love the idea of having servants and another to those people of all colors who prefer a more organic and people-friendly name.

The company states that it is “committed to being a leader in community citizenship.” How about starting with a little honesty and consistency?