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The psychology of small plates: why food service radically changes how much we eat - The Guardian
Two hundred years ago a group of aristocrats changed the way we eat – for the worse. If you ever worry you’ll still be hungry after dessert, here’s why
was confronted by a conundrum at the weekend. My sister had made chickpea curry for 14, and a lentil and mushroom curry, also for 14, and there were 22 of us, and if you’re wondering why there was no meat on this table, it’s because all the meat eaters of the older generation are dead. Take heed, carnivores. Oh, but also, there were sausages.
Anyway, hours in, when I was on my fourth or fifth helping, I noticed that there was no end to it. No, there was more of it than when we started. There was a lake of chickpeas. We had got to the “Would you like to take some home?” stage. And here’s what was truly bizarre: the quantities weren’t actually for 14; she had taken a recipe for two, and tripled it. So, it was basically two dishes for six, and it could have fed three generations of extended Williamses for a week. How is this possible? How do you explain this exponential thing that happens, when you scale up a recipe a few times and somehow end up with enough to feed 1,000 people?
Two hundred years ago a group of aristocrats changed the way we eat – for the worse. If you ever worry you’ll still be hungry after dessert, here’s why
was confronted by a conundrum at the weekend. My sister had made chickpea curry for 14, and a lentil and mushroom curry, also for 14, and there were 22 of us, and if you’re wondering why there was no meat on this table, it’s because all the meat eaters of the older generation are dead. Take heed, carnivores. Oh, but also, there were sausages.
Anyway, hours in, when I was on my fourth or fifth helping, I noticed that there was no end to it. No, there was more of it than when we started. There was a lake of chickpeas. We had got to the “Would you like to take some home?” stage. And here’s what was truly bizarre: the quantities weren’t actually for 14; she had taken a recipe for two, and tripled it. So, it was basically two dishes for six, and it could have fed three generations of extended Williamses for a week. How is this possible? How do you explain this exponential thing that happens, when you scale up a recipe a few times and somehow end up with enough to feed 1,000 people?