Why do you hate this roast?

Sometimes, you just want a sunday roast prepared by someone else.

Sometimes, for this very reason, you go – on a sunday – to a reputable ‘italian’ restaurant and see that the roast in question is on the menu. Obviously, you order the roast, since this is what you wanted.

You sit there, observing the faux wood paneling on the walls, the orange lamps and 70s looking tables whilst the food is being prepared. You see people coming in for their sunday lunch, hear them say things like “ooh, that’ll be lovely” and “I love a good pasta” and so on and so on. Eventually, your food is brought out. And you see it on the plate. The food looks at you. You look back at the food. And you fucking hate it.

You can forgive the generic industrial yorkshire pudding. You can sort of tolerate the boiled vegetables. Your eyes come across the mushy potatoes and your patience starts slipping. The overall appeal shatters at the meat. It was meat once, probably. However, after being subjected to some kind death by a microwave, it is more reminiscent of crushed chalk that was coloured then re-shaped into food-like substance.

And you see all this and you hate it. You hate it because it’s bad. You hate it because it is what it is supposed to be, and if there was another person instead of you at this table, they would’ve said “what a lovely bit of roast dinner”. You hate it because you can make this better yourself. You hate it because you spent your time going to this restaurant based on somebody else’s recommendation when you knew better. You hate how isolated in your taste it makes you feel.

Sometimes a roast is not just a roast, but something that’s bigger than the sum of its parts. And sometimes you hate all the parts and their sum both of because of they are and what they are not. In this case, nothing about this roast is good and that’s why you hate it.