Apricots

There is a phenomenon at cookbook events where an attendee will ask, “What’s your favorite [insert relevant topic]?” If you wrote a book on pie, it will be “What’s your favorite pie?” If you wrote a vegetable cookbook, it will be “What’s your favorite vegetable?”

I find this recurrent episode strange. Why must there always be a favorite? In the spring, rhubarb is my favorite, but in the fall, it is grapes. It’s not, as we say, apples to apples. And yet so often it feels like folks are trying to suss out the winner.