By Rachel Sauer
Special to The Daily Sentinel
You know, it’s one thing to tell me not to eat romaine lettuce or pre-packaged spinach. I didn’t want to anyway, so I could greet the temporary advice to avoid them with an insincere “aw, shucks” and blithely maintain my streak of not eating beneficial greens.
But on Thursday the CDC warned against eating raw cake batter, citing a 12-state E. coli outbreak with illnesses linked to cake mix and traced as far back as February. And this is where I have to confess to one of the foundational principles guiding what I eat: The Theory of Did Anybody See That?
Now, I have borderline-obsessive respect for contract tracing, epidemiology and the data that guide our public health in beneficial directions, and I wholeheartedly support the CDC, but… my dudes. Cake batter? A very tasty thing?
So, to the alarm of doctors, nurses, my mother, registered dieticians – pretty much anyone with sense and even the most rudimentary understanding of bacteria and the human body – I lean heavily on The Theory of Did Anybody See That?
You’re probably already familiar with its convivial and delicious cousin, The Five-Second Rule. But unlike The Five-Second Rule, The Theory of Did Anybody See That? relies not on time, but on proximity and observation. That is, if nobody else saw, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t count.
Did anybody see me drop that strawberry on the floor, then brush it off with my fingers and hover over the faucet like I’m definitely going to give that berry the scrub of its life? No? OK, I’m definitely NOT going to give it the scrub of its life, but will quickly poke it under the water once and then slice it into the bowl with the rest of the fruit.
Did anybody see me scoop out that ball of cookie dough and bounce it in my hand like I’m about to get a runner out on first, or at least put it on the cookie sheet and bake it like I have some class? Oh, nobody saw? Well then, I’m not going to bake it, I’m going to eat it.
Living by The Theory of Did Anybody See That? means a lot of side glances and peeking back over my shoulder. It’s furtive, which your basic, boring moralizer will tell you is the first hint that I shouldn’t be doing it. But I have two things to say to that:
- That is why moralizers don’t get invited to birthday parties.
- It’s the best method I know for doing the thing I want to do while also not letting on that I’m basically feral, despite my parents’ best efforts.
The Theory of Did Anybody See That? allows me to not only eat the spoonful of Nutella, but dip the spoon back in the communal jar for round two. It allowed me to find a single M & M in my purse the other day and eat it without even questioning how long it had been there. Or why it was there. Or whether I should be eating things that I have to brush fuzz off before sending them down the hatch.
And the great thing about The Theory of Did Anybody See That? is it doesn’t just apply to eating inadvisable things. It also applies to falling down, because isn’t that the first thing most of us do after falling down? Check whether anybody saw?
If nobody saw, I’m free to win an Oscar for Best Actor in an Otherwise Embarrassing Moment, limping and swooning and maybe crying a little. But if anybody saw, I’m obliged to bounce back up with a hearty, “Ha ha, who put that gravity there, am I right? I’m fine, fine, absolutely fine! Better than fine! Ha ha! Who doesn’t love a few youthful scabs? Such great conversation pieces!”
Conversely, and circling back to food, if anybody sees me drop my bratwurst on the patio, for example, I’m forced to draw from the same well of heartiness: “Ha ha! Darn! Guess I’ll have to throw that one away! I hope the squirrels that get in the trash sometimes like sausage!”
But if nobody sees, you better believe I’m picking it right back up and eating it.
So, I promise you, CDC, that I’m so grateful for your vigilance and advice, and I will try my very hardest not to eat the cake batter. But if nobody’s around to see…