It’s easy to see why the desire for the foods that made us feel warm and safe when we were gluttons in utero, embryonic stuffers so to speak, must be kept hidden from that growing army of nouvelle cuisine worshippers who tend to classify a slice of poached chicken breast, accompanied by a green pea or two and a dried beet chip, as a sybaritic repast.

In a world where, as the Duchess of Windsor pointed out, “you can never be too rich or too thin,” the poor souls who reach for another roll can become pariahs.

Not since the early Christians met in the catacombs beneath Rome has a group been so persecuted. Some of us even publicly embrace the theory that “less is more,” while privately we’re hopelessly addicted to such fattening taboos as an heroic slab of meat loaf partnered with a mountain of mashed potatoes awash in rich, brown gravy, or a thick, juicy hamburger smothered in onions and ringed with golden French fries, or white bread slathered with creamy peanut butter, oozing a trail of sticky-sweet grape jelly.

From infancy on, comfort food is either a reward or a bribe. Cry and you get a bottle, finish your carrots and you get dessert. Talk about eating with a loaded deck. It’s not too much of a stretch to go from that kind of emotional blackmail to bingeing on blintzes and pigging out on pork chops.

What’s wrong with revisiting your childhood for a little solace from a Twinkie or two? When your broker forgets to sell short, or someone suggests a great rinse to cover those new gray hairs or you find yourself on the top of the list for an IRS audit, do you want to curl up with a bowl of oat bran? No sirreeeee. This is a job for tapioca pudding! The British wisely equate the food their nannies served them with their ability to have withstood two world wars, and still ask at the end of dinner, “what’s for pudd?”

“Cherry Cobbler is shortcake for the soul.”
–EDNA FERBER

“Chocolate goes well with sex–before, during, after–it really doesn’t matter.”
–HELEN GURLEY BROWN

VEAU IS ME

Since the dawn of time, food has been used to comfort the spirit and dull the ache of loneliness that almost everyone sometimes experiences. People gather to eat and drink at wakes or after funerals. It’s often customary to bring something sweet to the bereaved to help soothe the bitterness of loss. These social ceremonies are a source of comfort for the grieving, a reassurance that life will go on.

And how often has the phrase, “food is love,” been used to unmask the psyche of the overeater? We repeat it to ourselves to explain our need to reach for a pound of peanut brittle in the midst of a career crisis or when a love affair dies. There’s no doubt about it, there are just times when cheesecake equals peace of mind.

Then there’s chocolate, that South American aphrodisiac in Swiss clothing. The very first book about this delectable debauchery was written in Spain, in the 1660s, long before Godiva was anything more than a lady with absolutely nothing to wear. The author, however, found the New World delicacy palatable only when two grains of chili were mixed with every 100 grains of cocoa, which only reinforces the observation that some like it hot.

What few realized back then was that cocoa could be made into the most seductive of sweets, sparking not only tooth decay but also the observance of that diabolical holiday, Valentine’s Day.

ILLUSTRATION BY CLAUDE SERRE FROM LA BOUFFE, 1986, EDTTIONS GLĖNAT, GRENOBLE

Only recently has it been discovered that chocolate contains a chemical called phenylethylamine, which produces the same euphoria one feels when one falls in love. It may finally be clear why, of all pleasures, the comfort-food addict most craves chocolate. Not only that, but the sensual sweetie is most enjoyed...in bed. The voluptuous quality of chocolate, with it satiny, melt-in-the-mouth enticement, might be the closest thing to making love that a lonelyheart has on a cold winter’s night. Now, doesn’t that make all those calories worth it?

It would be a great shame to let anyone talk us out of food for comfort. It doesn’t matter whether you wind up with a Big Mac or a pound of Beluga caviar, if it makes you feel warm and safe. Is anyone really sure that Freud didn’t keep a bag of potato chips handy for that free ten minutes between patients, or that Lincoln didn’t have a box of fudge with him on the train to Gettysburg?

In the beginning there was mother’s milk, warm and cozy in that miracle of anatomical packaging. From that moment on, food was comfort, food was love, food was power. The proof is in the pudding.

“Sex is good but not as good as fresh, sweet corn.”
–GARRISON KEILLOR

PHILIP JOHNSON FUND, PHOTO ©1999, THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART, NEW YORK

“What is patriotism but the love of food one ate as a child?”
–YIN LUTANG

Two Cheeseburgers with Everything (Dual Hamburgers), 1962, by Claes Oldenburg

“I like white-trash cooking. Cheeseburgers, the greasier the better. Mashed potatoes served in a scoop, a little dent in the top for the gravy. Drake’s Devil Dogs for dessert. Pure pleasure, no known nutrients.”

–ORSON BEAN

MIRACLE MEATLOAF WITH MUSHROOM GRAVY

FOR MEATLOAF:

1 pound hot Italian sausage meat

2 pounds meatloaf mixture (ground pork, beef and veal)

2 cups chopped onion

1 cup bread crumbs

½ cup ketchup

2 eggs, beaten

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

½ teaspoon salt

Generous grinding of fresh pepper

4 slices of bacon

FOR MUSHROOM GRAVY:

3 tablespoons butter

2 ¾ cups sliced mushrooms

2 tablespoons flour

2 tablespoons drippings from meatloaf

1 can beef broth

Salt and pepper to taste

Squeeze Italian sausage out of the casings into a large bowl. Add meatloaf mixture, onion, bread crumbs, ketchup, eggs, Worcestershire, salt and pepper. Using clean hands, mix together thoroughly.

In an oval or rectangular pan that will accommodate the meat, shape into a loaf and layer bacon slices diagonally across it. Bake in a preheated 375-degree oven for 1 hour and 45 minutes. Drain fat and reserve for gravy. Turn off the oven. Keep meatloaf warm in the oven while the gravy is prepared.

TO MAKE THE GRAVY: Heat butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Sauté mushrooms until golden. Add flour and stir. Add hot drippings and stir well. Gradually add broth and stir continually until thickened. When serving, spoon over slices of meatloaf. Makes 8 servings.

COMFORTING VANILLA POTS À CRÈME

6 egg yolks

½ cup sugar

Pinch of salt

2 cups half-and-half

½ cup milk

1 vanilla bean, split

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 300 degrees.

Whisk yolks, sugar and salt in bowl until thickened.

Heat half-and-half and milk in saucepan until small bubbles appear around the edges. Scrape seeds from bean into the milk mixture; add bean. Remove from heat and let stand for 5 minutes.

Remove bean from saucepan; strain milk mixture. Pour into yolk mixture, stirring constantly. Stir in vanilla extract. Pour into six 5-ounce ramekins, dividing equally. Gently blot any foam from tops with paper toweling.

Set ramekins in large shallow pan. Pour hot water into pan to depth of 1 inch.

Bake in oven for 1 hour, until custards are set. Remove from pan. Chill. Makes 6 servings.

CHOCOLATE PEANUT-BUTTER SOUL PIE

FOR CRUST: 2 ¼ cups chocolate-wafer cookie crumbs	1 cup sugar
4 tablespoons sugar	1 ¾ cups chilled heavy cream
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted	2 teaspoons vanilla
FOR FILLING: 1 ¼ cups creamy peanut butter	FOR TOPPING: ¾ cup heavy cream
1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened	7 ounces semisweet chocolate

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

TO MAKE THE CRUST: In a medium bowl, combine cookie crumbs and sugar, then add melted butter. Mix well. Press mixture into bottom and up sides of 10-inch pie plate. Bake 10 minutes. Set aside to cool.

TO PREPARE THE FILLING: In a large bowl, cream together peanut butter and cream cheese until smooth. Add sugar and beat well.

In a large, chilled bowl, beat 1 ¾ cups heavy cream and vanilla until soft peaks form. Fold 1/3 into peanut butter mixture. Then gently fold in rest of the whipped cream.

Pile filling into cooled crust. Cover with wax paper and chill at least 5 hours or overnight.

TO MAKE THE TOPPING: Bring ¾ cup heavy cream to a boil in small saucepan. Remove from heat. Stir in chocolate until smooth. Cool 10 to 15 minutes, until topping begins to thicken. Stir occasionally.

Pour topping over pie and spread evenly. Chill at least 30 minutes, or until topping is set. Makes 10 to 12 servings.

FRANCES ELIZABETH SMITH CARTER’S THREE-LAYER DEVIL’S FOOD CAKE

FOR CAKE:

2 large eggs

2 cups brown sugar, packed

1 ½ cups sour cream

2 tablespoons buttermilk or milk

2 ½ cups sifted flour

½ teaspoon baking powder

Pinch of salt

2 teaspoons baking soda

½ cup unsweetened cocoa

½ cup very hot water

1 ½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract

FOR BITTERSWEET BUTTERCREAM FROSTING:

6 large egg yolks

½ cup sugar

½ cup corn syrup

1 pound unsalted butter, softened

8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, melted and slightly cooled

TO MAKE THE CAKE: Grease and flour 3 (8-inch) cake pans. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, beat eggs well. Beat in brown sugar. In a separate bowl, mix together the sour cream and buttermilk or milk. Set aside.

Sift together flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda and cocoa.

Add dry ingredients to egg mixture alternately with sour cream mixture and hot water, ending with dry ingredients. Fold in vanilla. Divide batter evenly among pans.

Bake at 350 degrees for about 25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean. Let cake layers cool on rack.

TO MAKE THE FROSTING: In a large bowl, beat the egg yolks until light. Set aside.

Grease a heatproof, glass measuring cup and keep within reach of the stove top. In a small saucepan over medium-high heat, combine sugar and corn syrup. Stir constantly until the mixture comes to a rolling boil. Once at a rolling boil, transfer the sugar syrup quickly into the measuring cup.

While beating with a hand-held electric mixer, pour the hot syrup in a steady stream (avoiding the beaters) over the egg yolks. (Use rubber spatula to scrape out syrup from measuring cup.) Beat well.

Beat in the butter and melted chocolate gradually until fully incorporated. Allow buttercream to cool to room temperature before frosting the cake.

Use frosting between the three layers and on sides and top of cake.

“Health food may be good for the conscience but Oreos taste a hell of a lot better.”

–ROBERT REDFORD

ILLUSTRATION BY L. LESLIE BROOKE FROM THE THREE LITTLE PIGS AND TOM THUMB, LONDON: 1922, COLLECTION OF FRANCES CONVERSE MASSEY, REPRINTED IN THE UBIQUITOUS PIG BY MARILYN NISSENSON &SUSAN JONAS. COURTESY OF UBIQUITOUS AUTHORS AND HENRY N. ABRAMS, INC.