R.I.P.

Gourmet Magazine, 1941-2009

Fare thee well, Gourmet.

Up until now, I've managed to observe the implosion of magazine after magazine (even though some of them were old favorites) with a certain cool, detached sense of inevitability.

It was simply a given that the Internet would ultimately destroy short-term print runs (i.e., newspapers and magazines). Why waste all those trees and ink on a publication that has a shelf life of 1-29 days, after all? Move it all online, my intellectual self said. Get on with it.

And yet, this morning, when I heard that Gourmet magazine will be laid to rest by its parent company, Conde Nast, I felt genuine pangs of loss and regret.

Gourmet (and its surviving sibling, Bon Appetit) is, quite simply, a fundamental part of who I am in the kitchen. Every month, throughout the 90s and the early 2000s, it was always there, a reliable source of recipes to be attempted (generally successfully, but occasionally mangled in the most amusing of ways), ingredients to be pored over, techniques to be adopted, equipment to be lusted after.

The new month's issue of Gourmet was a map, an itinerary, and a compass all in one, and the adventure was Eating & Drinking.

Now, I'll admit it.

In recent years, sometimes I didn't get around to actually taking the plastic wrap off of the actual physical magazine (the subscription to which has, not coincidentally, been a predictable annual Christmas gift from Mom since I graduated from college).

The recipes, after all, were all online at Epicurious.com. Bon Appetit's recipes, too. I could search based on what ingredients I had in the refrigerator and/or freezer. I didn't need to flip through the actual publication.

But still, there Gourmet remained, on my coffee table, occasionally nudging its glossy cover full of food porn mischievously into my line of sight, like an elegant dog that might like to be petted but doesn't want to be too demanding about it.

I'm really going to miss it.

So now I'm re-thinking the plan I made last weekend to gather up all my back-issues and bring them to the place I work, so patients and families will have something timeless to browse. I admit it. I'm feeling selfish.

This magazine--this silly, nearly 70-year-old magazine that existed to print ads for things I could never afford--has had a real place in my heart. It helped me become a better cook.

It made me brave enough to try dozens, maybe even hundreds of foods I would never have thought to place in my mouth.

It offered me necessary escape fantasies when I was trapped in a town for four years with only Wal-Mart as a source for groceries.

It deserved better.