Wandering around Manhattan last week I was struck by the large number of businesses devoted to food. There were blocks with only these, restaurants next to pizzerias next to fast-food franchises. There were the familiar - Chipotle seemed almost as prevalent as Starbucks - and some that were new to me, like Maoz (wonderful falafel with a fresh salad bar). One day in midtown I walked past the soup place made famous by Seinfeld (and now selling T-shirts printed with the words "No Soup For You"). Then of course there were all the street carts grilling kabobs and sausages.
It was hard to walk a block without seeing or smelling something to eat. It didn't seem so much a health problem - people generally looked pretty fit - as a psychological one. New Yorkers, like other Americans, have become obsessed with food.
I stayed in a friend's apartment on the Upper West Side, and was disappointed to see that the Barnes & Noble at 66th and Broadway had closed since my last visit. Walking around the neighborhood I found a choice of edibles from around the world - many of them temptingly displayed and ready to eat - but no store where I could buy a book. On the Upper West Side, one of America's intellectual enclaves. There seemed no clearer sign that in the national battle between the mind and the stomach, the stomach has won.
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