The Complete Meal

What is a complete meal? In which order should we eat? In the US, we eat bread first, than salad, than usually a large plate of meat with vegetables and a starch, and finally desert. In Italy, you eat the salad after all the main dishes and before desert. They usually start with a light appetizer, then have a pasta plate, fish plate, meat plate and than desert followed by an apperatif such as Amaro Averna. In Spain there is a lot of tapas and snacking and then the meal is served. In Sweden the meal is usually served at once similar to the US. In England they...well who cares about English food, seriously!?

Anyway, which method is best? Which series of dishes is most healthy? How fast should we eat? I remember growing up my family set the table and ate together every night, unless my dad was on a business trip or my brother in a tennis tournament. Looking back, eating as a family was huge in establishing the closeness we have now. I have no idea how my mom did it, my brother was a normally weird teenage and I was a fricking disaster, but she did it...and I'm glad she did.

Back to the subject. In my opinion, it doesn't matter how you eat, when you eat, how fast you eat, just as long as you eat with your family and friends as much as possible, eat healthy and definitely get creative and get your brain working. For some reason, most people in the US rush through meals and don't appreciate the importance of the nurishment of the body and soul while eating and don't take advantage of the opportunity presented every day. Whatever! I'm going to order a pizza tonight and drink a few beers while watching Entourage by myself!