Probably the most famous book about gastronomy ever written is _The
Physiology of Taste_, by Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin.  It was published
in 1825, and includes such famous witticisms as "you are what you eat".

While rereading it recently, I stumbled across
this gem, in "Meditation 21: On Obesity":


    I shall begin this discussion with a condensation of more than five
    hundred conversations which I have held with my dinner companions
    who were threatened or afflicted with obesity.

    Fat Man:  Heavens, what delicious bread!  Where do you buy it?

    Myself: At Monsieur Limet's, rue de Richelieu: he is baker for Their
    Royal Highnesses the Duke of Orleans and the Prince of Conde':  I
    began to go to him because he is my neighbor, and I shall continue
    to do so because I have already called him the best breadmaker
    in existence.

    Fat Man:  I must make a note of that; I eat a great deal of bread, and
    if I could get such rolls as these I'd gladly do without any others.

    Another Fat Man:  What on earth are you doing there?  You're eating
    the liquid from your soup, and leaving that wonderful Carolina rice!

    Myself:  I am following a special diet I have prescribed for myself.

    Fat Man:  What a dreadful one!  I love rice as much as I do
    thickenings, Italian pastes, and all those things:  there's nothing
    more nourishing, nor cheaper, nor easier to prepare.

    Particularly Fat Man:  Will you be good enough, my dear sir, to
    pass me the dish of potatoes which is in front of you?  At the rate
    they're disappearing, I'm afraid I'll miss out.

    Myself:  Certainly they are within reach, are they not?

    Fat Man:  But won't you have some too?  There are enough for both
    of us, and after that who cares?

    Myself:  No, I shan't take any.  I value potatoes solely as
    preventatives of actual famine.  Aside from that, I know of nothing
    more completely tasteless.

    Fat Man:  But that's gastronomical heresy!  Nothing is better than
    potatoes; I eat them in every form, and if there happen to be any in
    the next part of the dinner, whether a la Lyonnaise or in a souffle',
    I here and now declare myself for the allotting of my just share
    of them.

    Fat Lady:  It would be so very kind of you if you would bring me
    from the other end of the table some of those Soissons beans which
    I see there...

    Myself, after having carried out the command while paraphrasing a
    well-known song in a low voice:

        Happy the folk of Soissons parish!
        Beans on their very doorsteps flourish

    Fat Lady:  You shouldn't joke.  The whole district is made richer by
    them.  Paris alone pays a considerable amount of money for its supply.
    And I must also come to the defense of those ordinary little beans
    now called English: when they are still green, they make a dish for
    for the gods.

    Myself:  A pox on all beans!  A pox even on little common English
    beans!

    Fat Lady:  And that's enough of your scorn!  One might almost think
    that you were the sole judge of such matters!

    Myself, to another Fat Lady:  Permit me to congratulate you on your
    good health; it seems to me, Madame, that you have grown a wee bit
    heavier since I last had the honor to see you.

    Fat Lady:  I probably owe it to my new diet.

    Myself:  But how is that?

    Fat Lady:  For some time now I've made my luncheon of some good rich
    soup, a bowl big enough for two, and what a marvelous soup it is!
    A spoon could stand straight up in it!

    Myself, to still another:  Madame, if you glance does not deceive me,
    you will accept a spoonful of this charlotte?  I shall plunge into
    it in your honor.

    Fat Lady:  Ah, my dear sir, your eyes do indeed deceive you!  I see
    two things I especially adore here on the table, and both of them
    have a French name of the masculine gender: this gateau de riz with
    its golden crust, and then this enormous biscuit de Savoie, for I
    can tell you for your records that I simply dote upon sweet cakes.

    Myself, to another:  While all that serious discussion is going on
    at the other end of the table, Madeame, may I put the question to
    this almond tart for you?

    Fat Lady:  But gladly! Nothing delights me more than pastry.  We have
    a pastry cook as one of our tenants, and between my daughter and
    myself, I truly believe that we can eat up the price of his rent,
    and a little more besides.

    Myself, having looked at the young lady:  This diet is wonderfully
    becoming to you!  Your charming daughter is a very beautiful creature,
    and more than generously equipped.

    Fat Lady:  Well, it is hard to believe, but some of her dearest
    companions sometimes tell her that she is too fat!

    Myself:  Perhaps they are jealous of her?

    Fat Lady:  that might be.  Anyway, I am about to get her married,
    and the first baby will take care of all that...

    And it is from such dialogues that I made clear to myself a theory
    which I had formed quite apart from its human connections, that the
    principal cause of any fatty corpulence is always a diet overloaded
    with starchy and farinaceous elements; it is from these conversations
    that I was able to prove to myself that this same diet is always
    followed by the same effects.

    Certainly meat-eating animals never grow fat (think of the wolves,
    jackals, birds of prey, crows, etc.).

    Herbivorous beasts seldom grow fat either, except as old age forces
    them into a life of greater repose; on the other hand they gain
    weight quickly and in any season when they are forced to eat potatoes,
    grains, and any kind of flour.

    Obesity is never found either among savages or in those classes of
    society which must work in order to eat or which do not eat except
    to exist.