Food column left a bad taste | LETTER TO THE EDITOR

To the editor:

Margaret Walton’s recent “food” column  went well beyond recipes. I quote: “Policemen removed a 10-year-old, 51-pound girl from her home in Mukilteo and took her to the police station, where she ‘devoured four Pop Tarts, pretzels and popcorn.’ I don’t know about you, but to me that constitutes further abuse.”

While I agree with Ms. Walton that Pop Tarts, pretzels and popcorn don’t top the list of items on the healthy diet my old home-ec teacher pushed, I feel quite sure that they were manna to a semi-starved little girl. My home-ec teacher, by the way, weighed well over 200 pounds and was not exactly abiding by that healthy diet either.

Ms. Walton’s statement that giving the child these items “constitutes further abuse” lets me know that Ms. Walton knows very little about real abuse. I’m sure every bite of those Pop Tarts, pretzels and popcorn tasted like love to this child and that the Mukilteo police offering them to her were angels in her eyes.

The rant that follows about eating habits, obesity, the physical appearance of police officers and overweight dogs was completely out of line in a column titled “Whidbey Recipes.”

If Ms. Walton wants to write about something other than recipes, let her do it on a blog. As for me, I’m unlikely to try any of her recipes in the future, because I know now that they’ll likely contain at least a cup of bitterness.

MOLLY LARSON COOK

Coupeville

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