NY Times Dining & Wine

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/22/nyregion/22soup.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1258758962-aVf20elMFZ/ThsfwfdA65Q

I think this is an example of what's often frustrating about food writing. The writer takes an interesting observation - many ethnic cuisines feature chicken soup - and fails to even try to explain why this is the case. Why is chicken soup common to such different cultures? Do they all use it for curative purposes? Any other purposes beyond sustenance? Instead of describing the culture behind the food, she fixates on the food itself. The problem is that there's only so much you can say about food without resorting to trite, exaggerative descriptions: the Korean version came with a "stunning" side of mushrooms; when she had the Sichuan soup, her "whole body hummed"; the Greek one tasted "elegant". In what other section of the Times would this ever pass as good writing? Yet, for the food section, it's the norm.

The most overused food writing cliche has to be "delicious." Saying that something is delicious is appropriate for someone who doesn't know anything about food and just want to express dining rapture. For example, I'd expect a college kid drunkenly gobbling down fried chicken at 2 a.m. after a frat party to yell, "Delicious!" It's not appropriate for someone entrusted by the top-ranked newspaper in the country to provide well-researched, engaging analysis of food. So why do I get more than 100,000 results when I enter delicious into the New York Times search engine?

http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch?query=delicious

Is this just the frustration and jealousy of one who will in all likelihood never see a letter of his food writing grace the old grey lady?