I emerged from the Mexican desert, 18, covered in bug bites, and starving. My friends and I had stolen, joked, and, with amazing good luck, fumbled our way across the dusty countryside for two months with almost no money. In fact, we'd pushed our out-of-gas van onto a ferry in Puerto Vallarta with little more than a box of graham crackers and a jar of orange marmalade to our names. Much had happened between the ferry ride and the border--a couple of terrible fights, lots of dope smoking, and an extended search by American guards. But all was forgotten once we crossed into San Diego and found the Golden Wok, a Chinese all-you-can-eat buffet.

My friends and I had fantasized endlessly about Chinese food while in Mexico, where we survived mainly on dry corn tortillas, boiled pinto beans, and the occasional egg. For months, eating had been a strictly utilitarian endeavor, meant to keep the stomach pangs away while we traveled and performed other utilitarian tasks like sneaking showers from backyard spigots.

Chinese buffets are rich in colors, tastes, smells, and quantities--everything we lacked in the Mexican desert, where for weeks we had bitten into beans, imagining they were deep-fried sweet-and-sour chicken morsels. Drooling at the thought of thick, gooey sauce and moo shoo pork and pot stickers, we made our way into the Golden Wok. It was perfect. It was hot and plentiful and cheap. It was our welcome back to America--our reintroduction to abundance, too many choices, and crass overconsumption. Ah, the indulgent satisfaction of it all. We ate for what seemed like days, our eyes expanding in their sockets at the bursts of flavor and aroma. It was one of the most satisfying meals I've ever consumed.

This is a testament to the Chinese buffet, to be sure. But it's also a tribute to the superhero-size power of food more generally. When we are truly and deeply hungry, the desire for food makes us hunters of the most ferocious variety. When we are in love, food is excruciatingly symbolic--all sauce and flesh and sugar. When we are breaking up, a snapping cracker elicits tears. Food is sad and obsessive and dangerous. It can be the centerpiece for friendships or even lure us to read and perform silly tricks. It's had a tangled relationship with femininity, but it can make a man a hero. It's delicious and comforting and poisonous.

But, above all, food is good food.

--Jennifer Vogel