Sifton Slightly Concerned About Weekly 24,560 Caloric Intake

For this week's Sunday Times magazine, critic Sam Sifton publishes a week long food diary, chronicling every bite taken and every calorie expended at the gym, concluding that he's consumed 24,560 calories and shed 4,180. To anyone familiar with the role of the critic, the quantity of food consumed is not so shocking, nor is Sifton's growing worry that he is slowly destroying his body.

I’ve had double lunches in a day, double dinners. I’ve had days that began with lard-fried doughnuts and ended with torchons of foie gras followed by steak, with double-cooked pork and slick dumplings in chili oil in the middle for lunch...

The consumption fatigue is a concern for two major reasons. One, "once you begin to eat restaurant food all the time, it’s all you ever want." And two, to properly respect and assess a restaurant, a critic should feel hungry, and sound in mind and body; "He should not feel sluggish, logy, fat."

Anyway, if any enterprising reader wants to take a look at that food journal to try to ascertain where Sifty's been, just note he was out of town for the second part of the week.
· My Life in Food [NYT]
· The Cheat: Salad Day [NYT]