If you are a fan of rock music and you hear the name Ian Anderson, there is an fairly decent chance your mental database registers that he is the virtuoso flautist and leader of the Grammy-winning progressive rock band Jethro Tull. There is also an excellent chance that you hold some sort of grudge against Anderson since he and his group inexplicably won said Grammy because the voters of the quasi-prestigious trophy mistook them as a metal act. However, I would venture a guess that you most likely would not expect Anderson to wittily espouse on the delectable virtues of a daringly spicy serving of Chicken Vindaloo in a knowledgeable, authoritative way. And yet he does on Jethro Tull’s website with this lengthy yet fantastic dossier on Indian cuisine, which can be found here: http://www.j-tull.com/musicians/iananderson/indian.html

As a long time fan of Anderson and his band – at the risk of being forced to relinquish my cool card, I will admit to have seen them in concert three times – it was quite humbling and a bit unsettling that the bloke that penned “Bungle in the Jungle” is a better food writer than me. Yet by the end of the primer, the initial shock had been thoroughly replaced by the rather satisfying assumption that anyone can be an epicure. What’s more, in this day of ever-expanding social media and growing sophistication borne out of traditional media outlets like Food Network or Travel Channel, a happy discovery such as Anderson’s foodie tendencies should be more of a commonplace happening rather than the rarity. This of course has much more to do with the growth of Facebook, Twitter, and the blogsophere. It has been no secret that the upswing in culinary knowledge over the past decade has been dramatically large in scope; the social media revolution over the past few years has finally
given the burgeoning army of foodies that exists the tools necessary to communicate their passion with furious speed.

Now, when left to ponder, it makes a good deal of sense that Anderson would know a thing or two about the wonders of tandoori and nan. After all, Indian food is practically the national cuisine in his native United Kingdom. But I had no idea that he had such a depth of information about it despite my immense fandom, and probably would never have known if not for the weapons of Web 2.0. However, such arsenal exists, and because it does, I know that this won’t be the last time I will refer to someone famous or otherwise as a foodie in a rather hurried, surprised fashion. In fact, for me to assume otherwise would pretty much have me admitting to being thick as a brick.