Cold cuts separate us from the barbarians. Without deli meat we’d simply wander around at lunchtime gnawing on turkey legs and lamb shanks.

Cold cuts deliver our midday fill of meat in a clean and easy process. But our primal instincts are never far away, as evidenced by the grocery store deli department where people lie, cheat, and steal to try to cut in line.

Many stores now have a kiosk option but I don’t trust it. You must be present to be heard.

Even the rigid ticketing system meant to bring order fails to keep a busy deli department from devolving into chaos.

The deli line isn’t like the House of Representatives where everyone is heard for equal time. It’s more like the Senate where any blowhard can hold everything up with a point of personal privilege.

When I finally seize the floor my strategy is to find the cheapest offering of whatever base meat I want but to also keep things loose.

Ham alone brings me to the table; I’m open to leaving the counter with either Maple, Black Forest, Virginia, or anything other than pressed. Pressed ham is disgusting.

I start the exchange by probing the attendant’s expertise with the question: what’s the best buy you’re offering today?

I value the back-and-forth because purchasing cold cuts is the last personally tailored experience in my life. This is true ever since my barber stopped asking for my opinion of a haircut.

She used to ask, “How does that look?” or, “Is that good?”

Now she just snaps the protective smock off and motions towards the cash register. It sounds rude, but I caused the situation by always deferring to her by responding, “I don’t know, what do you think?”

As the hair care professional, I trusted her judgment more than mine. She picked up on my weakness and cut me out of the process altogether, which is admittedly ridiculous.

But nobody is ridiculous at the deli counter; you can’t be the ridiculous one when the other person is dangling slices of meat asking you to assess their thickness.

I go “towards the thin side” with my meats (which must be a maddeningly vague instruction to receive) because I’m yet to see a thickness scale that makes a lick of sense.

Of course meat is only part of the game, the real action is in the cheese where I ask them to “cut it thick.”

I’m a Pepper Jack guy with American as my go-to backup. I’ll also dance with Provolone or Muenster in a pinch (or Swiss for one recipe only). Every other cheese is either too intimidating or so heavily processed that it’s gross.

Everyone has their own preference and that is the beauty of the deli counter. There are no wrong choices, except for olive loaf.

And once you get your order home, you’re on your own. The deli counters I use don’t provide expiration or best-by dates.

Days later you’ve gotta touch the meat, smell it, and really explore it to decide if it’s still good. This is especially risky considering that cold cuts are the only fully cooked meats that pregnant women are cautioned to avoid.

Why? Because deli meat can grow a bacteria so powerful that it kills an unborn child.

But go ahead and take that free sample. I’m sure it’s from the freshest part of their inventory. After all, we’re not barbarians.

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