What's a Chinese pie?
I think you can't stop eating because you have to read wierd turn of the last century English poetry. I'd be depressed, too, if I had to read "Dulce et Decorum Est." Why don't you switch your major to Spanish or Latin American Studies? That way you could be reading Naruda or Gabriel Garcia Marquez or Isabelle Allende.
Mexican and Latin American Cuisine is wonderful, too. You'd have to search out the specialty shops to get all the ingredients in the recipes given in "Like Water for Chocolate."
How did you ever make out with Houseman, BTW. and were my suggestions re "Dulce" any help?