and Wednesday too
Hello! I'm back again! Everyone has been blogging about food and I hate being left out, so I'm going to belatedly join in for One Entry Only. I was ***HIGHBROW CULTURE ALERT!*** watching Freaky Eaters on BBC3 last week and it was busily condemning a woman who only ate bread. I felt a jolt of recognition because, until relatively recently, that was me. Actually, her diet was more varied than mine because she supplemented it with exotic tinned delicacies like Spaghetti Hoops and soup whereas I used to live on bread and potatoes and biscuits. Protein was no friend of mine, and fruit and vegetables were scary strangers. I didn't like food with lumpy bits or stringy bits, or food where I didn't know exactly what was in it, or green food. Or red or blue or orange food, unless it was cake. I was an expert in mashing food around the plate and hiding most of it under my fork. I had to be in control of what I ate, and if that meant having two potato waffles every day for dinner, then so be it. I am s-l-o-w-l-y becoming more adventurous. Yes, I am underweight - I'm officially too small to give blood, which is a shame because injections don't bother me (although the nurse had to use the premature baby needle last time I needed one because my arms were too scrawny for the Big Girl's needle. I was 26 years old). No, I don't have an eating disorder although I probably ticked all the boxes for "Most Likely To Acquire One" in my youth. I enjoy food, and I bloody love cooking. I've changed my hours at work so I have more time to make my tea in the evenings. I've become the sort of person who reads recipe books in bed. We have 51 in the flat so that's almost one for every week. There has been dark talk of throwing a dinner party. My pockets are always full of shopping lists. And my mum is in shock. All those years of worrying that I would waste away and trying everything to make me eat new foods - from rewarding me with gold stars to, in one moment of severe frustration, tipping a plate over my head - and suddenly, something has clicked in my head and [Food Is Good]. I am still adding new foods to my diet. Here are some things I have tried for the first time this year: 1) Blueberries. Like tiny jewels exploding with...blueness. The only thing that puts me off is the thought that somewhere, "Dr" Gillian McKeith is approving of my diet. 2) Grapes. Aren't they crunchy! Are they meant to be crunchy? 3) Mushrooms a) In a vegetarian burger: yum! b) In a risotto: groo. There is still some work to be done there.
Comments
If you eat mushrooms, you are better at eating than me.
Crunchy grapes are the best kind.
I'm a BIG FAN of potato waffles. And Alphabites, as you know, but they NO LONGER EXIST probably due to Gillan McBitch.
Mushrooms only work in risotto if you add them near the end of cooking time, so they don't go all mushy. I loves 'em. And savoy cabbage. Have you tried pasta with savoy cabbage, pancetta, mozarella and parmesan, yaags? It is heaven on a plate.
Bluberries must be the only nice things that Snakeoil McKeith has ever approved of. All her food is beige. Like her face. Ack.
Right, savoy cabbage is the next new food on my list. I doubt Asda in Leyton stocks it though. Sounds a bit exotic for us.
And can everyone stop talking about mushroom risotto, because it makes me feel a bit sick. I can build up to that, and hopefully I'll be wolfing it down in 2012.
There was a time when I needed to gain weight. The only food I thought I needed to add to my diet was mayonnaise.
That wasn't wrong...was it?
You neeeeed to have fresh corn on the cob with butter and salt. And mushies sauteed and served atop toasted sourdough and ricotta is MMM-MMMMM (especially with fresh cracked pepper)!