March 19, 2013

I was hungry (but not ravenously so, like I used to get on Paleo) and I went to the kitchen. Nothing in the fridge was even remotely attractive. I tried to imagine anything edible that would appeal to me, whether I had it available or not. Nothing. So I drank some orange juice, had a Nespresso and left the kitchen, rather bewildered, still mentally searching for something I might bear eating.

This is by no means novel to me — I used to be like that most of the time when I was smoking. I ate only when something appealed greatly to my senses or when I was dining out with friends so I turned the whole thing into a social event and what was on my plate lost significance.

But I thought those days were over.

I am not upset at experiencing this again. I take it as a sign of health. And of being myself again. A fussy eater. It runs in the family - Dad was the worst, but most of us had it. Mom also contributed to this to some extent, as she taught us to enjoy food — pleasure had to be an important part of life and food was an important source of pleasure. She would genuinely suffer if we didn’t enjoy and praise out loud her cooking. So we did come to think that the world owed us pleasurable food and kept looking for it as adults.

When I moved to the States, easily finding pleasurable food became an issue. I kept looking for the rich tastes I had grown used to in Romania. I would use half and half instead of milk with my coffee and cereal. I remember being frantic over the “0% fat” or “low fat” labels, kept looking for the full fat products. People looked at me like I was an alien — and not in the INS usage of the term, either. But yes, I was an alien coming from planet Eastern Europe/Tasty Food.

Then I discovered places like “Dean & Deluca”. My food budget became ridiculous.

But nowhere could I find the classic meat & vegetable broth I was used to and I craved often. So I learned to cook it for myself.

Whenever I traveled for work and had breakfast with my American friends in European hotels, they would look at my plate with genuine concern on their faces. They tried to prevent me from eating “raw pork”. It was one of those situations where the two parties are convinced that the other is a barbarian.

Raw beef was something I learned from them, however. And raw fish.

In France, good food can be achieved a lot easier. After all, “Dean & Deluca” had their choicest stuff originate here and in Italy. But now I am worried about things being organic and, again, I am running into some trouble. Excellent AND organic is not an easy combo to find… The best wine, cheeses and deli things are not organic and without additives, here as elsewhere. I have to process lots of things myself and I have to stay away from many of my favorite foods. Keep it simple.

Quitting smoking awakened my bud tastes with a vengeance, so food started to feel good a lot more often… It didn’t have to be as awesome as when I was smoking. I could now get tremendous pleasure from simple things — and I did. So I put on weight, then I had to refrain from eating in order to not gain more. Food started to speak to me in a much louder tone, so I turned from a smoking gourmet into a non-smoking gourmand.

But this is the first time I am hungry in France and I cannot find anything appealing to eat. Of course, I am automatically keeping into the Peat barriers — maybe I would like to eat pizza with prosciutto crudo, but that is wrong in so many ways that I cannot truly salivate when I think of it. Honestly. That positive result to gluten antigens suddenly reduced my edible world to a figment of what it once was. I do have some gluten free pizza dough in the freezer, but I could never replicate the kinds of pizzas I used to adore or the apple pies that made me happy, etc., so there goes the possibility of a tasty pizza dream.

If this means that my body is replete with everything it needs and would rather take a break from processing food, I would be so thrilled! Maybe I can train it to recognize what it genuinely needs from the offer on hand and to simply prompt me via the salivary glands when it sees something that might be beneficial.

Wouldn’t that be a grand achievement!