The Elephant Show

... I am slowly going crazy, 1-2-3-4-5-6--Switch.
Crazy going slowly am I, 6-5-4-3-2-1-switch.

The term will be officially over in seventeen hours, when my philosophy paper needs to be in the doctor's hands.

I'm going out of my mind.

I've locked myself out of the kitchen.

I'm on page one. Of 10. Even though I've been writing since I finished my physiology test at 2 today.

I do believe I'm going to go ride my bike to get my hair cut. Then, there will only be 14 hours left and maybe I'll write a little bit faster.

Some things I love right now.

This kitten face.

Turning off the heater and lighting a fire, with all of this wood.

Starting said fire, all by myself, even if it takes 10 minutes.

Letting said fire burn down to embers... then putting more wood on it and watching it ignite with my breath.

A fridge full of leftovers, still, one week after the feast.

My incredible classmates.

Finals week, and how that means I can sleep in, wear my pjs all day long and pretend like life is for dawdling--and then cramming in the 11th hour.

Finals week, and how that means I'm almost 1/12th of the way to becoming a doctor.

Craft blogs. My new favorite procrastination distraction.

Namaste cookie mix, with butterscotch chips, chocolate chips, coconut and rolled oats, just like I used to make the "real deal"

The snowflakes that fell this morning.

Not for the faint hearted.

I have a bad case of the creeped-out crawlies. You know the ones. The goosebumpy, spiderweby, bugs-on-me tingly ones; the sight every little speck with a gasp, and approach with caution, poking with stick or fork or toe until it's been determined that said speck is in fact a speck--a part of a leaf, a crumble of turkey, your housemate's daughter's cereal--and not the goosebumpy, spiderweby, bugs-on-me thing you were hoping it wasn't.


I went to the cupboard for quinoa today. I have some four gallons of turkey broth from last week's feast, and I wanted to use some to boil up a bowl of grains. Grains. I know. But it's finals week, and it's turkey broth, and it's quinoa and--I wanted some.

So I went to the cupboard and started fishing for quinoa. First to the big tupperware full of bulk bags and half-useds. Near the bottom, I spotted a bag of little pearlies so I grabbed it--millet. Darn. But wait--millet with little pieces of sand. Little pieces of sand, and silky looking webs...pale beads of millet sticking to the soft plastic in clumbs... and WORMS! Just writing it sends those shivers back up my spine.

Ok. So worms in the millet. But wait--there were worms in the oats, too. Not just the open bag of rolled oats I used in cookies not three days ago, but in the sealed paint-can of a tin of steel-cut oats. And in the glass jar of rye--I didn't dare open that jar. The top inch was clouded over with web, and the bottom eighth full of telltale crumbles. And in the quinoa. Just barely--but barely enough.

I do believe I was infested with our friend the Indian Meal Moth. Ewwww.

I mean it's cool and everything--the shimmery webs, the way the larvae are these neat little, white, parasitic looking worms who spin as they eat, clumping the grains together as a way of saying "look who's home!" before cocooning into a cranny to morph into the triangular gray moths I found in the deep crevices of some of my bags--but EWWWWWWWWWW.

This prompted a full-scale investigation. My findings? Gross!


The the lentils, the coconut, the instant oatmeal (pathetic, I know, but I really was hoping these were clean). The raisins. The raisins were probably the worst. Hell, I even had one in my parchment paper box (I'm so glad I checked).

Graciously, I think my newly purchased bags of Namaste pizza crust and muffin mixes were spared. There was a wriggling worm, wrapped in its own web and tucked into the paper bag crease of one--but no evidence of anything getting inside.


I guess it had been a long time coming--I'd needed to purge a lot of that from my life, but didn't have the heart to toss it and most of it wasn't donatable. Some of those boxes and bags traveled with me from California, two years ago--a few of them lived in my dorm room for even a year before that. The pantry looks a lot better. I just wish I hadn't had to throw away so much food!

and I kinda wish I had some quinoa to boil in my turkey broth.

Thanksgiving Picture Story

A few photos from our Thanksgiving


we named her Donna



that's my little sister on the right. SO HAPPY she could come up to visit
for the week. Donna isn't all the way cooked here, but we needed to send
Mom a picture she could print and put up for the family Thanksgiving
going on in California. Check out that pile of roasted Brussel's Sprouts!


cohosts extraordinaries: Mamie, Tiffany and me.
We're pretty excited the turkey is ALL the way cooked when we wanted it to be!



It's amazing what you can do in a 10x12 foot space with a little
creativity. Dinner for 10 (party for 15), on sheet wood and
overturned recycling bins.





22 1/4 pounds of turkey--for five meat eaters
We carved it with our fingers.


(finger food turkey fest)


Leslie, Kelly, Laura--reading the dish cards to know
that their food is allergen-free.


We are thankful for this food.
We are thankful for our school.
We are thankful for each other.
I am so blessed to have such a family away from family.



Two badasses in the kitchen. Nolan had been a vegetarian
for 10 years before he met our turkey, Donna.
Then he went on to eat an entire drumstick.

An Autumnal Feast

This Thanksgiving, I'm hosting.

Well, me and a couple of my girlfriends. And my little sister, by default, because she's coming to visit (!!!!!!).

This year, like last year, I'm feeding friends who don't have families in town.

An Orphans Thanksgiving.

A feast of Thanksgiving.

And this year, like last year, everything is going to be free of wheat, dairy, sugar and soy. We've cut construction paper dish signs so that people can mark their ingredients and whether their food is veg or not; I know that I, for one, am excited that I'll be able to fill my plate and my belly and not get sick.

We've ordered a free range turkey which I'm brining and roasting it as per Mr. Alton Brown (he hasn't let me down yet, and people are still talking about last year's bird--so let's do it again!). Christa is going to assemble the ginger, tangerine, cranberry relish. Bob's Red Mill's mix is giving up the cornbread (oh, so good, really), and we're rounding out our part of the meal with a green bean casserole-inspired mushroom and roasted brussel's sprouts dish (topped with lard-fried shallots) and a butternut squash smash, reminiscent of sweet potatoes and enriched with a splash of Grand Marnier. Oh yes--and this pumpkin pie, sans crust. And hot mulled cider with spiced rum to make it extra warming. And- okay.

Leslie is making vegan lentil loaf, vegetarian gravy and something yummy of broccoli and rice.

Tiffany is making beet soup in acorn squash, green beans tossed with meyer lemon and toasted pine nuts and her yummy gluten-free banana cookies. Oh, and honey butter I'm going to want to eat off a spoon.

Mamie is on mashed potatoes.

There's more, too. More friends, more food. We're expecting 15 or so over the course of the night; 10 for sitting down to dinner, I think?

It is SO FUN to take this over the top. To stay up late looking at recipes. To ponder my utensils and serving dishes instead of physiology. To load up with what is going to be too much food, and feel a little guilty and excessive about it.... and feel so, so thankful that this food, and these friends, and that night are a possibility.

Lardo

I borrowed my friend Greg's beer brewing pot. It's big. Big enough for my current projects, which include rendering lard, brining a turkey and making some serious broth.

Today's adventure? Caul fat. Shimmery, lacy, globule-speckled caul fat.

I bought 15 pounds of it from my favorite pork man a couple of weeks back. My plan was to render it into lard... but for what uses? Apart from seasoning my cast iron pan, I had no idea. It just sounded like fun.

Initially, I thought I should have been more specific and asked for leaf lard, the soft fat similar to what you find in your bacon. Supposedly, that's top quality pastry lard. Despite not eating pastry, that's what I wanted.

Caul fat is much more famous for its place around meats. At the farmer's market, it makes an appearance around Viande Meats' pates. It's the crispy membrane around a crepinette (the new thing-to-do in NYC restaurants, so I hear); it's what holds stuffed roasts together, and what imparts moisture to thick, free range cuts. On the lard scale, it's bottom of the line.

Nevertheless, I had 15 pounds of it and an original plan.... so I cut that lacy membrane into pieces and filled Greg's pot.

I'd read as much as I could google about rendering lard. Of course, most website contradicted all the other website--and none of them wanted to talk about rendering caul. So, I put the pot on the stove and let it do its thang--whatever that was going to be.

Appetizing, huh? I really ought to have taken a picture of the final product--it looked nothing like this. In time, in patience, in heat, this sticky lump melted into a viscous oil and crispy membrane bits. I strained the clear stuff into jars, and mixed what remained with sauteed onions to eat on slices of apple. Yum.

The lard is pristine white, as solid as butter 'cause I keep it in the fridge, but a joy to cook with. I try not to smoke it (I think what I REALLY really wanted was beef suet. Maybe another time?) so I'm not really sauteeing things... but it makes a mean breakfast egg.

And, it did one heck of a job seasoning my cast iron.

Stock Pot

I have 15 pounds of caul fat in my freezer right now. I bought it from my favorite pork man, who assured me he could hook me up when I asked if he had fat I could render into lard. Fifteen pounds of silky, dew-drenched spiderweb looking fat frozen into a solid hunk.

A frozen 15 pound hunk which I full intend to render into tasty and usable lard... just as soon as I find a pot in which to do it, 'cause my 10 inch cast iron skillet just ain't gonna cut it.

Struggles

I consider myself pretty darn lucky. My biggest challenge right now?

Studying biochemistry.... instead of reading Shauna James Ahern's new book, which I finally got my grubby fingers on when I went to meet her at the Bob's Red Mill store instead of attending my Histlogy lecture.

C'mon. It's a quality of life issue.

So, instead of doing either, I get on here. Productive!

Cavemen

My parents returned home on Thursday night. Everything on the other side of Highland Valley Road is burned, completely. Their house was untouched. My heart goes out to everyone affected by those flames--they're still going.

I have a constant internal dialog these days. A stream of consciousness, it runs through the back of my mind, like fuzzy television sound, not quite white beneath more intentional thought and activity. It sounds something like this: "dehydrogenase is the enzyme that uses NAD+ to remove a hydrogen from a substrate--I think. The respiratory cavities go "trachea, bronchi, bronchiole, terminal bronchiole, alveolar duct. I think. The radius is connected to the scaphoid, lunate and triquetrum, and to the ulna. I think. Right atria, right ventricle, pulmonary vein, lungs, pulmonary artery, left atria, left ventricle, aorta. Mucosa, sub mucosa, muscalaris. Aorta, arteries, arterioles, capillaries, venules, veins--" and so on and so forth, rendering me all but useless, interpersonally.

Really, they ought not let us first years socialize.

My other internal dialog is about food. Mashed butternut squash with garlic, onions, chicken stock, butter, leeks and coarse ground pepper. Crock pot pot roast. Five and a half quarts of chicken soup, homemade and brimming with too many vegetables. Chantrelle mushrooms sauteed with butter and olive oil, onions, garlic and bacon, deglazed with good red wine and tossed with shrimp. Oh, yum. Tapioca bread and raw goat's milk cheddar grilled cheese sandwiches. GF chocolate chip cookies a la Bob's Red Mill, so yummy that my biochem class had no idea they were allergen free. (Grains. I know. Sugar, I know. It's a quality of life issue.) Deviled egg eyeballs.

I feel like I've found a flow with school. I'm not drowning. I'm not even treading water: I'm doing okay. I've figured out what material I learn better on my own, and for which I ought to attend lecture (I must admit, it's still a little thrilling, even in week 8, to be a class ditcher). I've passed all my tests (biochem Wednesday might be another story?) so far, and have still made time to bowl terribly on my Underdog league, sleep 8ish hours most nights, get my groove on at Halloween parties (so far, three costumes and counting. the 31st should make four?), finish Nina Planck's book, and, most of the time, to feed myself.

Much to the disappointment of my vocabulary and syntax, writing is not one of those things I've made much time for. Good thing no one reads me :) Maybe next term.

California knows how to party

Southern California is on fire. My parents and brother, along with more than 500,000 others were evacuated on Sunday and are safe. The fire went straight through where my parents live in Ramona; once the roads open up again, we'll know what's still standing. Bigger than that, though, is the massive amount of destruction and the incredible number of families and businesses affected. Please, keep that region--especially the heroic firemen--in your prayers

(Some pictures I stole from a myspace bulletin. Truly amazing, in so many ways.)

Riding my bike home from school this afternoon, I listened to the soft patter of leaves hitting the sidewalk and I had to zip my jacket against the chilly air.

Autumn is coming quickly.

At the market this morning, I could buy strawberries, raspberries and blackberries if I wanted to. I could also buy pumpkins and butternut squash. Pears were out in abundance, and apples and peaches. Delicate lettuce stood beside heartier kale, and the first crops of beets were on display. What a delightful, delightful time for eating.

So much has happened, so much has changed, since I posted last in July.

For one, I spent twelve nights on a baltic cruise, and 10 days between Paris and Italy.

For two through fifty six, I started medical school; I adopted a stray kitten, four weeks old; the Walk a Mile in Her Shoes march went off without a hitch; I moved from my huge Hawthorne house and my five lovely housemates to a two bedroom duplex. Tomorrow, my new duplex mate will move in and things will change some more.

I feel like I am living a completely different life. In many ways, I am.

There are so many things I would love to write here: of the lunch in St. Petersburg, Russia at which I tasted my first caviar; of the market and the reindeer bratwurst in Finland; of the midnight buffets, the salsa dancing and staying up all night with my sister. Of the gelato in Italy and the pimples it gave me (oh, the wheat, dairy and sugar... and the havoc it wrecked!); the burger in the Bastile, and the midnight wine on the roof of a deer friend's Parisian apartment in view of the illuminated Eiffel Tower; of the local specialty in Monterosso: frozen TV dinner chestnut pasta with pesto.

And I'd love to write about cooking in the morning for a full day of eating, stowing the hot foods in glass jars and stuffing them into my backpack for my ride to school, and of how I couldn't resist the Ben and Jerry's on sale at Fred Meyer's last week (but am paying the price. when will I learn???), and of my tiny kitten's affinity for chicken hearts.

In my head, there are beautiful narratives of all these things. And, in my various picasas, there are pictures of most of them.

But, on my living room floor right now I have yet-unpacked boxes, stacks of notes and books and lists of assignments which all require my present attention.

What the World Eats

What the World Eats, Part II

http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1645016,00.html?xid=rss-photos

Thanks, Aaron.

A New Kind of "Flat Bread"

For about a year now, I've begun most days with two eggs, over easy. I slide two delicately cracked, golden yolked eggs into melted kerrygold butter in my small, two-egg pan. Over medium heat, the white sets until it doesn't slosh when I shake the pan, and with a gentle thrust I toss the eggs into the air and catch them on the way down. Face down, they cook for just a moment more (it's a sad day when I touch the yolk and feel it hard beneath my fingers) and I jostle them into my pyrex carry-out bowl. On a good day, these go above or below slabs of bacon, steamed, diced zucchini or wilted spinach or chard. Frequently, all they get is a sprinkling of salt and pepper before they get thrown in my bag to be taken to work and eaten, coldish, at my desk.

I started eating them this way when I learned how very good for you runny yolked eggs are.

In "30 Minute GET REAL Meals" (a low carb-ish cookbook; not a bad reference for eating grain and sugar free), Rachel Ray makes a salsa topped, egg and cheese roll up. I read the recipe, imagined the endless filling options, and resisted...but never completely forgot.

A month ago, Heidi posted this skinny omelette recipe; and still, I resisted.

I resisted... until I had a jar full of swiss chard surprise (what to do when your friend sends you home with two pounds of chard, and you don't feel much like cooking? You wilt it all... then wait a week, and turn it into a food processor pesto of sorts. This time, it was garlic, ginger, kaffir lime, one and a half chicken breasts...but mostly garlic. And salt.), but no rice pasta on which to eat it. Since that fateful day, I've made a ton of these. They're delicious... and a great way to use up leftovers.

Tonight, after finally exhausting my jar of chard pesto (there's another container of it in the freezer, where it's going to stay for a while), I ventured into new ground: the pound of crimini mushrooms I'd been wanting to sautee for days. I chopped these in the food processor (I think I just decided I'd be using that gadget more often. Cutting and cleaning the machine together took less time than chopping all of those 'shrooms by hand would have) and threw them into a pan of melted organic butter to do their thing.

Then, I made one of these egg roll ups and stuffed it full of mushrooms. I sprinked salt and pepper, cut in a bit of chives and sprinkled on some plain chevre. Oh, so good. This is not the news, though. The news is that I left the bottom end of my mushroom burrito open, and lost a lot of my filling as I ate. The egg wrapper tore just like injera bread would have, and cleanly picked up my morsels to deliver them safely--and cleanly--to my mouth. Oh, the possibilities!

Egg "Flat Bread"
I've done this with two eggs or three, and with butter or olive oil. Three eggs was overkill.

Crack two fresh, cage-free organic eggs into a bowl. Beat them with a fork to a uniform pale yellow. Put fat in your largest frying pan (mine's 12 inches in diameter) and bring to heat. Slip your beaten eggs into the pan. Tip the pan gently to swirl the eggs around and around until they coats the bottom evenly and completely. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, if desired. I usually don't. At this point, you can cover the pan for a second, or leave it uncovered and wait only a few moments longer. The egg will set quickly. It's up to you how dry you let them become; I usually take them off the heat just as soon as the egg is set enough not to run when I tip the pan. A few firm shakes should release the "flat bread". If it doesn't, release the edges with a spatula, and peel the egg out on to a plate.

Then, get as creative as you'd like, ladling your filling down he middle of the wrapper. Fold one edge across your filling, and use it to pull your mixture into a tight log. Then roll and enjoy. I haven't had any problems with breakage, so I can imagine that the egg would hold up to being rolled burrito-style, with the bottom in, to contain your filling. I can also imagine that these would cut into appetizer-friendly pinwheels pretty nicely.

I want to try pigs in a blanket, with a tasty breakfast sausage link and maybe a drizzle of maple syrup. Hummous, sheep's feta, olives and spinach would be brilliant, too. Or mustard, turkey, sprouts and goat jack cheese; salmon with dill; refried beans and salsa--the possibilities are endless. I would only warn against something super rustic, like a caesar salad on iceberg lettuce: the lettuce would probably rip right through the roll-up.

I'm most thrilled for the next time my dinner calls for flat bread: the next time I'm eating Indian or Ethiopian (note: Ethiopain injera is traditionally made of teff, and is usually wheat-free), or anything else I want to pick up with my fingers. Sturdy enough to tear, thick enough to hold up, delicate enough to not add any strong flavor--I'm pretty excited about all the options!

Also exciting is that, unlike with a tortilla-based roll-up, the filling does not have to be protein based: two eggs is a good 14 grams of easily absorbed animal protein!

Game Night

Deviled Eggs, with homemade mayonnaise, stone ground mustard, diced onion and celery, salt, pepper and paprika

Baba Ganoush from two firm, farmer's market eggplants, fire roasted under the broiler and blended with tahini, lemon and not quite enough garlic, served with olive tapenade and sheep's feta

Peeled, cooked, medium shrimp, heated through in a bath of olive oil, butter, garlic, and habanero pepper flakes, tossed with lemon zest, lemon juice and parsley.

Four pepper chevre and savory rice crackers.

Rice Pasta Pasta Salad, a la Toby

Mojitos for a crowd.

Games enough to go around.

No wheat, dairy, sugar (okay, maybe a little in the drinks) or soy. All good stuff.

What the World Eats

This Time Photo Essay is really interesting:
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1626519_1373664,00.html

Why I love the Northwest

Mount Hood Strawberries. Oh, yum.
They're red allll the way through.

The Big Apple

Curbside hot dogs in New York City, hot off the cart Meat and Vegetables-style.
(That's me with my fabulous sister and grandma.)


Virgil's Barbecue
Oh, my goodness. I don't know much about good barbecue, but I do know good food. This is good food. Mom and I shared the Pig-out Platter: pulled pork, brisket, sausage, tasty, tender, meaty ribs, a quarter of a chicken and a couple of sides. Eat here if you're ever looking for tasty, tasty eats in Time Square.

Chicken Something for the Soul

I'm home from work sick today. Finally. This stuffy, drippy, coughy, sore-throaty, can't talkie, headachey thing has been coming on, slowly, for a while now. But, the "responsible" inside of me makes it hard to take off from work when I know there are things for me to do there.

I woke up to my alarm at 7:30 this morning. I called my boss and fell back to sleep until 2pm. Whew.

I know I'm feeling better, because I just cooked some chicken goodness. I haven't had vegetables in my fridge for a week. Terrible, I know; but, I missed the farmer's market the last two Saturdays due to seminars and I've been avoiding the grocery store because I blew my food budget before the 15th of the month!

Anyway. Home sick. I walked to the produce stand down the street for some basics: spinach, chard, garlic, apples. Last week, I took some meat out of the freezer to defrost and I had a feeling it was getting near the end of its useful life. I'm taking the ground elk to a friend's birthday barbeque tonight. The other package was chicken breasts. Boneless, skinless chicken breasts. In my parents' house, I ate these for dinner more nights than not. Since cooking for myself, and committing to free-range organic, it's a cut of meat I can't really afford. At $6-7 per pound, give me red meat! (That, and there's so much good stuff in the skin and bones of a free range organic... why bother?) But this package was a gift from a friend who'd held it in her freezer for too long. So I took advantage.

Spinach, Chicken, Feta Surprise

Coat your biggest frying pan with a drizzle of olive oil, and bring to heat.
Rinse your chicken breasts. Place in hot pan.
Season liberally with salt and pepper. Flip. Season again.
Allow to cook through. I'd separated the chicken tenders from the undersides of the breasts. These cook quickly! Keep an eye, so as not to dry them out.

Meanwhile, cut up the half onion that's been lying around, and chop a few cloves of garlic.
When the chicken is cooked, set it aside and put the freshly chopped yummies into the pan. Add more oil if necessary.

Remove the roots from a bunch of spinach. Wash well. Tear, if desired.
Chop or crumble some feta--I used about 3/4 of a carton of Trader Joe's "Authentic Greek Feta in brine" (sheep cheese = okay cheese). Chop the chicken breasts into slices or cubes or chunks or whatever.

When the onions and garlic are fragrant, add the spinach, tossing and wilting until it all fits in the pan. Add the feta. Add the chicken.

Crank up the heat. Toss and mix and cook until the spinach is as soft--or not--as you like, and the feta is as melted--or not--as you like.

Take off the heat and eat up.

Or, do what I did, and store it in something in the fridge until you have an appetite again.

Frozen Grapes

I'm eating frozen grapes in a vain attempt to stay away from the Ben and Jerry's ice cream in the freezer at the 7-11 next door. It's 4 dollars I shouldn't spend and1240 calories I don't need. It's 108 grams of sugar and a pint of dairy. It's a sore throat in the morning, stiff knees and tiny, painful pimples around my mouth next week. It's delicious.

Sticking to the AK diet is really hard for me. Hard enough that I'm not very good at it. One of the reasons I started this blog was to have a place of accountability. So far, I am my own only reader and that is just perfect; this whole writing in a public space thing is new and a little embarrassing for me. I've considered making a formal blog-posted commitment to swear off wheat, dairy, sugar and soy for X number of weeks or months, and to follow it with these posts... but I don't want to fail. Besides, I want to eat cookies and ice cream sometimes--and feel guilty enough about it as it is.

Fail.

That's what it feels like I'm doing every time I dip my spoon back into this pint of "Everything but the..." on my nightstand. That vague sense of "not good enough" just makes me want to eat it more. So does the sense of "I feel a headache coming on" and "gosh, my gut's not quite right." It's such a twisted place to be, mentally.

I do not have celiac disease. I am not a diabetic. There is not a single food I know of that would send me into anaphalaxis. In that sense, I feel blessed--if I want to, when I want to, I can eat anything without really having to think twice about it. At the same time, though, I feel like if I had a more concrete, more immediate consequence, this would be easier.

I poison myself slowly.

After taking the "static" out of my system (unswitched, as we call it), an AK practitioner can test my muscles with and without different foods in my mouth. A strong quad--related to the small intestine--will go weak if I sample dairy. A strong lat--related to the pancrease and spleen--will weaken instantly to sugar, just a pinch, applied to my tongue. I've been involved in demonstrations twice during which our teacher, a highly skilled chiropractor to whom I will refer as DTF, finds my problems and fixes them only to make them reappear by dosing me with one of these foods. Lying on an adjusting table, vulnerable in front of a stadium-seated classroom full of mentors and peers, future colleagues, DTF adjusts a few bones, adresses a few muscles, and clears away neurological disorganization, trigger points and digestive issues, facilitates muscles and increases passive range of motion. Then, he sprinkles sugar or powdered milk on my tongue... and all of the strong muscles are weak again, the subluxations return, the flexibility is gone, the switching reappears.

I know how these things affect me.

But I eat them anyway. And I pay the price.

I've never been overweight, really. I've never suffered from a chronic disease, or migraines, or anything worse than a nasty cold or virus. Before I started getting better, I didn't know I was sick.

I thought it was normal to get dizzy when you stood up, to feel stuffed after a meal, to get tired around 3pm, stay alert until 2am and never wake up rested. I thought that, at 15 years as a sophomore in high school, my wrists and knees were just old. The doctor tested me for Lupus when I kept complaining that it hurt; my tests were negative. He told me to take Ibuprofen, and wrote me a note to get out of P.E.

Since cutting back on these foods, since getting AK adjustments and taking whole food supplements, I wake up rested. My energy holds through the day. My menses are easy; I don't black out when I stand up, I don't get heart palpitations. As long as I stay off the cookies, my knees don't ache. I don't get tonsil stones, anymore. My tummy stays flat, the circles under my eyes dissapear, my gait is graceful, my posture is strong, my skin clears up.

I don't get "wing bone pain", the dull ache underneath my shoulder blade that plagued me from 8th grade through college, anymore.


On Wednesday, I walked to Trader Joe's during my lunch. I bought a bag of chocolate chip cookies. I ate six of them during my trip back to the office. (I never can just eat one. Of anything.) My wing bone pain returned, even as I walked. The next day, I woke up bloated and stiff. My knees are achey, my throat is sore, I had a headache, which I rarely suffer, and there are tender-sore muscles up and down my spine.

I know what this stuff does to me. I don't enjoy it. I eat it anyway.

I feel like I can't stop. Then, I feel like I could stop if I really put my mind to it. But, I don't really want to put my mind to it. Why not? Because I'm not really that sick. And then I eat some, and then I feel terrible, and then I want to--both, simultaneously-- 1) get hardcore about the diet and 2) binge.

Food is so emotional for me.

Don't get me wrong. I revel in the stuff. I absolutely adore it. I love to eat. And, I love to eat the good stuff much more than I love to eat the bad stuff. But, it's like there's something inside of me that's not okay with this. Something that I don't know how to deal with, yet.

[Addendum: a place of accountability may have been one, teeny tiny reason I started writing here... but more so, because it was about time I started doing something about sharing how we can eat wheat, dairy, sugar and soy-free instead of just telling people to do it.]

10pm

It's 10 o'clock on a Thursday night. My kitchen smells so good right now; I wish I could make this scent into an air freshener to hang over the rear view mirror of my car.

In a pan on the stove, bacon sizzles loud and proud.
On the next burner, thinly sliced leeks melt, low and slow, into Kerrygold butter.

The bacon, cut into one inch squares, turns dark and crispy in a bath of clear, rendered fat. I drain it on a paper towel and pour most of the fat into the tin can I keep under the kitchen sink for that very purpose. A few tablespoons, though, go into a bow next to the stove and a teaspoon or so remains coating the bottom of the pan. I add a half of a leek--the firm, pale, stalk-half, which I've reserved from its melty fate and diced into tiny bits. These cook and crisp over medium heat; I'm careful not to let the bacon grease smoke (a sign that it's too hot and shifting shapes). Then comes the remainder of my red wine vinegar, about a tablespoon and a half. It protests loudly, bubbles and smokes, when it hits the hot pan. I swish it around with my coated tongs (my favorite kitchen tool, I think), scraping the bacon bits off the bottom of the pan, freeing all of the goodness. Oh, the smells. The thick, slightly acrid, buttery, bacony smells.

I squirt in a tablespoon or so of my housemate's local Dijon mustard (oops. I don't think he'll mind.) and stir vigorously. The mixture congeals, slightly. Before it begins to darken I dash it with sea salt and cracked pepper, and drizzle in a few more tablespoons of the still-warm bacon grease. Stir, stir, stir. Then I add, tong-full at a time, a whole head of frisee lettuce. It wilts, batch by batch, as I turn it against the bottom of the pan, wiping up the bacony, leeky, mustardy goodness. Not more than two minutes--it's done.

I put it in my favorite Indian pot and sprinkle it with bacon. Warm, like it is right now, I think it's my favorite salad. Cold, for breakfast, it's still tasty. I'll poach two eggs when I get out of the shower and their warm, golden yolks will seep through the soggy lettuce, coat the crispy bacon, and make my morning amazing.

This is that salad, made for a friend last week.
The bacon was burnt, the dressing to scant and I should have
poached two eggs each--but it was still delightful.
I need to work on my picture taking skills! I promise, it tasted better than it looks.

I'm drinking a "Natural Brew" ginger ale. (Oh! The sugar!! oh, the sugar.) As I dance around my kitchen at 10 o'clock on a Thursday night, it's perfect.

Now, a pound and a half of country sage bulk pork sausage is screaming from the bacon pan. It hisses and pops and sounds, well, delightful! The smell is sweet, like muffins or pancakes, not meat. It will go into an old glass cashew butter jar and I'll eat it cold or room temperature over the next few days, at work and in seminar. When the munchies say, "granola bar!" I'll say, "sausage!" and everything will be okay.

I let the leeks go too long. I became impatient and turned up the heat. Instead of melting into soft, translucent slivers they are mostly crispy and brown, like French Onions on green bean casserole, after they've sat for an hour or so and lost a little crunch. I melted goatzarella into the mix. Its salty stringyness hold the overcooked leeks in a coherent lump. I think I may put poached eggs on this, too, and eat it for lunch?

I am so lucky to be able to eat what I can, to be able to cook what I can, to be able to spend time how I do.

The frisee lettuce with warm bacon vinagrette and the leeks with mozarella cheese were both inspired by Shauna at glutenfreegirl She--her taste, her writing, her recipes and her joie de vivre--is a constant source of inspiration!