by Cookiecrumb
Everything tastes good! Even my savory dishes are inexplicably sweet, but not in a sugary way. Butter tastes sweet. Onions taste sweet. By god, the other day, hamburger tasted sweet.
Sweet! Oh my.
Last year I described the transformation I experienced after a month of eating locally as "rehab for my taste buds."
I haven't used sugar for 10 months, except for the occasional gummi bear, so I guess I have a whole new definition of "sweet."
I attribute this sensation not only to restricting my food to the 100-mile foodshed, but to the undeniable fact that the food is fresher — because it's local! Fresh peas are sweet. Fresh fish is sweet. Fresh yogurt is sweet.
I began this month's challenge with a slate of clever dishes I planned to concoct using local ingredients (and I did get to a few, because for some reason, I decided to theme my month the "Barbary Coast Kitchen": cioppino, Joe's Special, Hangtown fry, etc.). But for the most part we ended up living on utterly simple foods like potato salad, roasted bean-stuffed peppers, berries, cheese.
I'm actually amazed in retrospect that I baked a batch of local crackers the first week. Who needs that when you can just slice a cucumber and smear it with blue cheese? Heh: I was even going to oven-dry sliced vegetables to use as dipping chips, but. Didn't hafta.
Yes, I cheated a couple of times. A bean burrito or two. A tub of egg salad from the fitness club (the eggs were so good, they had to be local, but the mayo?). Oh, all right, I confess. Last night I had a LOT of gummi bears. I've been a little, er, hungry on this local diet, and I haven't learned all the tricks for feeling sated.
One trick is to eat breakfast, something I haven't done regularly since high school. But that's easily accomplished with fruit and yogurt. I even have a bag of local whole-wheat berries that might make a fortifying porridge if I could think to put them in the slow cooker the night before, set on a timer to start cooking in the wee hours.
I posted a grumpy near-retreat from the Challenge halfway through the month, in which I came to the conclusion that, for me, fanatical, 100% devotion to local eating for a month made little sense, because I eat locally enough year-round. (Yeah, that's my story, and I'm sticking with it.) Then I decided to stay with the Challenge through the end of May anyway.
And so I have. I miss bread. I would have missed soy sauce, but I made a mid-course adjustment on my list of exceptions. I miss tofu, a lot. I'll get back to those items soon enough.
For now, I'm enjoying the sweetness.
