Back to a Pantry Devoid of Cholesterol Ratings

We (my boyfriend, my dog and I) just returned from a week in the Adirondack mountains where we stayed in a cabin that literally hung over the rock face of a shore of Lake Champlain. It's such a magnificent backdrop of utterly breathtaking scenery - mountains, pine forests, craggy boulders - that nobody who visits comments on the odd choice of decorative ornaments that fill the cabin: a huge yoke for an ox, a hatchet, a rifle above the stone fireplace, a fishing net missing its net, old snowshoes. The lake crashes against the rocky shore. The train whistles through the mountains in darkness. The fireflies crackle like embers. The air is ripe wtih the musky scent of pine and cedar. And then there is the food.

People like to eat in cottage country. It doesn't seem to matter what state or province you camp in it simply seems to be an excuse to eat wherever you go. Our cottage is in hunting country. Heart of the Republican grip on middle America. Stars and stripes wave from every front stoop. The main streets are often desolate with many stores boarded up but still the flag rips in the wind and the gun and tackle shop do just fine with business. Is Ron Paul still in the Presidential race? Because I saw a few signs erected proudly on lawns.

Back to the food. I've never eaten so much meat in my life. If it wasn't meat, it had a beak or scales, and in my still recent journey into being a carnivore, if it has a beating heart it takes more mental energy not to mention kilowats to take in and digest over a baked eggplant or a bowl of brown rice and dahl. So, we had steak one night, chicken another night, left over chicken another night, grilled fish a following dinner, and hamburgers our last dinner. There was luncheon meat in the fridge and bacon and eggs for breakfast. I have never been so constipated in my entire life. Well, that's a lie, but not in so many months. My ridiculously regimented 'diet' or eating habits include as an example: fruit for breakfast. And only fruit. It may mean half of an entire melon with a handful of berries or chopped kiwi. I will probably follow it with a banana and then indulge in some cherries. Lunch is typically anything green. I have only eaten salads for lunch for more than a decade. They may weigh close to 7 pounds but they make me feel great. I load them with nuts and dried fruit and cheese and grated bits of something or other maybe toss in a few legumes and then ground it out with a variety of lettuces. Today's lunch was a sink sized tupperware of: mango, avocado, raw sunflower seeds, dried goji berries, romaine lettuce, cubes of old cheddar cheese. It was simply an artful amalgamation of all that I had on hand. Now if I was still at the cottage lunch would have been some take on a club sandwich. We even went out to a charming lakeside village for lunch one day where the ferry sets off across the lake to Vermont and I sat on the deck overlooking the water and ordered a beer and read the menu and it was all platters of chips, burgers, fried calamari, club sandwiches, popcorn shrimp, ceaser salad with chicken. I do not understand why salad is anathema to America. I also do not understand the concern people feel for me when I do eat salad for lunch. Eating vegetables is not akin to starving yourself.

My Italian boyfriend craved fresh tomato sauce on pasta all week to ease his wrenching stomach. I dreamt of the fried block of tofu in my fridge with chopped cucumber and cilantro over soba noodles in a spicy chile/soya/peanut sauce. We're happy to be home and ensconced in our respective pantries.

Comments

[Mats Flemstrom]

Daphne, why would you buy so much of the foods you don't like? Is going to New York state a kind of endurance test? Are there no stores that stock vegetables? No salad bars in restaurants? When you get a new boyfriend, is he not, at a minimum, required to read your blog? "So, we had steak one night, chicken another night, left over chicken another night, grilled fish a following dinner, and hamburgers our last dinner." Why????

[Daphne]

Oh, he does read my website. Thus he knows all about my prediliction for ridiculous amounts of green things on my plate. If I don't eat a salad during a 24 hour period I'm a tempermental whack job. Chlorophyll is my crack cocaine. The cottage wasn't ours. We were guests. Albeit of my family. But they call the shots for meals. It's not that I didn't enjoy the protein overload... because the food WAS good... it is that I wouldn't centre my own meals 6 nights in a row on a protein, a carb, and a vegetable. I find people do eat differently in the States... less accommodating to vegetarians. We didn't eat out except for one lunch and it was serious slim pickings. No salad bar. A side of coleslaw was as good as it got.

[Mats Flemstrom]

Ahh..being guests; that explains all. In a previous life I was a guest at the ex-inlaws cottage. Nothing bad was served, but , being "on" 24 hrs/day made me tense and unable to "process" food. I couldn't wait to get home.