My Semi-complicated Relationship with Food. Glorious Food.

"Food is essential to life.  Therefore, make it good." -- S. Truett Cathy

I need to let you in a little bit on my relationship with food.  It's long.  It's complicated.  But it's here to stay, and since food is a legitimate part of most of our lives, well.....I will just leave you with some of my general thoughts.  I think bullet points may be necessary.  (Warning:  This post may make you hungry.  I'm getting hungry just thinking about it.)

1)  I have always loved food of all kinds.  My mother and grandmothers are insanely good cooks. The chicken and dumplings?  Dutch apple pie?  Homemade mac 'n cheese?  Bak pau (Chinese steambuns)?  Sweet chicken braised in coconut milk?  To die for.  And my siblings are pretty amazing in the kitchen, as well.  My brother throws random things in a pan and miraculous things just appear, sauteed to perfection.  Let's not even talk about his fish tacos or his Asian green beans.  My other brother whips up his own homemade pasta carbonara (yep, noodles too), and my sister just sent me a picture of a pecan praline cheesecake she threw together the other day.  And all of my aunts?   I could eat so much of their Indonesian pork satay (sate babi) that I get sick. (And I think I ACTUALLY did that once.  On July 4th one year.  Because it was so, so, so, so good.)  Another of my aunts is famous for making about 10 pies for Thanksgiving every year.  Not an exaggeration. Plus, my dad makes a serious bowl of ramen.   How could I help but love good food?

2)  I have always struggled with losing weight.  For my entire life, I have struggled with weighing a little more than I should.  Since the Freshman 15.  Or 20.  Or 25.  I can't remember.  And then after I had Hannah and finished nursing, I struggled with weighing a lot more than I should.  It just all caught up with me -- "I'm nursing, so I have to eat more of everything!"  Fortunately, I wasn't usually crazy hungry during the pregnancy (except for the random cravings of salt-and-vinegar chips) so I didn't gain a lot of weight then.  But, like most women, I was hungry while nursing, and then I got RIDICULOUS hungry after I had weaned Hannah.  Sort of like the Hungry Caterpillar, but not cute and Christmas-colored.  And I think he ate a lot more fruit than I did.

3)  Until this past year.  I'm not really sure exactly how it happened.  I have gone on diets and made decisions to lose weight over and over and over and over again.  And over again.  And I never lost more than a couple of pounds before it seemed impossible and I just gave up.  This past year, I woke up one day, realized that I was at least 40-50 pounds over what I really wanted to be, and pretty soon, I wasn't going to fit into anything at any of my favorite stores anymore.  And then I bought a size that I knew I would NEVER buy and I hyperventilated a little bit.  Nope.  Not okay.  Plus, when you have a baby, you really start thinking about the health of your child too, so you start to take the whole family into consideration.

So, I was reading my Cooking Light magazine, and the editor mentioned that he needed to drastically change his diet, but not by eating gross food or fake food or shakes but by still eating delicious, real, mostly unprocessed food, with healthier choices thrown in here and there and then help from MyFitness Pal (which really DID become my pal).  So I thought....what the heck, and I tried it.  One day at a time.  And for some reason it stuck. After about 8-9 months of some mental re-working and serious dietary changes, I had lost about 40 pounds and was MUCH healthier.  Perhaps more on this another time, though.

4)  I have a bit of an addiction to cookbooks, the Food Network, and trying out interesting restaurants when I can.  I guess technically I'm a foodie, although that word seems to sound a bit on the snobbish side, and I am anything but.  Give me some Kraft Mac 'n Cheese out of the box and I am happy all day.  All I mean by that is this -- discovering new and interesting foods and food experiences is a hobby for me.  I've slowed down on the cookbook addiction, only because my husband insists that I need to actually cook out of all the ones I already own before purchasing new ones.  (Picky, picky :) Although props to the man for waking up randomly one Saturday to build me a cookbook shelf.  Just because.) Technically, I don't have the Food Network because I don't have cable.  But I have Netflix.  Which has the Pioneer Woman on it.  Whom I adore.  (And part of the reason we DON'T have cable is because, between ESPN and Food Network, Greg and I just know we would never see each other if we had it.  So we don't.)

Our Bacon-Gouda Fries from
Hammontree's in Fayetteville, AR-- Whoa.
And yep...we take food pictures.
Can't help it.

As for trying out new places to eat, that is my idea of FUN.  Like, serious fun. Whenever we go on vacation, I gleefully research all of the places that Food Network has visited, especially all of the Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives picks from Guy Fieri.  We hit as many as humanly possible. Because food is as much a part of vacation as the view, or the sights, or where you stay (and I love ALL of those things too).  I will never forget the savory Triple D shredded pork sopapilla that I ate at Salsa's one night in Flagstaff, Arizona or the 7 types of mole' that we scarfed down at the little hole-in-the-wall Red Iguana in Salt Lake City or the crispy dill fried fish sandwich & creamy sweet coleslaw that I ate twice at Jax, a little diner inside of a train car in Truckee, Nevada, where it was rainy & cold in June, because it was one of the best things EVER. Which relates to #5.

5)  I associate a lot of memories with food.  Just like I associate certain smells and songs with memories, I do the same with my tastebuds.  A lot of food is nostalgic to me.  It has always been something that brought my family and friends together.  Literally and figuratively.  I remember having flour wars in my parents' kitchen over Thanksgiving one year while my sister and I made pie crusts from scratch. (I lost badly as you can see.)  I know when I have Thanksgiving with my family, we will always have turkey, stuffed mushrooms, sweet potato casserole, Stove Top stuffing (See!  Not a food snob...), 3 types of vegetable casseroles (at least 2 types with cream of mushroom soup in them), and pecan and pumpkin pies.  Because it's tradition.  It's WHAT WE DO.  Easter?  Deviled eggs and ham.  My husband's birthday?  Crazy chocolate cake with no frosting.  When my friends came over for study groups or sleepovers in high school, turtle brownies because my mom ALWAYS had turtle brownies or something delicious for us to munch on.  So many discussions about phenothphalein and AP chem labs, literature projects, and boys over turtle brownies.

And traveling abroad?  Ecuador was fish oil pizza, french fries, and popcorn in my asparagus soup.  Brazil was my first sashimi experience.  Argentina?  Grilled beef and chimichurri.  England?  Tea and scones with clotted cream and jam.  Iraq was Kurdish kabobs, flatbread, and gus from the bazaar (a dreamy sandwich with grilled beef and pickled veggies on fresh hot bread). Greece?  Moussaka (oh goodness...moussaka) and boiled octopus (gag...).  Israel?  Falafel and shawarma with yogurt sauce.  Indonesia?  Spicy beef rendang, the best bakmi noodles you could ever eat, curried cow brain (not my fave),  and the best fish ever grilled over a fire in chicken wire with garlic and sweet soy sauce.  Oh deliciousness.

But most importantly...

6)  I have come to learn that time around the table is important.  There is just something about pulling up around a table of steaming food and wonderful smells, heaping piles onto plates, clinking forks and knives, slurping iced tea, and having good conversation.  It fills you.  Food fills you literally, but time around the table FILLS YOU.  And as a wife and a mom and a girl, well....I just want that to be the experience around my table.  I want the people who come to my table to be filled, yes with physical nourishment, but also to be invited, loved, and poured into.  For there to be room for good conversation, sometimes hilarious with snorting laughs and tears, sometimes poignant with thinking and seriousness and even bits of silence that don't have to be uncomfortable or even sad tears.  The table matters because relationships matter.  Everyone eats.  Everyone spends time at the table.  Let it be at your table.

Picnicking in the backyard earlier this week