The Hunger Struck - Confessions of a Food Fanatic.

Simplicity is everything for me right now. Over the past couple weeks I’ve been in the process of cleaning out our over cluttered apartment in preparation for the month long separation from our beloved home during the winter Olympics. As of Sunday we’ve managed to clean out almost everything in the bathroom, closet, bedroom and living room and as of this weekend we will finally be forced to do the same to our kitchen. Sigh.

I knew when it came down to it it would be challenge, but I suspect the magnitude of the challenge will be greater than I initially thought. Over the  last 3 years I’ve managed to develop an extensive collection of spices, condiments, flours, grains, dried goods of all shapes and sizes not to mention every gadget under the sun and I’m absolutely in love with every single piece of it, even the extremely unnecessary and underused – garlic peeler I’m looking at you. I think this might have something to do with being a pack rat, or at least that’s what my husband would say, I’m more comfortable with the term collector to be quite honest.

Happy New Year Everyone!

There is probably no need to say it, but to avoid any confusion and to provide myself with a reminder should I forget, maybe  I will anyway: I’ve made some New Years resolutions. Now, don’t get all excited thinking you know exactly what I’m about to say because these resolutions have nothing to do with dieting or eating healthier. I already eat healthy and have done so for most of my life and dieting is just something that I will never do. Nope, this years food related resolution is all about tomatoes.

I have been having one of those months where anything goes in the eating department. The amount of cakes, muffins, cookies and other not so great for you sweet baked goods I’ve had this month is sort of shocking. It’s actually probably been more like 2 months… I sort of lost count after Thanksgiving. Sigh.

In and effort to tone it down (it being my thighs) and avoid having to shop in the maternity section before my time, I decided to put some effort towards not eating so much bread and other extremely tempting glutonous products that I love so much for every meal. I’m still going to eat bread, because life would be extremely depressing without it, but just not for every single meal.

Sometimes cucumbers just save the day. Last night I came home thoroughly exhausted, to the point where I couldn’t even fathom cooking because that would mean I would be standing for at least a half hour, which at that moment seemed next to impossible. Just the thought of it was sending shockwaves of rejection through my body, and as perplexing as it was, I was even too exhausted to think about it. This is quite unusual for me-the not wanting to cook part-even after the longest day in the world I still can’t wait to get into my kitchen.

I knew I had to grab something fast before I collapsed into an exhausted coma and I remembered the cucumber salad I had made the previous night. I’m not a big fan of day old salads, the vegetables never taste that great and take on too much of taste of the dressing. I’m talking about salads without greens of any kind, you know Greek salads or bean salads. But in my run down stupor this didn’t register very high on my priority list and I grabbed the bowl of left over cucumber salad and a piece of bread and collapsed on the couch, without fork or napkin, and started shoveling food into my mouth.

I’m sure everyone has a vegetable that for one reason or another they grew up fearing or at the bare minimum regarded with a certain amount of hesitation. For me fear is definitely an accurate description of my feelings towards fennel growing up. Until maybe six years ago I had never to my knowledge actually even tasted it, as I was raised to believe that nothing good could come of it.

I’m not sure what fennel did to my mother but the reaction she gives when you mention a recipe that features it leads me to speculate that it was definitely traumatic. Funny thing is that on the many occaisins that I have spent in the small town in southern Germany where she grew up, I don’t think I have ever had anything made with it. I’m guessing that’s probably a good thing.