Why I am Not Eating Traditional Foods

Now there is a headline that will likely get some readership.

I have been doing a lot of thinking this week. I have been thinking as well as working, commuting, number crunching, petty cooking, errand running, house cleaning, parenting and laundry. A lot of laundry. What I haven’t been doing was reading, researching, commenting on other people’s blogs, deep cleaning, talking on the phone, editing the various projects I have up in the air or cooking anything interesting. As much as I try to clear my backlog of work, more keeps on coming in. My life in the last week feels a lot like digging a hole at the beach. No matter how hard you work to keep the sea water out, it just keeps coming back in. There are crumbs on my floor, dirt on my bathtub, messages on my phone at work and 15 pounds of meat in my freezer that I don’t have the energy to prepare.

After getting back from vacation last week, I realized we hadn’t accomplished anything even though we had stayed home. I cleaned out one closet and went to the dentist and those were the only productive things I got done. And that was on the very first day of vacation! By the end of the week, the house was filthy and I still hadn’t made a fresh batch of granola.

I have a house full of food that I cannot make into anything. This week my pledge to eat homemade items seems overwhelming. More and more I am buying ingredients rather than prepared foods. And the time and energy it takes to prepare meals is more than I have. I haven’t found the time recently to make pasta on the weekends and forget about any new foods! I have the best of intentions, but some other obligation comes up and I cannot fulfill.

I am jealous of all these other bloggers who make such delicious food and take gorgeous photographs. I am not doing any of that this week. And I have read a few posts recently about the virtues of traditional foods. But I am unable to measure up to that ideal. I have been lucky to get dinner on the table at all this week. And so far this week it has been meat and one veg. Add to all of this two kids on different meal plans. Thing 1 thankfully eats most everything with a couple of annoying exceptions (like potatoes), while Thing 2 doesn’t touch anything but milk after 4pm. I don’t have the energy to make everyone happy. Someone is always crying. And frequently it is me.

So when I read someone’s post about unctuous roasts, or an ingenious guacamole dip with pureed greens or homemade sourdough bread and when I read someone’s tweet about chickens roasting away alongside chunks of butternut squash or home smoked meats well I am giving you all the middle finger behind the safety of my computer. Because I am not doing that stuff this week. I did manage to make some rather lousy sweet potato fries, but while sweet potatoes are traditional foods, does it count if they are baked into sticks in the oven? I used coconut oil, does that get me extra points? I don’t feel like I have been making a home this week. I feel like I have been merely sustaining life. And seriously I am out of stuff to blog about until some new vegetable comes into season or work slows down or something. Until then I hope you can accept these picture less posts of my incoherent ramblings.

And THAT, my friends, is why I am not eating traditional foods.