A Dangerous (?) Addiction

Prednisone is a wretched drug. I'm counting down the days until I'm not on it anymore. The side effects are wretched, but it saved my life, so yeah. I'm not addicted to Prednisone.

I'm addicted to foodporn.

At the nail salon today, the Food Network was on silent as Kenny G's saxophone wailed in the background. Paula Deene came on, and within 5 seconds I turned to my mom and told her which episode it was from. I have a crush on Alton Brown (the nerdy one from 'Good Eats) that far exceeds my celeb-crush on JTT back in elementary school. I want to be friends with the people at Charm City Bakery and I watch Ace of Cakes with jealousy and awe. I could watch 'Follow that Food' on the Fine Living Network for hours--the combination of travel and food makes me itch to try the new dishes. Even before I got sick I would try the recipes from that show and curse the fact that my Guinness Roasted Potatoes weren't as pretty as those on the tv or the fact that we didn't have fresh creme fraiche for my homemade tomato soup.

I also discovered, horror of horrors, food blogs. Shauna from "gluten-free girl" helped me get through the days of no-sodium--I read a year's worth of archives and I'm still browsing through her recipes to find treats for my mom. (Who is allergic to wheat) From there, I've moved on to most of the people she has linked, revelling in the pictures of food, imagining the recipes. I judge these bloggers by their photographs, by their ability to blend their love of food with recipes that make me want to rush to the farmer's market. I've laid in bed for countless hours in the last month, transfixed to the screen, wanting something I can't have.

Which is why I call it foodporn.

One of the less painful/annoying side-effects of Prednisone is it makes me hungry. All the time. If I'm not hungry, I assume there's something wrong--and thus far, this has proved true, meriting my return visit back to the hospital and some changes in sleeping medication. But back to the feeling like I'm starving part. I eat at least 5 meals a day. Not weight-watchers friendly snacks, but meals. When I'm strong enough, I use my strength to allow my brain, that is filled with potato cakes and frittata and polenta and ciabatta bread and tapas and stews and pasta sauces and pad thai and stir fry, to flow through my hands and into my belly. When I'm not, I eat cereal, yogurt, fruit, veggies or whatever my mom brings me--she who claims to be a poor cook has created meals and snacks according to whatever diet the doctors had at the time. But she and I are both glad on days that I have enough strength to putter and chop and knead and saute and stir fry.

Kristin & Greg gave me an Amazon gift certificate for my birthday. I used it to buy Christian novellas, rose trimmers and a cast iron wok. The first day I could stand for more than a few minutes I made a ginger tofu stir fry that makes my mouth water. Although I read the novellas within a couple of days and have slowly broken in the trimmers on my roses, the wok feeds my addiction. I used it on Wednesday to make fried rice, and then I made it into a fried rice soup. In the wok. Excellent.

After my doctor's appointment today, and the news that my cholesterol/triglycerides are still chilling in the stratosphere (but have come down from the ionosphere, so that's an improvement), I need to continue to avoid fats. Which means my brain is bursting with bacon recipes, and it seems that almost every Paula Deene recipe I see calls for Crisco. Every so often I get visions of watching The Biggest Loser with Christy, while Katie & Maia ate Easy Mac and Sharee wandered in with a bowl of noodles, and wonder why I wasted so many moments in college eating chips for dinner when I could have been making Basil Salmon in Puff Pastry or Fresh Coconut Ice Cream. Oh that's right...we had no money for food. And though I never went the Cookie Dough roll for a day (as Ben did our freshman year) or the Red Baron route, I am sad that I've spent so much of my life eating Pizza rolls and corn dogs. I'm also sad that before all of this "research," I made so many mistakes--the roasted chicken that was 4 lbs heavier than I'd used before and thus led to making Allison's guests wait for over an hour, the tuna casserole I subbed Vanilla Soymilk for that my roommate Brynn watched me choke down as leftovers for a few days, the innumerable batches of cookies, biscuits and breads where I tried to "improve" on the original recipe. I've learned so much. In my week "vacation" at my sister's house, I enjoyed her ability to make me delicious meals with seemingly no effort. For her, I think it's natural--I needed more research.

7 weeks ago I had 40 balls that I juggled (poorly) soaring through the air. These days I spend a lot of time thinking about food.