Remember wafer cookies?
They came in packages of vanilla, chocolate, and pink (which I think were strawberry). I loved them as a kid, though in truth, I loved just about anything made out of sugar.
Since I started paying closer attention to what my body wants to eat — and then actually eating the food my body requests — I've been slowly wending my way through the foods that I wasn't allowed to eat as a kid. What I'm finding is that, after I eat a moderate-to-large amount of whatever the food is (c.f., Little Debbie Creme pies), it doesn't actually taste that good to me.
My memory of the food is, it seems, not very accurate. Or, possibly, it IS accurate, but my taste buds have matured past the age at which snacky cakes and wafer cookies were forbidden. After all, when I was 8, if I had known about sushi, I would have run screaming from anyone who tried to get me to eat unagi, but NOW — well, I don't exaggerate when I say that I could probably eat sushi every night and not get sick of it.
So my 36-year-old taste buds are not impressed with the foods that my 8-year-old self was banned from eating. This shouldn't be as surprising as it is, particularly when I remember the Great Cereal Rebellion that took place in my first post-college apartment. The only cereal that I ate for about 6 months during that first heady rush of "My own place! My own place!" was Frankenberry. Because, of course, I wasn't allowed to eat it as a kid.
The thing was, I got tired of Frankenberry after those 6 months, and, in fact, am not terribly fond of super-sugary breakfast cereals now. I guess I was actually engaging in demand feeding back then, without knowing it had a name or a purpose. (Of course, all other forbidden foods were still forbidden.)
And that's what I'm seeing now — I don't want the wafer cookies (they have a weird bitterness under all the sugar), and the oatmeal creme pies left my tongue with a waxy coating.
I wonder what I'll discover I actually *enjoy* eating, as this process continues? Other than sushi, of course; my love for that continues unabated.
5 comments:
I actually ran into those cookies on a movie set last month!
I have vivid memories about them, only being allowed 2 of the mini ones after dinner and trying my damnest to sneak more when my parents weren't looking, (because they hid them away in all crazy locations around the house so I didn't gobble them all up) and now after eating about 2 or 3 last month, they taste like cardboard!
I hear ya, sister. For me, it was saltines and orange juice eaten in a very precise fashion.
You know what makes my mouth kind of ouchy and raw? Saltines and orange juice. Oh, the years I wasted longing for those two things apparently only my 23-yr-old self was doofy enough to love.
Or the food may have been changed. I used like Chips Ahoy cookies, and I refuse to believe that they had that weird chemical taste when I was a kid.
I'm thinking that the foods have changed too.
The preservatives and sweeteners used are different.
When we were kids, cane sugar was still mainly used- not corn syrups. I can tell the difference.
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