On my dietary habits

[beautifulduckweed]

Now that I'm eating so infrequently, my meals sometimes look like an excuse for ingesting fat in as many different forms as possible. For instance, here's a sandwich I made myself for breakfast/lunch:

3 strips of bacon
3 slices of turkey pastrami
Half a mashed-up avocado (in lieu of mayonnaise)
Cucumber
Butter lettuce
Whole grain bread

I almost put cheese on it--and a fried egg. But I decided they'd be overkill. This time.

My fat craving makes perfect sense: it's cold outside, and since I eat maybe one decent meal a day nowadays, my body wants an efficient source of calories. But I was thinking how even when I'm not on a stupid eating schedule, I very rarely crave carbohydrates. I'll occasionally have a yen for rice and vegetables, but here are the food cravings I've experienced most often in my life, in descending order:

1. Rare steak
2. Spinach
3. Eggs (with the white set and the yolk pretty much raw, so over easy or lightly poached)
4. Chocolate
5. Dark chicken meat
6. Raw salmon
7. Whole milk (preferably chocolate-flavored, or in the form of eggnog when the season's right)

When I talk about cravings, I'm not talking about "Oh, it'd be nice to have this for dinner." I'm talking about a gnawing hunger that won't be satisfied by other foods and that persists despite any physical satiety. (I've been craving a huge slab of raw salmon for almost a week now. Cry. Just thinking about it right now makes me want to run to Saburo and savage the huge slabs of toro sake they have behind the sushi counter.)

Except for the chocolate, none of these foods contain significant quantities of carbohydrates. The running theme seems to be "fat, iron, B12 and protein."

The other day, for the first time ever, I craved broccoli. BROCCOLI. I've always thought that shit was vile--until last Saturday, when I ordered some absolutely disgusting beef and broccoli from a Chinese restaurant and inhaled half of the order in one sitting. My brain knew it really wasn't that good (the sauce was bland yet slimy, and the beef was...the less said about the beef, the better, really), but my body didn't care. It tasted amazing. I was literally giggling with glee as I ate it.

For a girl who eats so much fat, I'm in relatively good shape--the fact that my overall calorie intake is more-or-less appropriate for somebody my size and activity level helps a lot. But who the fuck knows what's happening to my insides? I suppose it'll be no more than I deserve when I die at age 45 from arteriosclerosis, colon cancer, diabetes and cardiac infarction--all at the same time.

Comments

[katealaurel.livejournal.com]

My diet lately pretty much consists of frequent intakes of rice or bread, with occasional other stuff thrown in. (For example, ramen-noodles-in-a-mug from the Stim Table in the library lobby just now. Oh boy.) I must like carbohydrates?

...mmm, raw fish.

[gorthx.livejournal.com]

The running theme seems to be "fat, iron, B12 and protein."

'iron' was the first thing I thought of when I read the list. Broccoli is also very high in iron (I'm sure you know that). MORE MEAT!!!

[linettasky.livejournal.com]

Your body seems to know what it likes. I mean, you don't feel crappy(ier than is normal for someone doing finals), do you?

My body seems to be happy on a vegetarian diet. I don't have cravings the way you do, but sometimes I do want certain things, like when I walk into the grocery store and need to eat that kale right now, thank you.

Which is all to say: at least you're paying attention to your body. Most people don't.