This time I decided to go with my first choice and instinct and revisit an old favorite of mine from before the beginning of the project, Tofutti Cuties and chocolate Silk. In my recollection the Cuties, these mini sized vegan ice cream sandwiches were the stuff dreams are made of: sweet, rich, cool, just the right amount of chocolate covering a thick block of soft, creamy ice cream and the chocolate Silk, well, I remember living on the stuff for days at a time. So that’s what I binged on, two Tofutti Cuties and a couple of small glasses of the Silk.
The Tofutti Cuties
Right off the bat I can tell that something is definitely not right going on in my mouth and on my tongue. Something is different. And then I know what it is, gone is the blind stuffing of food into my mouth and is replaced with knowledge. Scary knowledge. It is apparent to me that what I’m eating is no longer a vanilla ice cream block sandwiched between two layers of chocolate.
No, what I’m now stuffing into my mouth is an amalgam of chemicals and strange and artificial ingredients, many of whose names I will never have any hopes of being able to pronounce. It is not how I remember them tasting. Certainly they are sweet but now they are almost too sweet and after the first one the intensity of the vanilla ice cream mixed with the layers of chocolate I couldn’t imagine eating another one, but I did for the sake of science, yes, science.
The Chocolate Silk
Nothing special here. For the most part it is exactly how I remember it, it has that distinctly Silky taste mixed with a hint of chocolate.
But, again, something was odd. Something was off and like with the Cuties it took me a while to figure out what it was, and then it hit me: it wasn’t as intense as I remember, in fact it was almost bland and tasteless. That didn’t make any sense to me at all since these indulgence days tend to make noticeable how intensely chemically flavor packed everything I used to eat is. But the Silk was different, it wasn’t as intense as I could have sworn it used to be. It just goes to prove that a whole lot of this project, especially these indulgence days, is mental and not just physical, which is what it would appear to be at first glance.
The Effects
There was an almost immediate discomfort when I tried to stand up and walk around and I didn’t think until after I had eaten all of that stuff that I probably shouldn’t have done this before I went off for a full day of work where I would have to stand and move around teaching multitudes of children for six hours. I became much more intensely full after eating that stuff than I get after eating a regular PCP meal which only added to the overall feeling of discomfort. If there was a sugar rush then I hardly felt it and it certainly wasn’t as intense as after my last indulgence day which was quite a relief since that last one made me fear for my life. Luckily there wasn’t much of a crash but I did wish that I hadn’t forgotten to bring my dinner to work to eat and regain my normal feeling of alertness and regular, sustainable energy. Live and learn, eh?
All of this proved to me, once again, that I don’t need these foods to have a normal, healthy diet and day. Whereas at one point I couldn’t imagine going a single day without all of this stuff now I couldn’t wait for it to pass through me so that I could get back to my newly normal self. It’s ingraining new habits into me even as I’m indulging in my old ones and, like I’ve said before, those habits are what’s really important to me now and the best thing I could ever hope to get out of the project.
Have a wonderful day, kind ladies and sirs.
3 comments:
So amazing how much of that 'healthy' food we buy in North America turns out to be unhealthy in the end. I was so stoked to get back here and shop for all the variations on tofu I can't get in Japan(we have stuff in Canada that's pre-flavoured called 'ground round'in Mexican and Italian seasonings). Well, I took one look at the contents within that 'tofu' and saw it in a whole new light since starting the PCP. It's LOADED with salt and various other stuff I can't pronounce. So disheartening to take something as pure as tofu and destroy it with all that crap to make it more sellable. Tried some just outta curiousity and couldn't stand to eat it anymore...didn't seem like food.
It was a sad day in my life when I had some of that "tofu" stuff you were talking about and then nearly had to spit it out because it felt like my mouth was going to melt right off of my face from all of the insane chemicals unnecessarily packed into it.
What a world.
yeah, I've become a devotee of a plain cube of tofu with chopped "negi" (leeks) and diced ginger on top sprinkled with soy sauce.
That tofu substitute stuff used to be the highlight of my trips to the US... I don't know how I feel about it now...
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