Normally I avoid getting personal here on Stacked and have been walking this fine line trying to write a post in which I share a few food-related books with you. Bear with me.
Now, Veronicais in Taiwan right now, and she posted this photo of panda cookies. And OMG! I want to eat a panda cookie right now! I believe the appropriate Internet speak for this is “nom.”
About ten years ago, my mother and I went to Taiwan and they have these absolutely incredible red bean and sesame seed things–little fried up balls that are seriously the BEST THING IN THE WORLD! Veronica offered to bring me back something, and I was all “balls, bring me back balls.” Then I realized how inappropriate that sounded and gave her this really long winded explanation of what these things were because I have no real name for them. Apparently they’re best when warm and probably won’t travel well on her flight back. But you can get them here in Chinatown or Flushing. Yay!
Over the years various food related health issues have come up for me and the list of what I’m able to eat has gotten smaller and smaller and smaller. Suddenly it’s no more panda cookies and “Hey, Veronica, can you read this list of ingredients in Mandarin for me?” Some people react as though I’m being melodramatic about what I can and cannot eat. Maybe I am. But I’ve found that playing it safe makes me mentally healthy because I’m not always nervous that I might get sick again.
The hardest part hasn’t been changing my eating habits and choices. Yes, it’s still a learning process–what food is okay, what is not–but I’ve learned an incredible amount, discovered foods I’d never have thought of eating, and have made some stunning meals. I still make mistakes but hey, lesson learned. The hardest part is getting other people to understand when foodie culture is currently so popular.
Tomorrow night I’m attending a reading by Cathy Erway at Word Brooklyn. Cathy’s book, The Art of Eating In, came about after she decided to stop eating at restaurants and instead learned to cook all her meals for the course of two years. She blogs at Not Eating Out In New York, and New York is filled with a wide variety of amazing food that people want to go out and try. She too found difficulties in getting other people to understand what she was doing, even losing a boyfriend in the process. I’m hoping her book talks a bit about how she got her friends and family to accept and support what she was doing.
The problem with going out to eat or even over to a friend’s is that you just don’t know what has been put in the food. Even if you tell them you can’t eat X, Y, or Z (and in some cases, all three!) they just aren’t going to read labels as carefully as you are or realize what a spice mix is actually made of. Did you know that if you’re lactose intolerant (no milk for you!) you have to be careful about what bread you eat because some brands use whey which is a milk byproduct? Or that soy sauce has wheat in it to act as thickener? It’s not to say people aren’t supportive or accommodating, just that they aren’t as diligent or aware as the person with the problem.
But it doesn’t have to be a problem. Not unless I make it one. I have a friend who very gladly brings her own food to dinner parties, another who eats before going out. For all the things I can’t eat, I don’t feel at all deprived. Sure, occasionally something like panda cookies beckon to me, or a whiff of pizza makes me a little wistful that I can’t just grab a slice on a jam-packed evening. I don’t feel deprived because it’s really not about what I can’t eat. This isn’t a diet to loose weight where I have to be restrictive. It’s about choosing to be healthy and making that a lifelong process–building good habits and finding joy and creativity in what I can eat.
Recently a friend stated that, “People get insecure about others’ healthy habits.” It’s not about me, it’s about them. Suddenly my choices in how to be healthy become crazy, weird, or fads–not because they really are, but because others can’t imagine changing what they eat so drastically. They’re not comfortable when faced with different choices that they don’t fully understand.
Yesterday, I made a request on Twitter for book suggestions about Ayurveda. Ayurveda is a lifestyle despite it often being categorized as something more akin to “Chinese Medicine” or “that weird new age holistic crap,” as one friend put it. It’s one of those weird trends when viewed from the outside. From what I know about Ayurveda, it’s more about learning the personal quirks to your own body and finding a balance to how you live–what you eat included–to make you a healthier person. And that’s healthier in all ways–mentally and physically. For me, it’s another avenue to explore in getting to be my healthiest self and where my choices are not based on fear of becoming ill again.
With my Ayurveda request, Stephanie (manager of Word) suggested that Susan and Jen at Breath Books in Baltimore might be able to help me. Within seconds, Susan, who has been on her own Ayurvedic journey (again, someone willing to get personal on the Internet) replied with the suggestion of starting with Ayurveda: The Science of Self Healingby Vasant D. Lad. It would have taken so much trial and error finding books on my own that are filled with information I can trust.
It’s difficult learning who you can trust. After practicing tai chi in college, I moved to New York and found that most classes were taught by someone with two or three years class experience of their own. That is something I find in swing dancing and yoga as well–people who are relatively good at something that other people know nothing about choosing to teach. And this is really dangerous–in all three activities a person can get hurt very badly when the teacher doesn’t know better. Rather than try out class after class, I went to my multi-decades trained, kung-fu teaching uncle and asked if he had any connections or advice for my finding a knowledgeable tai chi teacher in the city.
Learning to break bad habits, to eat better and wisely, it’s all a long process and probably never ending. Not knowing where to start can be scary, especially when the changes we choose to make affect us in such big ways. Changing my eating habits isn’t about hopefully tacking on a few years at the end of my life, it’s about making the quality of my life NOW better. Part of that comes with finding out who I can trust–who is knowledgeable enough to guide me without imposing their own bias or fears on my choices. It means wading through overwhelming amounts of books to figure out which author is a good teacher. So many times I’ve read a book thinking I learned great new things only to find people in that field think the the author was misleading and misinformed.
When we are new to something, it’s easy to see how we can be led astray and why our friends think our new choices are ridiculous. Changing their thinking to be more in line with mine isn’t going to happen, all I can do is plod along asking for advice, read a book where I can, try things out, and hopefully continue to feel better. And maybe our friends will decide we’re weird, that they love us anyway, and then figure out how to make panda cookies we (i.e., me) can actually eat.
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Thanks for this post. As someone w/Crohns, I am on a similar journey of learning what I can and cannot eat/get away with. And yes cooking for oneself and friends/loved ones is a way to control/keep foods “safe” while still enjoying relationships.
Best of luck on your journey.
- A
It’s interesting seeing different philosophies and approaches people take to their food when they have to make changes. I use to think in terms of “get away with” until it resulted in “cheating” a few times and huge errors in judgement about what I could eat. Opps – nothing like getting sick to make you really stop eating some foods.
And good luck to you too! It can be a tough journey – but definitely a tasty one! I’m going to the Art of Eating In reading tonight and will hopefully have a review in a week or two – probably with some thoughts on how her project relates to my own eating habits and choices included.
I hear what you are saying. I have had a few digestive issues in my lifetime, they have been controllable using common sense about my eating habits. But beyond those issues, I have always been about trying to feed my family without preservatives and cooked most foods from scratch. The kids always said there was nothing to eat in the house, since there were few prepackaged foods, it all had to be prepared. And of course, I happily prepared it for them. (They can cook now, but were not interested at the time.) The older I become, the more aware I have become about what I eat. The problem is I do love to eat and love to cook (and exercise a great deal to make up for it!). I recently began reading The Ominvore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan. Quite the eye-opener! While I try to eat preservative free, organic is at times a matter of affordability. But reading this book, organic, free-range, and other “organic” buzzwords; “Buyer Beware” you are not getting what you think! I have been reading labels more than ever and exploring local merchants. It can make you crazy! Although, better for the local economy, “local” does not necessarily mean “organic” or pesticide free. I am trying to find a balance about what is healthy and what is reasonable to expect given the availability. Because I do not have serious health issues in regard to diet, I do not have to go to extremes when I attend a function, but I can certainly make choices about what I eat. I must say, when I am aware of an individual’s health requirements, particularly in matters of survival, I go out of my way to cater to their needs and make it a joyful experience. My belief is that food is a part of life’s experience, and everyone deserves to relish in the tastes of world! My apologies, I could go on for hours about this topic, and in particular, this book. I cannot find anyone with the same interest level on this topic and with my love for food.
Margie – Pollan’s book is great although at times disturbing! I’m always willing to talk about food and eating healthier – so you at least have me to talk with. After your porkchop comment on Facebook, I’m definitely coming to visit this summer and we can be all food-nerdy. I’ll bring you some foodish books too.