I'm discovering just how much I eat cheese. According to the Amber Waves website, a resource for the economics of food farming and natural resources, http://www.ers.usda.gov/amberwaves/february05/findings/cheeseconsumption.htm, I, as an average American, consume somewhere around 31 pounds of cheese a year. That's close to one quarter of my body weight in cheese. So I decided to stop eating cheese, for just five days. And that's when I realized that this was going to be a challenge. I don't know if it is reverse psychology, but every meal I think of seems to somehow involve cheese: feta, goat, cheddar, mozzarella, just to name a few. For breakfast I usually have an omelet with cheese, or cheese melted on toast. For lunch a sandwich with cheese. Dinner is usually some sort of pasta; always with a sprinkling of parmesan. Would I be limited in my diet options when I decided to go cheese-less? Is my diet really that dependent upon cheese? Is the desire for cheese actually a physical chemical reaction within the brain, with addictive qualities, as suggested from an article on the website for Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine? http://www.pcrm.org/news/commentary030519.html
DAY 1
ReplyDeleteBecause I'm not eating cheese, I suddenly feel as if that is all anyone around me is eating. This morning I watched one of my housemates have toast with cheese. For dinner I saw her eat a calzone. My other housemate ate a thick slice of cheese as a snack. A third housemate had cheese and crackers for dinner. I had oatmeal, because I couldn't think of anything else. Why do we eat so much cheese? Sure, it's delicious, but is our food so lacking in flavor that all we can do to enhance everything is smother it in cheese? Domino's seems to think so; and their recent increase in sales suggests that the country does as well. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/07/us/07fat.html
DAY 2
ReplyDeleteBreakfast: Whole wheat toast with honey and peanut butter
Lunch: Roast beef on a kaiser roll with lettuce and tomato.
This is the first time I have eaten a roast beef sandwich without swiss cheese. I am not impressed.
Snack: Oatmeal with apple and raisins
Dinner: Turkey BLT
My friend wanted to meet up and go to the diner. Choosing an entree took about 20 minutes, because almost everything on the menu involved cheeese. By the end of the day I'm cranky, and my craving for cheese has not yet subsided.
DAY 3
ReplyDeleteBreakfast: Yogurt, oatmeal with peanut butter and honey
Lunch: Steak, salad
Dinner: Hamburger
First time I can remember eating a burger without cheese. I was pleasantly surprised, and I could really taste the lettuce, tomato, and onion. I counted the number of entrees available without cheese on the menu, there were drastically little.