I was all of eight when I first read Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows and discovered that delightful quadrumvirate: Mole, Toad, Rat and Badger. Their exploits, travails and discoveries are now a little hazy — it was so long ago — but there is this one description in the book I have never been able to forget.
Mr Toad has just been arrested for stealing a car, driving it recklessly and ultimately crashing it; he is thrown into prison for it. He sinks into the darkest of despair, refusing “his meals or intermediate light refreshments” until the gaoler’s daughter tempts him with “a plate piled up with very hot buttered toast, cut thick, very brown on both sides, with the butter running through the holes in it in great golden drops, like honey from the honeycomb. The smell of that buttered toast simply talked to Toad, and with no uncertain voice; talked of warm kitchens, of breakfasts on bright frosty mornings, of cosy parlour firesides on winter evenings, when one’s ramble was over and slippered feet were propped on the fender; of the purring of contented cats, and the twitter of sleepy canaries.”
We all have versions of comfort food — the familiar taste and texture of which is so inextricably connected to love and belonging and home. Think khichdi topped with a dollop of ghee and your grandmother’s mango pickle; dosas fresh off a griddle; bread pudding studded with raisins and topped with custard or pooris eaten with sooji halwa .
These are often unarguably high in oft-vilified macro-nutrients and certainly don’t sparkle with virtuousness, like say salad or egg whites or oatmeal. But they nourish you in ways that go way beyond their nutritive value.
For me, comfort food has always been ice cream. It is what my daddy took me out for when I got an injection or did well at school; it is what my grandfather bought especially for me every time I visited him in Kerala; it is what my partner unfailingly orders in when I meet him (the melty goodness is our version of red roses and pillow talk); it is what I seek when I am sad or lonely or homesick.
I love ice cream — sugar and preservatives be damned — and I refuse to live in a world where I cannot eat it. I’ve been pretty good the last few weeks: exercising consistently, getting in my protein and vegetable targets, sleeping unfashionably early to get in my eight hours of rest, drinking enough water and fitting more walking into my day. I think it is working: I’m a kilo or so lighter than I was two weeks ago, and I’m certainly feeling better. But yes, I still crave my weekly scoop of ice cream.
Guess what: I’ve figured how I can both have my ice cream and eat it too. It’s an approach to food that is popularly known as IIFYM (If It Fits Your Macros) or Flexible Dieting. You need to first figure out exactly how many calories and macronutrients you need (it’s a pain but there are some great online trackers like MyFitnessPal that make it easier). That is constant, but what you eat to reach those numbers can be tweaked.
So if I want to eat ice cream, I avoid grain, lentils and fruit that day, and get a majority of my carbs from a scoop or two of ice-cream. And if it means I lose weight slower than if I ate completely clean, so be it. Food which is a resurrection of the people and memories that mean something, has to stay in a nutrition plan. Period.
