Write Through Doors

June 20, 2014.    On June 9,2014 I gave up sugar, gluten, dairy, and alcohol, (all of which I usually  enjoy a great deal.  I’m the type who grabs a handful of free restaurant mints.) Although this is only for 21 days, a friend still called this “a torturous diet.”  “Why?” she asked.  A good question indeed.   The reason is that I’ve always wanted to see what it would be like to live without all of these consumables that I know change my moods.  Also, my dentist told me again I shouldn’t have sugar, which I think is kind of crazy since his livelihood is only helped by my teeth disintegration.  I’ve also noticed I have the beginnings of what these days is politely called  “a muffin top,” and I just wanted to see if I could let my liver have a nice few weeks without wine.   And I was bored with my usual food and cooking.  And I found a friend of a friend who is a knowledgeable professional and supervises these diets and I like her, and I could never do this without supervision. I’d cave in a day.

And… and… and, every day I keep finding more interesting things about why to do this goofy thing.   Food is tasting better.  I ate out twice this weekend and was not totally annoying when talking with the waitperson. No one seems surprised; everyone is picky these gluten-free, sugar-free, vegan, recovering-alcoholic days. I realized I could still have a nice dinner at Gratzi’s while watching everyone at the table order a martini and eat the warm bread except me. Our waitress at Zingerman’s Roadhouse was totally into this diet as soon as I told her (she asked me if I had allergies so I had to explain what I was doing), and recommended I could order a fruit salad, even though it isn’t even on the menu!

Three things I can’t do with you for the next 21 days (until June 30).

 

   1.  Eat waffles.

 

 

 

 

Full disclosure, I can’t remember the last time I ate waffles. But I do like them. So please don’t walk up to me and pull a warm waffle out of one pocket and blueberry syrup out of the other and offer them to me. The reboot eliminates gluten—which is in waffles, Zingerman’s rye toast, and that fabulous soft warm bread they present to you in Knight’s restaurant wrapped up inside a basket like a present, when you have just sat down and are starving. No more breaking bread for me for three weeks, although I know it is rude to refuse a present. Gluten is known to cause stomach problems. So far giving it up has mostly meant for me that I can’t have my morning bowl of Smart Bran. We will see how smart an idea going gluten-free was in 21 days.

2.  Have a glass of Kendall Jackson chardonnay.

The reboot really doesn’t specify which kind of wine or alcohol to give up—the reboot means giving it ALL up, including my favorite KJ. No Glenfiddich, grey goose martinis, Bell’s Oberon. Truthfully, I didn’t miss a glass of wine yesterday with dinner, because cooking dinner was so much work I couldn’t think of anything else but.

  3.  Stop by Dairy Queen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

DQ has two no-no’s in it for me: dairy and sugar, which as a child were my two major food groups, along with gluten. (I didn’t eat any meat, fish, chicken fruits or vegetables as a child. For the next few weeks that is all I am going to eat. Oh, the irony. ) I now will give up my twice-a-day yogurt and close to a gallon of milk each week. Will cows be standing around the water cooler wondering why they don’t seem so popular for the next 21 days? I doubt they’ll miss me. But I’ll miss them. And by the way, if you are wondering if there really is milk in DQ, there is. Here are the ingredients in chocolate DQ softserve, so you can see there is plenty of ingredients in there worth giving up for 21 days(e.g. artificial flavor): Milkfat and nonfat milk, sugar, corn syrup, whey, cocoa (processed with alkalai), mono- and diglycerides, guar gum, artificial flavor, polysorbate 80, carrageen, vitamin A. Palmitate.  I found that out here.

Will you send me any good recipes if you like to eat this way? Or just a nice beet. Which I will try to eat.