Friday, January 25, 2008

Substitute

Those of you foolish enough to have been with me from the start, know that every year during whichever week Summer turns up, I turn into a woman of Goo and Phlegm. I become far too sexy for my own good; sneezing, eyes puffed up and watering, generally feeling like crap. After Summer has passed, everything then turns to concrete in my sinuses and I generally feel like crap. To try to limit this misery I have over the years cut down on my dairy consumption. I have fake milk in my two cups of coffee a day and I don't eat much yoghurt or cereals. I do continue to eat cheese. I am very partial to my cheese and no, I won't be giving that up any time soon.

However, I do quite like a bowl of museli every now and then. If I do have it with cow's milk, it now tastes rank. Bleugh. Someone said, try goat's milk. Which I have. It's not bad, considering and it does have a bit of a tang, but when I ran it past Viking - you should have seen his face. Absolute disgust doesn't quite convey the lack of enthusiasm he has for it. I'm a great believer in compromise, so I try and make sure he has his cow's milk when he comes to visit.

But it got me thinking, what else could I try? Soy milk immediately comes to mind, but I've had it in the past and was not impressed. I also would rather not have it in the house because it's been linked to lower sperm levels in men and as I keep telling Boy, I'm eagerly awaiting grandchildren (not right away though - yes I realise he's knocking on a bit in Chav terms, but I'd rather he left school and got a job first - how middle class am I?).

It got me thinking about substitution and does it really work? When I was a veggie I tried tofu and quorn. Tofu is something I've always tried to be hopeful about. I've always thought I don't cook it right. After years of trying I realised that actually, I just really don't like it. Texture, flavour or lack of. It's just not nice. As for quorn. I didn't mind it in small doses. Burgers were reasonable, as was the mince. But it just doesn't taste or feel the same as meet. Veggie burgers made from mashed potato, chopped carrots, beans etc, I just think - why? It's not meat, it too laden with carbs and gives me indigestion. Veggie sausages are okay. But I'm hard pressed to identify what goes into them, which makes me equally suspicious of them as regular sausages. There was a thing called veggie bacon, which looked so dodgy I steered well clear and I haven't seen it since. A good veggie friend of mine said when she cooked it disintegrated in the frying pan.

So in my mind, food substitution doesn't work. You're just better off eating something completely different.

It got me thinking about other things we have in our lives that are substitutions. Laminate flooring. Apparently cheaper than proper wooden flooring and you can't mop it, have it in areas which are likely to get wet and you shouldn't walk on it with high heeled shoes. I'd rather have the real wood. You can always sand the bugger if it gets pitted.

Can you think of any examples where substitutions actually work?

11 comments:

  1. Ive tried goats milk, so im with viking on the face pulling(yukety yuk) my mum made me drink it as a child, i am a gluten free girl (coeliac)and its a pain to try and find things that taste good without the flour content... i havent found anything that substitutes pizza and cakes..yum

    Laminate flooring gets stuck in my teeth...lol :)
    xxx

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  2. B*E*G ~ I'll have to remember about keeping things gluten free if I ever cook for you.

    Apparently, Hitler used to chew the carpet when he lost a battle. I'm running out of clean scenarios as to why you'd chew laminate flooring.

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  3. Anonymous5:40 pm

    No.
    Well. You did ask!

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  4. If you substituted a bucket of crap for this government, then yes...that might work!

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  5. Actually...come to think of it...the only real difference between this government and the bucket of crap IS the bucket...

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  6. I just don't see the point of eating pretend processed meat products when there's so much good stuff available in its natural form - vegetables, fruit, grains and pulses etc. Can't think why anyone would want to eat fake bacon. And tofu is just horrible, insipid slop!

    I've never tried it but I've been told that rice milk is quite nice. I use soya milk but it took me a while to find a brand and type (unsweetened) I actually like. Even then it takes some getting used to...

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  7. Anonymous12:54 am

    With two (out of five) vegetarian children I'm usually fairly tolerant, but I'm afraid I take the view that if you chose to go vegetarian, then for f**k sake eat vegetables...not artificially processed crud, flavoured, textured and treated to taste like meat...

    Vegetables are (in general) naturally healthy...crud isn't...although with either you MAY require certain dietary additions...

    As an omnivore, I'm quite happy to have a go with nut roasts, veggie burgers, three cheese pizzas, etc, but I'm distinctly disturbed by bacon-flavoured vegetarian rashers...

    For gods sake, either you have convictions or you don't... Think...If your convictions can be sold out that easily, are they really worth holding ?

    Why should vegetarian dietary requirements be so largely built around artificial food? Well, in my view, because they're built around such an artificial premise...

    but thereagain, I might be wrong...

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  8. dickiebo ~ yes I ask, and I still can't think of any. By the way, how's the diet going?

    cogidubnus ~ in this we'll have to disagree. There is potential in a bucket of crap. You let it mature and then sprinkle it round your roses. I wouldn't even toss the government into a worm farm.

    mousie ~ rice milk? I'll have to give it a go.

    southron ~ welcome. We are definitely singing from the same hymn sheet. It pains me to say I know quite a few dedicated veggies who don't eat veg or fruit. Which is downright silly in my books, worrying when they are friends of my Boy.

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  9. Anonymous11:32 am

    I've given this about 24 hours thought and cannot for the life of me think of a decent substitute and I think that's the crux of it, things aren't meant to be substituted.

    I'm with everyone else here, if you don't want to eat meat, just don't eat it, rather than trying to eat things that are reminiscent of meat and full of e numbers!

    Although having said all that, I have thought of one possible substitute...but it's a bit lame and down to personal taste.

    I don't eat fish, but harbour a great love fishfinger butties (with lashings of ketchup), but if I'm making them it has to be the value range fish fingers - you know the ones that aren't really 'fish' fingers as they are made with maximum 1% fish from the one eyed, hump backed, radioactive cod they have to scoop up from the floor of the ocean...does that count?

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  10. Anonymous7:37 pm

    Haggis.

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  11. NM ~ I'm afraid you're having the fish finger buttie by yourself, but by all means enjoy.

    anonymous ~ to you too.

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