How do you spell guilty pleasure?  Here in Canada I spell it P-O-U-T-I-N-E.   Poutine is a side dish (or meal, depending how you look at it) that is comprised of fries, brown gravy and cheese curds.  If you have never had it and are just trying to visualize it I can imagine you are thinking it is disgusting.  Yes…that is what I used to think too.

Last time I visited Canada I had poutine ever so briefly on my way out of the country – I was unaffected.  This time I have not been so lucky.   This time I have acclimated to the local ways – this time I have embraced poutine.  This is not good my friends.

When I open the container, before I take my first bite I say to myself in a loud, stern voice, “NO, NO, NO – THIS IS THE EQUIVALENT OF PLASTERING FAT DIRECTLY TO YOUR HIPS AND HARDENING YOUR ARTERIES WHERE THEY STAND.”  Then I take one bite and my taste buds say, “THE HELL WITH THE HIPS AND WHO DOESN’T LOVE HARDENED ARTERIES?”

The only good news is that even the small container of poutine is a meal for me.  The bad news is no matter the size it goes directly to the hips.  I don’t know how these folks here can stay trim if they are exposed to poutine on a day-in, day-out basis.  I imagine they have built up some resistance.

I am so far off my regular dietary routine which is primarily almonds, oatmeal, boca burgers, spinach salads and the occasional taco.  I miss my regular food.  I so missed my spinach salads that I had to go on a spinach seeking mission at the little grocery store in Wakefield.  I was so preoccupied with my mission that I ran into a man as I rounded the corner of one of the aisles.  I was horrified and laughed like an embarrassed school girl – he was not at all amused.  While they didn’t have all my favorite salad ingredients they had most.  Thankfully, I was able to have a spinach salad for dinner tonight.  Thank goodness too – I had a lot of poutine to make up for. 😉

Day seven hundred and twenty of the new forty – obla di obla da

Ms. C