Grilled tomatoes and blood clots
I follow a very strict diet when I’m not on assignment - green salads, green olives, tomatoes and rice cakes. When I’m travelling I need to forego my Vegan diet for sake of ease and practicality (and because I’m fanatical about cleanliness and don’t feel comfortable with strangers handling raw food I’m to ingest) and eat only cooked vegetables and bread.
On a recent trip to England I spent a couple of days at a B&B at a picture postcard coastal resort. The hostess could not come to terms with the fact that some people chose not to eat products derived from animals and every morning she would present me with a full English fry-up breakfast. It was a song and dance repeated each morning. Perhaps she thought I’d have a change of heart overnight.
Each morning I would stare with private disappointment at the offering, followed by a withering look which asked how anyone could be so lacking in fundamental human decency. She’d scoop the plate up and stalk off the kitchen, then moments later she’d reappear with a plate of grey salad with watery cucumber and mushrooms that tasted of old newspaper. Each time I poked it with my knife, it recoiled as if I were tormenting it. But, not wanting to appear ungrateful I rearranged a few leaves (to give the appearance that I’d eaten some) and leave the rest.
On my last morning my hostess triumphantly presented me with a new offering. My jaw relaxed and I believe I mewed pitifully.
“I can’t eat that,” I told her quietly.
In a voice heavy with pain and years of irritation she responded. “If you don’t require a fried tomato for breakfast you only need to tell me.”
I thought it was a plate of blood clots.
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