'epicureanism'

several years ago i 'authored' the idea of a delicious diet - a diet where you can only eat delicious things. years ago when i tried it, i wound up eating delicious things and also things that weren't delicious, then i wound up simply eating everything and being kind of unhappy about it. after a really stimulating talk about creative lifestyle frameworks/lifestyle frameworks, and after hearing a story about my goddaughter who corrected the way her father was helping her put stickers in her sticker book - "they're too...close together, they're not dispersed enough" and seeing her relish in her extensive aesthetic points of view, i began the diet again, with no real goals but maybe to feel happier, and feel better about eating (i feel pretty good about it usually but a lot of time i take what i eat for granted). i will try to flesh out the delicious diet more here, because it's helpful to write about, soon. for now i will just say in theory it's supposed to make me more connected to my own subjective taste as something to have fun with and not feel very seriously about. it's also a very experience based approach to eating in that things can't be delicious when you're not in the right mood or place.

i've found things are often delicious when:
i eat them off of a cutting board while standing at the kitchen counter, especially alone.
the people you eat with are eating something they taste as delicious, some people are really talented at expressing that, and those are great people to eat with.
you're active
vegetables are so delicious
fat is delicious
hot tea is extremely delicious
ice water is delicious
regular water just feels good

i've also laid out this triangulation of deliciousness, in terms of the food itself:

texture temperature freshness

things are no longer as delicious when you eat them too often, or eat too much of them. 'too often' is up to you, though, and if you never get sick of something it's always delicious. like me and pizza,or my dad and peanut butter on toast. i've tried not to fall into discovering something is delicious to me and making that a lot. variety is key, and it's also apparently part of a healthy diet.

this sounds like the italy chapter of eat pray love, and it sounds like a lot of effort, and honestly it is. but it's no more effort than how feeding yourself and your family normally is. i'm just trying to make that old routine feel like less of an effort and more of a desire driven thing, more spontaneous. it actually feels like a very normal and natural way to think about eating. food has always been all about feelings for me anyway, so why not focus on pleasure? i'm not afraid of epicureanism, and it may just be that my bedroom is really cold but yes i have started wearing a bathrobe since this began last week.

so far the delicious diet makes me less critical of food (it's less that i look at an scone and am like 'not delicious enough' and more like i'm like, no, not now...what else? am i hungry? then a day later i really want a cup of tea and the old scone with sweet jam, and it's great, it's so great)

i'm gonna try to keep track of how this goes. today was a very delicious day:
water
advil cold and sinus
small dark roast coffee on the upper west side which happily cost less than a million dollars
at home, an egg sandwich around eleven on 6 day old foccacia bread - grilled two small pieces of foccacia in frying pan of olive oil w finlandia swiss cheese, fried egg in pan beside, added it to sandwich. fresh cracked pepper
ice water & twinings lemon and ginger clear tea

barry's gold tea w milk


a coconut donut from the brilliant sunshine donut, a "true" donut shop

some ricotta salata cheese while i was cooking dinner of fresh shrimp roasted in the oven with juice and zest of two lemons, 1/4 c olive oil, pepper, diced shallots
and a salad of baby spinach, thinly sliced zucchini i sautéed in balsamic and vermouth wine vinegar, a little olive oil, kosher salt - also roasted tomatoes, then with the ricotta salata and a dressing i made with honey, smooth dijon mustard, garlic, canola oil and a little olive oil and a little of that vermouth vinegar again
a hunk of a bread loaf w some irish butter

super small dish of chocolate hazelnut ice cream with crumbled milk chocolate with almonds in it on top
water

italian blood orange soda