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| Picture and Recipe from Kitchen Musings |
Why I hate Rice Pudding
The Year I turned four I was sent to daycare. It was in a pretty little house in a small town. The house was sky blue with white gables. It reflected well its name: Papillon Bleu, the blue butterfly. I loved going there and I was always disappointed when my dad pulled up in the driveway to bring me home. I had many friends there and we used to play on the hill in the backyard. My favorite part of the day was mealtime. The daycare had a wonderful cook who used to make us home made lunch everyday. Every mealtime included a sweet and tasty dessert. As a child, I had a big appetite and I used to always ask for seconds. I loved every kind of food. I was not a picky eater.
I remember one day, after
lunch, we had our scheduled dessert but this time it was something that I could
not eat. I looked at it over the rim of the bowl with disgust plainly on
written on my face. The gooey white mush that was in front of me was not only
full of chunks but also piping hot. What others might call a creamy smooth rice
pudding; I called a goopy, gunky, stomach churning mash. For the first time
that I can remember, I refused to finish my meal. Now this did not please the
daycare worker. It seems that she felt the need to force feed me this dessert
whether I liked it or not.
This ordeal may seem like a trivial anecdote in a person's life but this greatly affected my future eating habits. To this day, I cannot stand rice pudding. I can't stand any pudding as a matter of fact. I can't even smell the odour of creamy vanilla flavoured foods. I especially can't put anything in my mouth that resembles the texture of pudding. Now, you may think that this does not limit very much my choices but you are mistaken. Apart from the obvious pudding, I still can't stomach oatmeal. The texture and temperature makes it a perfect twin to the feared rice pudding. Even cereal is out of bounds once it absorbs too much milk. Another food item that makes me gag is yogurt. To clarify, I used to love all these aliments before the incident but now they are taboo. My life may have been much different if it were not for the evilness of a daycare worker and the silminess of sweetened rice.
I do not understand her reasoning to this day. I can
understand an adult coaxing and pleading a child to eat his or her veggies or
to finish a glass of milk, but a dessert? As she was forcing the spoon in my
mouth, I was begging and crying for her to stop. She did not. The result? I
vomited all over her and the floor as soon as that disgusting substance invaded
my mouth. It was not the taste that repulsed me, It was the consistency. As
expected, she was not pleased but could not reprimand me since I warned her
beforehand and did not do it on purpose.
This ordeal may seem like a trivial anecdote in a person's life but this greatly affected my future eating habits. To this day, I cannot stand rice pudding. I can't stand any pudding as a matter of fact. I can't even smell the odour of creamy vanilla flavoured foods. I especially can't put anything in my mouth that resembles the texture of pudding. Now, you may think that this does not limit very much my choices but you are mistaken. Apart from the obvious pudding, I still can't stomach oatmeal. The texture and temperature makes it a perfect twin to the feared rice pudding. Even cereal is out of bounds once it absorbs too much milk. Another food item that makes me gag is yogurt. To clarify, I used to love all these aliments before the incident but now they are taboo. My life may have been much different if it were not for the evilness of a daycare worker and the silminess of sweetened rice.
