My mothers-in-law came over for dinner the other night. They brought regular fruit crumble and gluten-free, possibly sugar-free crumble. David's Mom is doing the gluten-free thing, I'm doing the gluten-free thing. The rest of the folks got the sugary-gluteny-oaty-goodness and Mer and I had the gluten-free, extra crunchy bits, slightly-sweet, 'good for us' crumble. And it was pretty good. I'm used to gluten-free alternatives. I was thankful for it. Because there are people in the world who hardly get to have ANY food at all, let alone gluten-free fruit crumble. I had ice cream on mine. I can only go so far with being good.
Fast-forward to the next night after dinner, when Rissa discovered a container of leftover fruit crumble in the fridge.
"Can I have the rest of the fruit crumble Mummy?"
"Yes. Yes you may."
She slathered it in whipped topping (mmmm, edible oil product) and put a bite into her mouth. She chewed twice. She then said, "Euls lis la gooen hree hrungle?" (Is this the gluten-free crumble?) I nodded. Her eyes may have rolled back in her head a bit, and she looked like she was contemplating a projectile vomit.
"Swallow it!" I said. "Do not throw that up."
Her eyes rolled more - she gave a chewing performance worthy of an Oscar. Watching her, one could have sworn that she was eating raw worms covered in diarrhea, instead of a healthful dessert. After several MINUTES of chewing, followed by the most dramatic swallow I've ever seen in my life, she said, "THIS. IS. NOT. GOOD."
I could have have warned her. You see, that morning, I had eaten the leftovers of the non-gluten-free crumble. Because it was there. Staring at me from its see-through container from the second shelf of the fridge. Saying "Heather... Heather... Look at my oaty-goodness... See my brown-sugar crisped topping!! Imagine how good I would taste in your mouth!" I CAVED, alright? I CAVED. I didn't feel like sprinkling brown sugar all over the gulten-free, mostly sugar-free crumble to make it taste like the real crumble. And honestly, I don't think that oats are that much a problem for me. And the amount of white flour used in crumble? Come on... it's like half a cup - tops!!! For the whole recipe, which would mean I'd be eating maybe a tablespoon of flour... And yes, I know that I'm making excuses. I don't care. It was a perfect choice for breakfast. I had vanilla yogurt on top, which is... healthful. It was healthful and totally worth the gluten/sugar headache that I got after eating it. And you know what? The brown sugar was freaking awesome! And there was none left, because I ate it ALL.
Which is why Rissa had taken the gluten-free crumble, which had been masquerading as regular fruit crumble, because they had been placed in see-through containers and they looked remarkably similar. She was making "Pah! Blech! Pah!" sounds at the sink where she was rinsing her mouth out with water and gargling.
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Then she held up a piece of something in front of me. "Okay this... " She put a piece of something between my eyes. "THIS was in the crumble AND IT'S GREY." She was holding a sunflower seed. "THIS HAS NO PLACE IN CRUMBLE." Then she glared at me and said, "I'm having frozen mango!" Can't fault her for that. When your mouth is expecting a certain taste and you're left with bits of sunflower seeds NOT covered in brown sugar? I can see it would be disappointing. And if was a a good mother I would have given her a heads' up on it. Her reaction was so totally worth my being labelled a bad mother.
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