DIfficulties of working with food.

This week was a good one.  I am down another 2 pounds so I am headed in the right direction.  This week's entry I am concentrating on the difficulties of being a chef and working with food.  You see I am around food pretty much all day.  While at the very begining of the day the food is still mostly in its raw, unprocessed state, it is later on and throughout the day that one can easily step into the pitfalls of working with food.

Part of my job is to taste what I make. But not only do I taste what I make, I will often have a coworker ask me to taste his or her food.  Having a secondary opinion and another set of taste buds helps ensure the food tastes great.  The danger lies in over doing this.  You could easily eat your way through the kitchen under the guise of "tasting" everything.  The potato chips for the deli are hot and fresh from the fryer, what's the harm in having just one?  Well, everyone knows what a potato chip tastes like.  Do I really need to taste it?  The key to tasting is to always keep in mind that you are doing just that: tasting!  You only really one spoonful to taste something.  If you need to adjust the flavor, then you can justify having another spoonful.  Just walking around and shoving food into your mouth one spoonful at a time is counterproductive.  The really danger lies in that you don't even realize you are doing it.  How is one spoonful going to hurt right?  23 spoonfuls later...

The other problem is being exposed to delicious food all day long.  You can be as strong and willful as you want, but when you are around food you enjoy you will have a craving.  When I first started working at my current job the most difficult thing for me to deal with was that I had such an early start and my lunch break was not until several hours later.  I would be exposed to things such as pizza, BBQ, roasts, grilled chicken and other such noms. My stomach would growl and protest and when lunch time did roll around I was starving and had a tendency to overeat.  Luckily my body has grown accustomed to the schedule and I don't suffer through that as much. Every once in a while I will get a craving, but when I do I try to subdue it by being healthy and making good choices.  I could have the big cinnamon roll or muffin, or I could just have a banana or apple.  Don't get me wrong, I will still indulge every now and again, but for the most part I try to be good.

One of my biggest difficulties is that even when I try to make the right decisions about what I am going to eat sometime it is damn near impossible.  You see at my work place the staff gets to eat after we close our doors for lunch service.  We pretty much get the pick of what's left.  Sometimes there is plenty to choose from.  Sometimes there is barely a scrap left.  It really becomes difficult because since I have been trying to loose weight I try to have a salad for lunch.  However, if there is no stuff to make salads with then it becomes a moot point.  On days like this I try to stick with something from the deli.  I will admit I don't always have a salad.  For instance today I had a chopped brisket sandwich with a bit of pasta salad.  Part of the reason I indulged today was because I knew I was having a salad for dinner.  The way I see it, it is all about balance.  I was also careful not to over indulge.  I only used about 3 oz of brisket and maybe half a cup of pasta salad.  If nothing else Weight Watchers has taught me that you can eat whatever you want, so long as you realize two things: one) don't over do it and two) you might have to cut back somewhere else down the line in order to keep loosing weight.

So these are some of the things I struggle and deal with at work on a day to day basis.  I love working with food.  I love eating food.  I just wish I did not have to be so cautious about it.