No matter how much I eat, to my friends it’s never enough. I push my seat back from the table, full, and they say, “’Yun lang?” — is that all? — as if my refusal to stuff any more food down my gullet were less a function of physiology than… well, what, exactly? “Money’s wasted on you,” my best friend once told me. We were at the Sofitel’s Spiral — “the best buffet in Manila,” is their claim. I’m not sure about that, but they certainly have enough food to feed the entire Leveriza slum area nearby.
I had pork roast and a wedge of potato au gratin. It never occurred to me to sample the world, as Jerome did. Which was not to say he made sure to eat his money’s worth: he is one big guy, after all. I even made him finish the gratin I had left on my plate. It wasn’t that good.
Even if it were, the fact is that I’m easily sated. “Stop eating before you’re full,” my mother likes to say, even though that philosophy has never stopped her from doing otherwise. The Taiwanese have a very similar adage and it sounds more eloquent, I just can’t recall exactly how it goes. The notion of stuffing myself to bursting has never really appealed to me; like Marxism and Jollibee’s Ultimate Burger Steak, it sounds good until you’ve actually tried it. “I have a small stomach,” I like to say. The few times I forget that I do, I end up feeling sick.
Which is not to say that I eat like a bird. On the contrary, I wolf down my food. It’s very inelegant. Some people chew slowly, even pensively, as if they are contemplating the mystery of Malaysia Airlines flight 370. I do that, I lose appetite. My friend Bomber told me, back in college: “When you eat, don’t think. Just keep shovin’ it in.” It was fascinating to watch him shove it in. Takeru Kobayashi could take a few tips from Boom-boom when it comes to graceful speed-eating.
Most of my life I have been trying to gain poundage. But just when it looked like I was getting there, I was diagnosed as hypertensive and pre-diabetic. The meds the doctor prescribed to regulate my blood sugar levels ruined my appetite and left me lethargic. Small to start with, I turned cadaverous. Ma was intrigued. “Can I take that, too?”
“It’s not funny,” I groused. My doctor did not think so, either, and took me off metformin. I bounced back, reclaiming two lost inches around my waist, although by Springfield’s catalog I was still an XXS. Shopping for clothes, I often found myself in the kids’ section.
Oh, it can’t be that hard to put on weight; the trick lies in doing so without killing myself. Because I love the Vietnamese noodle soup at Phat Phở and can’t resist the focaccia from Leona’s, with or without pasta, but preferably with. Suddenly carbohydrates never looked so good. I’m still easily sated, even more so now, but I think you know where I’m going with this.
Or do you? “Is something wrong?” Ma had asked when I woke her up in the middle of the night.
“Come to the kitchen,” I said. “The bread just came out of the oven.”
Dinner rolls at three in the morning! I have said it before and I will say it again: I’m a mediocre baker. What you can’t fault me with is a lack of optimism, and for that I blame the YouTube cooking channels. Chef John of Food Wishes is so smooth, like Emeril dialed down. Who could conceivably resist his pitch for no-knead garlic parmesan dinner rolls? Granted, mine looked nothing at all like his, not least because the rolls pictured here were based on a recipe by Laura Vitale and they turned out much better. But still. I love you, Chef John.
“Eat some more, will you?” my friend Therese keeps telling me. My mother takes a more visual approach. “Have you seen yourself lately? With your gaunt look, you might as well be sixty.”
“Would you like more bread with your pasta?” I offer.
“But my figure!” Ma exclaims. “Oh well, maybe just one. Pass me the sauce.”
And there it is: a losing battle on every front — and it’s still three in the morning.
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