Good bye, Droste chocolate cake with bittersweet chocolate ganche frosting. Bon voyage, Himalayan honey drizzled over hot, freshly baked cream biscuits slathered with rich European butter. So long buttery coconut brittle mixed into Leatherwood tree honey ice cream. Farewell, honey chili chicken from Chef Jia’s. Au revoir delicately tender lemon macarons with lemon curd filling. I must bid you all good bye. It has been fun these past two months of sugary excess, gluttony of all things sweet. I enjoyed making you all and consuming you all, but now I must don my vestal robes and re-enter the Life. A Life Without: sugar.
A life without simple carbs and refined sugar is what awaits me now. I tried to keep the glorious abuse going until the New Year, but my will could not scale the Wall. I hit the Wall, smashing into its hard crack stage surface, my face plastered against its mocha fudge mousse mortar. I had planned to end this salacious affair by making a pecan pie made with Lyle’s golden syrup and Maker’s Mark whiskey coated candied pecans. I had plans to concoct an Italian meringue frosted lemon curd cake, and the thought of crunchy, warm cinnamon sugar dusted churros dipped into a cup of thick, rich Valrhona hot chocolate was burning a hole in my mind.
No, I can not think of making any of those things any more. I must relinquish and release myself from those thoughts. I must become pure again. I must look with disdain upon that drug: Sugar. I must steel my will and shun all places where the demon Sugar resides and lurks, waiting for unsuspecting fools like me to walk into its sticky sweet trap, its prison bars made of carbs. I will seek not those flakey alleyways and dark coco corridors where that stripper of wills, defiler of good intentions lies. I will forgo the crusty sweet baguettes from the Acme baking company. I will not buy those golden brioche hamburger buns which I would toast with butter and use for my freshly ground and grilled burgers. No more homemade croissants eaten with globs of my brown sugar strawberry jam. I will expunge from my memory the taste of my toffee, caramel topped apple Tarte Tatin.
I am strong. I am in control. I am on guard. I can do this. I will do this.
Only, I cringe, and cower where I stand because I know I am not being honest with myself. I know that there is ONE more day to get through…Christmas day.
Christmas morning breakfast to be exact. It is the last post on the sugar road. It is my last stop, and after that no more. After that day I will be safe in my Atkins diet padded cell. There is bliss in confinement. There is purity in nothingness. But first I must survive that terrible awesome day.
That day! Ohhhh, that day…a day forged to sink lesser men into a sea of sustained gluttony, driving them mad with the sound of sirens singing their sweet songs of sugar supplication. I will lash myself to the mast as Odysseus once did. I will survive that maple perfumed day and sail on to the barren island of No Sugar.
And what will that day bring, you ask? This last day of sin and surrender holds what?
On that day there will be this: Bouchon candied pecan Belgian waffles slathered in melted French butter, and then drenched in warmed grade B dark Vermont maple syrup. On plate two will be Dakin farm maple breakfast sausage and cob smoked bacon, and on plate three will be soft scrambled eggs, scrambled in clarified butter and topped with flaky Maldon sea salt. All this will be washed down with 4 ounces of mango nectar, and 8 ounces of properly chilled milk poured into a chilled glass.
My mind reels. My knees are shaking and I can barely see through the tears in my eyes. It’s almost here, this day, this day to send sugar off with style. There may be cookies for Santa, but that fat man will not taste the carnal ecstasy of those crunchy, yet tender warm waffles, drenched in Vermont’s golden nectar.
Let me be now so that I may prepare my vestments and practice my penance for the day after The Day.
Pray for me.