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A Single Breakfast
With no one looking over your shoulder at home, there’s real eating freedom being single. The only thing standing between you and your favorite food is a willingness to cook it, or the takeout menu. During this past holiday weekend, I had a giant chocolate chip cookie for breakfast, and it was very satisfying. And then there’s cereal for dinner. This is the good life!
Photo by Sallie Harrison
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I have been known to eat cereal for dinner on occasion.
It’s liberating, isn’t it?!
…Or having leftovers so you can have more food the next day!
I’m a huge fan of leftovers, and often plot my meals that way.
cereal for dinner, amen. i love LOVE cereal for dinner.
Is there a particular type of cereal you prefer for dinner?
i am a raisin bran crunch girl, although i will never say no to honey bunches of oats or frosted flakes. nothing fancy, but it is so comforting somehow (and I convince myself it is a great idea because I throw handfuls of blueberries or strawberries on top.)
I’ve been known to make a meal out of peanut butter and jam, sans bread (take a spoon, dip into peanut butter, dip into jam, place in mouth). While standing up, I might add. It tastes better that way!
The first time I had peanut butter for dinner (on an English muffin, in my case), I felt like I’d become my own person.
I have been known to eat cereal for dinner on occasion ;-). Recently, I was shopping for ingredients to make risotto, but for some reason the cereal aisle was beckoning and I came home with a box of Trix instead. No silly rabbit, Trix AREN’T just for kids!!
After buying high-end granola for years, I’m decided to make my own. A fancy dinner…
I’ve occasionally had stove top (not microwave) popcorn for dinner, sprinkled with nutritional yeast.
Just about as good as cereal, I’d say!
Yum.
Thank you Wendy!
Recently, I was at a Match Stir event at Sur La Table and admitted that although I do cook, for dinner sometimes I eat a bowl of cereal standing at the kitchen counter. One of the guys replied, “well, I’m not as bad as that.”
In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have admitted that, but I had been emboldened to mention it because of this quote from Michiko Kakutani’s review of Oliver Sacks’s memoir:
“Shy and inclined to living ‘at a certain distance from life,’ Dr. Sacks writes that he unexpectedly fell in love — ‘(for God’s sake!) I was in my 77th year’ — with an American named Billy, which meant relinquishing ‘the habits of a lifetime’s solitude,’ like decades of meals that consisted mostly of cereal or sardines, eaten ‘out of the tin, standing up, in 30 seconds.'”
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/28/books/review-oliver-sacks-looks-at-his-life-in-on-the-move.html
Christy, I think it’s lovely that you admitted it. Really being yourself is the way to go!
I’ve never posted a comment on any blog, and now I’ve posted two to the same thread! But I love finding out that eating cereal for breakfast is not uncommon. And it reminds me of one of my all-time favorite reflections on being single and a love for eating breakfast foods at night.
Caroline Knapp’s The Merry Recluse, Salon.com, 1998:
http://www.salon.com/1998/07/27/cov_27feature_2/
thanks for posting the Caroline Knapp article, Christy. I am familiar with her writing but had forgotten about her recently. I needed that ‘reality check’ as I am a very solitary single person who lives in a neighborhood of families; my next door neighbors are extremely social and are entertaining or being entertained by friends it often seems 6 of 7 nights per week! That is incomprehensible to me, and it often makes me feel that something is drastically wrong with me.
I don’t eat cereal too much (more of a paleo diet) but do appreciate that I can eat what I want when I want, or not at all if I want. And meals are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to how much I appreciate my solitude (with dogs of course!)
We love our dogs.
I feel honored that you chose this blog as a place to comment. And I hope now that you’ve cracked the ice, you’ll continue to share your experiences. Thanks also for the link to Caroline Knapp’s wonderful piece, which I had not seen before. The writing is so good, it humbles me.
I just love the whole idea of being able to cook whatever and whenever for me. I am not a cereal person myself, anytime of day, but I like the idea of being able to throw just anything together for me. Broccoli and a baked potato? Good enough for me. Of course, the downside is, I don’t do as much creative cooking as I used to, I figure it is only me so why bother?
A baked potato for dinner, loaded up with butter, sour cream and chives, is one of my favorite dinners, Paulette. In my experience, being single has ignited my creativity in the kitchen. My point of view is, who better than me?
I like this point of view! Going to adopt it for myself!
Oh yeah! Love eating cereal for dinner! After my car accident in 2004 I actually ate a good portion of the brownies my sister sent me in a care box for dinner. LOL.
That’s a mighty fine dinner. Worth the calories.