Craving Comfort

posted on July 30, 2010 by Bianca Garcia

I’m not going to lie: I usually crave chocolate.

And sometimes, like during a particularly exhausting week, I tell myself that I’m going to give in to whatever I’m craving for during the coming weekend. Some food certainly bring comfort, and as much as I don’t want to eat my emotions, it’s hard to dissuade the power of a good, cooked-with-love, happy-belly kinda meal.

So why I am craving a salad??

Maybe it’s the warm weather. Maybe it’s the abundance of fresh produce; the plan to visit the farmers market. Maybe it’s the fact that salads take less time/effort to prepare. Or maybe it’s desire to do something good for myself. After all, isn’t that what comfort really is? To be enveloped in the familiar, to be cared for, to come out stronger, healthier, happier.

Why do we always think that comfort food has to be rich, slow-cooked, or calorie-ridden? Could it be that we all somehow equate calories with comfort? When did food become a substitute for a hug? And why am I sounding like a food-obsessed Carrie Bradshaw??

The salad I am craving for is from Woodward at the Ames Hotel: grilled shrimp salad with green beans, olives, tomatoes, feta and a cabernet vinaigrette. I have big plans to re-create it this weekend, but without the onions and olives (I hate both) and maybe with goat cheese instead of feta. I can’t wait, I just know it will be a pretty, wholesome, comforting meal ;)

salad