I've never been a nut person. Despite their proven success rate in increasing energy as a result of being packed with protein, I have never been one to make a point of integrating them into my dietary regime. However, I wasn't surprised (given my susceptibility to arbitrary events at my expense) when I fell prey to the hands of a pine nut.
I was on a somewhat rushed lunch break so I ran into the nearest Pret and grabbed what I consider, old faithful: avocado salad wrap with cumcumber, mayonnaise and the sum of all evils: pine nuts. I scarfed it down and felt great afterwards. However, the pine nut had proven it was a force not to be tampered with and my taste buds had unknowingly surrendered themselves to pine nut slavery.
I woke up the next morning, skipped breakfast because i'm lazy and got on the train to work. I immediately poured myself a generous portion of coffee. As soon as I drank it, the taste of led or chemicals crept up the back of my tongue. It felt like someone had brushed my teeth with a roll of quarters. My obvious assumption was the coffee was bad so I dumped that bitch out and poured one from a different container. The led lacing taste that had invaded my throat was stronger than ever. I decided to chalk it up to either a) acid reflux b) bad breath that had taken to many liberties or c) liver failiure. Nothing to worry about. I decided to eat one of the croissants left over from the client meeting and again, the sharp taste of pots and pans tore the back of my tongue. I consider myself to be persistent at the best of times and neurotic at the worst. There was no way I was going to let some bad breath demon control what I ate. At lunch, I went out and ordered the juiciest, fattiest, ketchupyest sausage roll I could find. I wrestled that thing down my throat with all my might---led taste and all. The aftermath was somewhere between a very generous burp and a dry heave. I started to panic. If this were 10 years ago my immediate thought would have been demonic posession but I reassured myself that there must be a simple explanation. However, I was floored when I spent no more than 30 seconds on google (the most reliable of medical sources) to find out the catalyst of my cage breath was in fact, pine nuts!
Three days later and I still cannot imagine a taste other than led. After several futile attempts to beat the pine nut at its own game with stuffing myself full of salty food, masking the taste with the strongest gum, and brushing my tongue repeatedly, i've learned to deal with it. My real contempt towards pine nuts was augmented in my most recent research: this can last up to two weeks! Now I am looking at this occurance as a blessing; how many people living can tell the pine mouth tale from truer lips than mine?
I'm sitting here, feeling somewhat sorry for myself. Will I eat pine nuts again? Probably. However, I don't think i'll line up for the pine nut casserole anytime soon. For now i'm just sipping on a tall glass of water with a shot of led. Top me up.
