Food and Other Pursuits; a revelation at Cafe China.

I love noodles. Slurping up a good noodle soup fragrant with chilli and coriander is, for me, the ultimate in comfort eating. At home I keep the pantry well-stocked with noodles, fish sauce and chilli in various forms and lovely fiery orange chilli oil, for those occasions where comfort is required (rather often in our house). My garden is dotted with chilli bushes too.

So, what to do when chilli has become forbidden (and therefore, by the way, taken on a more seductive and alluring charm).

I skipped into Cafe China the other day with an eating companion who, it must be said, has a charm not unlike the aforementioned chillis, that is seductive and alluring, though not, I believe, forbidden. But wait, I digress.

Being a woman of her word (yes, the change of diet), I ordered a chicken soup; noodles, chicken, vegetables and herbs in a clear soup and walked determinedly past the chilli. We sat in the front of the restaurant in order to watch the passing traffic but frankly my eyes didn't stray much beyond S__'s and even the soup didn't have much of a chance of competing, fragrant though it was, and not without it's attributes. You see, if I'd scattered the chilli generously, as I normally do, this soup would have been irrisistible, but as it was, my heart wasn't really in it. I had ordered a small bowl. Dear reader, I didn't finish it.

This is not wholly the fault of the soup. After all, not it's fault that I didn't dress it properly. There was a problem though. As per usual the stock was delightful, the vegetables fresh, and the noodles emminently slurpable but the chicken, bite after bite, was gristly and inedible. Cafe China has been a favourite comfort stop of mine for years, so this one problem will not deter me from their table but it was disappointing.

The other portion of fault is to be found within myself. As I gazed at S___ and disregarded the soup, I realised that, with the change of diet, has perhaps, come a change of focus. Are my attentions wandering from food to other pursuits?
Comme ci, comme ca. I'll go where the capricious wind blows.