Making The Most Of It

Time to talk about struggle snacks.

Last night before bed, I turned off the light, rolled over and realized that somehow, I was starving. I ran through the list of edible foodstuffs in my home and realized with dismay that there was absolutely nothing that didn’t need preparation. I padded down the hall to the kitchen, ate a spoonful of peanut butter with some maple syrup on top, brushed my teeth and went back to sleep. To be clear, that’s not a meal — it’s what you eat when you’re very stoned and realize that putting pants on to go get a Kit Kat and a seltzer is more effort than you want to exert.

My grocery shopping strategy does not include snacks because if I have them in my house, I will eat them in one sitting. A part of me thinks that it also keeps the cost down — chips and cheese and crackers and things are expensive — but I’d rather avoid the temptation and the very specific feeling of regret that comes after housing a bag of Sun Chips while watching TV and reading home design blogs on my phone. Enter the struggle snack — something you eat when there’s no real food in the house and you otherwise can’t be bothered due to laziness or lack of funds.

The concept is one that I’m familiar with, but was elucidated clearly for me via a suggestion from my good pal Christine. “Write about struggle snacks,” she urged, alerting me to a Facebook post she’d seen on this very topic. I realized that most of the things I eat that aren’t Meals could be defined as such. A toasted tortilla dipped in chili oil, soy sauce and rice vinegar is a struggle snack, approximating the idea of a dumpling without the heft. Nilla wafers dipped in Greek yogurt eaten standing up in front of my sink is less a struggle snack and more like something I read on a lifestyle blog somewhere, but is still a struggle snack to me.

What food do you eat when you know you need to eat something but don’t have anything that’s really food in the house? Do you keep certain things in the house knowing that you can always eat something, even if it’s just a Saltine dipped in olive oil with some pepper on top?

Tell me about your struggle snacks. Let’s discuss.

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