This brings me to the food. While the care and therapy I received at the nursing home were great, the food left much to be desired. In fact, it could barely be called food. I understand that as people age their taste buds lose their ability to discern flavor but that shouldn't mean that cooks in nursing homes should just stop trying. Ironically, when you are admitted they go through a lengthy process of asking you what your food likes and dislikes are and they put that in your chart. Then, everyday, it is there on your tray, listed on a piece of paper. On mine it clearly stated I loved lots of vegetables and fresh fruits and disliked oranges. It mocked me for the full two weeks. There was a void of vegetables and fresh fruits, except the occasional banana and I got canned oranges almost every day.
My first meal consisted of some kind of chicken that had no flavor at all. It didn't even taste like chicken! On the plate next to it was a pile of cauliflower and broccoli which, normally delicious, ha been cooked into submission and now all just resembled a mushy white paste barely holding onto the outlined form of those veggies. And apple juice. No salt, no pepper, no nothing. It was a harbinger of things to come.
Breakfasts usually consisted of lukewarm oatmeal or Cream of Wheat with a pile of brown sugar in the center. Fake eggs, scrambled with no flavor and, sometimes see-through bacon that carried just a wisp of bacon flavor. If there was toast it was always soggy. And apple juice.
Lunch was a crap shoot. Once I was given a fish patty like the kind that come in the McDonald's fish filet only without the taste and a pile of mashed potatoes and gravy. No veg, no fruit. And apple juice.
Mashed potatoes quickly became a theme. They started coming with everything! One day they served ring bologna, mac and cheese and mashed potatoes. And apple juice.
It started to be a joke, to see what was going to be under that lid when I got my tray. What would they surprise me with next? But the sad part is, the people who lived there permanently were eating this nonsense daily. We have to do better for our elderly and infirmed. No one should just have to eat crap like this. Food should be pleasant and have flavor and be presented in a way that makes a meal something to enjoy. Not just something to maintain life. Do better people. The first thing they do is put everyone on a stool softener so they don't get constipated but then they don't give them anything nutritious that would help prevent that in a natural way. It's crazy and it's wrong.
And if I never see another glass of apple juice, it will be okay with me! They use apple juice in the same way they use the stool softeners. It's the "go to" juice, if you get my drift and it's on every meal tray whether you ask for it or not. I used to like it. Now I can't even look at it anymore. Ew.
The more crap food that I was served the more I started to resent those kids on the KFC commercial who were just discovering how tasty the KFC popcorn chicken bites really are. Every time I saw that commercial my mouth would water and I wanted to slap those kids silly and force feed them my mashed potatoes! Friends would show up with treats but, inevitably, the treats were sweet - candy or donuts. All good choices, but not KFC popcorn chicken bites! I wanted something savory with flavor. Then my sister showed up with a grilled chicken sandwich. And it was the greatest thing I have ever eaten in my life. Haha! Funny how crazy one can get over something like food but I admit I am a foodie who likes my food to have flavor and taste good. It doesn't always have to be great food but it does have to taste good and what I was eating for the last two weeks should be ashamed to even call itself FOOD!
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