Sandwiches

It's a sandwich.  A very plain sandwich.  Just a couple of pieces of meat (ox tongue, as you ask) and a tomato on a slice of buttered granary bread.  There's no spices, no chillies and no heat.  It's very simple, and it's lovely.

I loved the food in India.  Unfortunately, it didn't love me quite as much.  I'm not vegetarian but I love vegetarian Indian food so I had decided I would, as far as possible, eat vegetarian food whilst we were there.  We soon realised it was very easy; wherever you went to eat in India one of the first questions they asked was "veg or non-veg?"  Generally, we found that there were usually more vegetarian options available than 'non-veg'.  Apart from all the different types of vegetable dish there was always a Paneer dish, paneer being a young cheese that is used in a similar way to tofu but has infinitely more flavour.

I embraced all the dishes with enthusiasm but after several days started to feel quite rough.  At first I thought I had picked up some sort of bug and certainly felt as though I had a temperature but with hindsight, I think it was just my body trying to cope with the onslaught of different flavours, spices and textures that it simply wasn't used to.

For several days I hardly ate at all.  After that I had small amounts but for the rest of the holiday really couldn't manage very much.  I couldn't even face a beer for several days which is unheard of!  Even now we are home things are still a little 'tender' so I will certainly be taking it easy, food-wise, for a few days yet.  Hence the sandwich, which really hit the spot.

One positive thing is that since we went away I've lost over 8lbs in weight.  Just have to make sure I don't put much of it back on again!