Ohio makes me fat

I am originally from Ohio.

While my eating habits are equally less-than-exemplary when not visiting “the heart of it all” (which is most likely clogged with cholesterol), I still find that I always bring back a little “extra baggage” each time I return from visiting the buckeye state (and by “extra baggage,” we’re not talking comic books here).

Part of it is my mom’s cooking. It’s so good. (Most) every child loves their mama’s cooking though, and my mother can’t be faulted for making use of the skills she’s been given and wanting her normally “famished” children to eat well while home.

Here is an example of a typical Mo’ D. breakfast. Fit for a lumberjack. Waffles, bacon, and Oberlin IGA’s unbeatable Italian sausage.

I simply can’t get enough. I know that I’m biased (I am her son, after all, and it is the food I grew up on, so it carries with it the effect of nostalgia along with its inherent deliciousness), but I find it extremely difficult to exercise restraint when things like this are placed in front of me day in and day out.

Clearly.

But it’s not only the mountain man breakfasts, it’s the voluptuous dinners, the constant baking …

“Oh look! A family of cookies!”

and the endless supply of pie, pie, pie …

π

As I mentioned before, my mother is not the only one to blame (well, obviously, my own self control is the number 1 suspect, but that’s beside the point).

The general culture of the midwest is one of excess. Big portions, hearty flavours and vats of hot oil as your primary “cooking utensil.”

I mean, where else would you be eating a burger for breakfast?

Or where else would they be advertising the price of a “Speedy Freeze” alongside gas prices?

Yes, the midwest is a joy filled land of juicy fats, crispy edges, sweet frostings and doughy delights.

… where you can find blocks of cheese the size of your torso!

And it all inspires your own creativity as well. You begin plotting out fried volcanos of mashed potatoes with gravy and cheese lava spilling over, hams that look like Christmas trees …

Or taking cannoli shells … and stuffing them with pepperoni and cheese!

So, Ohio, even though each time I visit you, I come back looking looking more and more like a bloated innertube, I am ever-thankful of your hospitality, your down-home cookin’, and your rare treats of fat-man deliciousness.