Mindful consumption and mindless grazing

I Friday, I decided to kill two birds with one stone. I combined the mindful consumption with a dinner party with some friends. Of course, since this was a dinner party, I slightly modified the criteria--I defined 'one sitting' as the general time frame during the party over which everyone would be eating/drinking/drinking more. So, really, any time between when I got off of work, and 1:00 a.m.

And just to be sure I kept it mindful (so I told myself), before the party I went solo on a grande gelato with brown butter, espresso, and Mexican chocolate flavors. (I truly wish I could entertain with a picture, but my phone had died by the time I started to dig in). The flavors were amazing, each unique and sharply delineated from the other, bound together by the same creamy, smooth texture and cool temperature. The brown butter was almost like a soothing balm against the spicy kick of the Mexican chocolate, while the espresso took it in an entirely different direction. After about the half-way point, as I dug down deeper into the butter flavor, I found my mind wandering, and I started people-watching in the gelato shop. About two thirds of the way in, my tongue partly anesthetized, the sugar rush kicked in. I ended by focusing more on the buzz than on the flavors.

The party was not pretty. Unlike the gelato, my experience was pretty far from meditative. Essentially, over the course of 3 hours, I gorged myself. The upside: half the fare was actually pretty healthy, with chicken & veggie skewers, a spinach & green-leaf salad, all washed down by water. The downside? The other half, not so healthy. I munched on potato and tortilla chips carrying teaspoonsful of either fatty dip or salty salsa. And towards the end of the evening, after everyone was on to their third (or fifth, or sixth) beer, I was downing the lemon squares our hosts made for dessert. About five of them.

Honestly, aside from a bit of a sugar hang-over and a somewhat bloated stomach, I felt fine the next day...

...as I would have if I hadn't lept quite so far from the wagon into a sea of gluttonous indulgence.