Constant Craving

Let us say then, to begin with, that different women crave different things. I read once of a woman who ate coal. At night, when her husband and children were asleep, she would creep down into the cellar in order to suck on the cold, dark lumps of rock. Then there was the woman who smelt neat disinfectant: she bought huge plastic containers of bleach so she could sniff the invisible liquid on pads of cottonwool which she kept secreted in her pockets. Anne Boleyn ate larks' tongues. Fabienne, the girl in the apartments opposite, kept a large tank of catfish. She would cut off their heads and eat the bodies warm. My mother told me of an African woman who ate termite mounds, preferably after the rain so the earth was moist. Mary Queen of Scots was said to have requested swans' genitals, and one of my aunts on my father's side insisted on smothering pickled onions in golden syrup. It is also recorded that a certain Tibetan princess favoured rats. Then there was Eve and her overwhelming desire for that now infamous piece of fruit.

Whatever, the list is endless and the stories unique.

- Angelica Jacob
'Fermentation' (5)

It is raining heavily outside and I'm craving creaminess. Last few weeks I have lusted for cheese (especially in toasted sandwich form). Dairy is a major comfort food for me, and one of my most constant cravings- cheese and chocolate and butter and milky tea. Sometimes I obsess about eggs too, poached or fried or boiled or scrambled. Milk and eggs, how very Mother of me!