Dad's Dinner.
Tales from an autistic household. Part one of a possible series.
As ever, this is the audio version if you would like to hear my dulcet tones…
I’ve mentioned my old man a couple of times on my Substack, but there is so much to say about him that I’ve decided to spend a little more time trying to explain just how unusual and remarkable he really was and how much he affected my life
I shall deliver some brief bite sized stories. Some food for thought.
Which brings me nicely to this week’s main course.
I was a bit of a fussy eater as a very small kid, in fact there was a period of time when I existed only on bananas and my frantic mother took me to see the doctor, worried that such a diet would be detrimental to my health. Obviously, it didn’t do me any harm and (spoiler alert) I lived to tell the tale.
As a family, though, there was a strict limit on what we were ‘allowed’ to eat due to a blanket ban on certain ingredients put in place by dad. The story went that, somewhere in his childhood, Alan had been taken to a funeral wake where the deceased was laid out in an open coffin, and that onions and/or garlic had been placed nearby to cover the smell of death. I call bullshit and the internet backs me up.
The story reeks.
Truth or lie, it made no difference. Even the merest hint of either in the house would send him into an over exaggerated strop. I guess that it was a hypersensitivity of his, which I do understand (the smell of fried chicken shops is gag inducing to me).
So, we all played by his rules and mum kept everything suitably bland, spaghetti bolognese being the most controversial meal on the menu and without these constituent ingredients it really lacks something.
He even had a favourite Chinese takeaway, whose staff were very used to his demands that his order should be onion and garlic free. Although I’m guessing they would just fish them out of the one big pot that they had cooked the chow mein in.
But can you imagine my joy when I left home and suddenly all these new pungent foods added themselves to an infinite larder of possibilities? My monotonous palette suddenly awakened to a world of flavours!
Now, every time I eat a curry I feel a sort of olfactory defiance. Every chilli is another rule broken. Sorry Dad, but you have no idea what you were missing.