How Rissa almost blew chunks…

This is the story of how Rissa almost blew chunks on the family room rug.

My mothers-in-law came over for dinner the other night.  They brought regular fruit crumble and gluten-free, possibly sugar-free crumble.  David’s Mom is doing the gluten-free
thing, I’m doing the gluten-free thing.  The rest of the folks got the sugary-gluteny-oaty-goodness and Mer and I had the gluten-free, extra crunchy bits, slightly-sweet, ‘good for us‘ crumble.  And it was pretty good.  I’m used to gluten-free alternatives.  I was thankful for it.  Because there are people in the world who hardly get to have ANY food at all, let alone gluten-free fruit crumble.  I had ice cream on mine.  I can only go so far with being good.

Fast-forward to the next night after dinner, when Rissa discovered a container of leftover fruit crumble in the fridge.

“Can I have the rest of the fruit crumble Mummy?”

“Yes.  Yes you may.” 

She slathered it in whipped topping (mmmm, edible oil product) and put a bite into her mouth.  She chewed twice.  She then said,  “Euls lis la gooen hree hrungle?”  (Is this the gluten-free
crumble?)  I nodded.  Her eyes may have rolled back in her head a bit, and she looked like she was contemplating a projectile vomit.

“Swallow it!” I said.  “Do not throw that up.”

Her eyes rolled more – she gave a chewing performance worthy of an Oscar.  Watching her, one could have sworn that she was eating raw worms covered in diarrhea, instead of a healthful dessert.  After several MINUTES of chewing, followed by the most dramatic swallow I’ve ever seen in my life, she said, “THIS.  IS. NOT. GOOD.”

I could have have warned her.  You see, that morning, I had eaten the leftovers of the
non-gluten-free crumble.  Because it was there.  Staring at me from its
see-through container from the second shelf of the fridge.  Saying “Heather… Heather… Look at my oaty-goodness…  See my brown-sugar crisped topping!!  Imagine how good I would taste in your mouth!”  
I CAVED, alright?  I CAVED.  I didn’t feel like sprinkling brown sugar
all over the gulten-free, mostly sugar-free crumble to make it taste
like the real crumble.  And honestly, I don’t think that oats are that
much a problem for me.  And the amount of white
flour used in crumble?  Come on… it’s like half a cup – tops!!!  For
the whole recipe, which would mean I’d be eating maybe a tablespoon of
flour… And yes, I know that I’m making excuses.  I don’t care.  It was
a perfect choice for breakfast.  I had vanilla yogurt on top, which is… healthful.  It
was healthful and totally worth the gluten/sugar headache that I got after
eating it.  And you know what?  The brown sugar was freaking awesome!  And there was none left, because I ate it ALL.

Which is why Rissa had taken the gluten-free crumble, which had been masquerading as regular fruit crumble, because they had been placed in see-through containers and they looked remarkably similar.  She was making “Pah!  Blech!  Pah!” sounds at the sink where she was rinsing her mouth out with water and gargling. 

Then she held up a piece of something in front of me.  “Okay this… ”  She put a piece of something between my eyes.  “THIS was in the crumble AND IT’S GREY.”  She was holding a sunflower seed.  “THIS HAS NO PLACE IN CRUMBLE.”   Then she glared at me and said, “I’m having frozen mango!”  Can’t fault her for that.  When your mouth is expecting a certain taste and you’re left with bits of sunflower seeds NOT covered in brown sugar?  I can see it would be disappointing.  And if was a a good mother I would have given her a heads’ up on it.  Her reaction was so totally worth my being labelled a bad mother.