My First Taste
The lights dimmed. I felt my tightened blindfold tug at my eyes. My heart was in my throat. Excited and nervous murmurs echoed around the classroom. Heavy footsteps approach me-my teacher. He placed a small, crumbly round object in the palm of my left hand.
“Alright, you may eat. Remember, keep the sensations to yourselves.”
I heard more whispers echo around the room. That’s it, I decided, I’d better do it. I popped the small round object in my mouth, and chewed.
Well, it wasn’t really a chew, more of a satisfying crunch. Then a stream of flavour-peanut butter, creased the folds of my tongue. A river of saliva seemed to dissolve the intensity of the flavour almost instantaneously. My teeth were white peaks of mountains, with the icy-cold saliva sea water below. Little shards of peanut butter shell were gathered in between my teeth. I ran my tongue along them, sighing at the taste of peanut butter again.
I swallowed the sea of saliva, and my nose felt like a spicy peanut butter volcano about to explode. It was unreal to have had a small shell like that deliver a punchy, sticky replica of a tablespoon of peanut butter.
“Alright, now describe on your papers what you think of the texture-what sort of words would best describe the taste and feel of it.”
It felt weird having to write with a blindfold on,-not being able to tell left from right. I wrote; small and crumbly. Spicy, explosive, flavour evaporates quickly. Completely fills my mouth with satisfying flavour. Peanut buttery, nutty and crunchy.
“Alright class, you’ve described what it tasted and felt like. I’d also like you to give it a colour based on the flavour, and describe what animal you’d be, eating food relating to the same sensations you’ve had.”
I wrote; orange. Spicy orange. Pale peanut buttery colour.
Then, I wrote; I’d be a lazy Chinese alligator basking in the sun after having a great, juicy water buffalo or a small deer, with numerous types of exotic birds picking stringy bits of flesh from between my bacteria-coated teeth.
“Okay, you can take off your blindfolds.”
My eyes adjusted to the bright light as I slowly removed the cloth obscuring my eyes from the light. The peanut buttery taste was faint, but still present inside my mouth.
I’ll never eat anything blindfolded, unless it’s absolutely compulsory and tastes to my satisfaction.
Ryan Matthew Aranyi