I was twelve when I peaked with my peanut butter and honey sandwich habit. The family was bringing home Kraft smooth peanut butter, Billy Bee liquid honey and Weston sliced white bread. Weston sliced white bread is called toast whether or not it's toasted. It's called toast to distinguish it from bread which comes in rustic loaves from the bakery. Toast comes spongy, sliced and in see-through plastic bags.
Two pieces of untoasted toast, one liberally coated with Kraft smooth and then liberally topped with golden honey spouted through a yellow nozzle from a clear plastic bee-hive shaped bottle. If my current collectors eye was as keen when I was twelve as it is today I may have started keeping those yellow nozzle caps, conical trophies to my sweet tooth and 'husky' sized blue jeans. Thankfully I have no way of knowing how many bee-hives I went through. Some things are better left to death bed visions than conscious knowledge.
The second piece of untoasted toast completed the sugar stack. Kraft smooth peanut butter, I was to later find out, included icing sugar in its ingredient list. Back then it seemed I was eating good stuff. The sandwich was now ready to flip, allowing the top toast to act as bottom, catching the honey in its spongy pores and with any luck becoming a crystalline playground. Why not just squirt the honey directly on the second piece of toast and let gravity do the work right from the start ? Good question. I believe that the honey squirted upon the creamy swirls of PB was simply more pleasing than it cascading onto plain white toast.
In any case, the sandwich complete, I was now ready to cram it into my face in any number of ways. Occasionally I would break it apart in my hands and see what rugged landscapes would emerge from the fault line. Other times I would take teeth to it first, enjoying what little resistance they met. Sometimes I made a second sandwich.
My aunt Christina, the 'cool' aunt who was probably only ten or so years older than me, would watch me making and eating these sandwiches with such relish that she requested I make one for her. "Just like you make it for yourself," she'd say. She admitted not liking the sandwiches but thought there must be something she's missing as I engaged with them as if they were the best things ever. I'd be confused as I made her a sandwich she wouldn't really enjoy. What a waste, I thought.
Two pieces of untoasted toast, one liberally coated with Kraft smooth and then liberally topped with golden honey spouted through a yellow nozzle from a clear plastic bee-hive shaped bottle. If my current collectors eye was as keen when I was twelve as it is today I may have started keeping those yellow nozzle caps, conical trophies to my sweet tooth and 'husky' sized blue jeans. Thankfully I have no way of knowing how many bee-hives I went through. Some things are better left to death bed visions than conscious knowledge.
The second piece of untoasted toast completed the sugar stack. Kraft smooth peanut butter, I was to later find out, included icing sugar in its ingredient list. Back then it seemed I was eating good stuff. The sandwich was now ready to flip, allowing the top toast to act as bottom, catching the honey in its spongy pores and with any luck becoming a crystalline playground. Why not just squirt the honey directly on the second piece of toast and let gravity do the work right from the start ? Good question. I believe that the honey squirted upon the creamy swirls of PB was simply more pleasing than it cascading onto plain white toast.
In any case, the sandwich complete, I was now ready to cram it into my face in any number of ways. Occasionally I would break it apart in my hands and see what rugged landscapes would emerge from the fault line. Other times I would take teeth to it first, enjoying what little resistance they met. Sometimes I made a second sandwich.
My aunt Christina, the 'cool' aunt who was probably only ten or so years older than me, would watch me making and eating these sandwiches with such relish that she requested I make one for her. "Just like you make it for yourself," she'd say. She admitted not liking the sandwiches but thought there must be something she's missing as I engaged with them as if they were the best things ever. I'd be confused as I made her a sandwich she wouldn't really enjoy. What a waste, I thought.
