I Know Why It's Called Fat Tuesday

Things I do not want to eat when it's cold, snowy and my kids have been home from school for six days:

cottage cheese

high fiber cereal

grapefruit

lettuce

hard boiled eggs

rice cakes

baked chicken breasts with a squeeze of lemon over a bed of salad greens

Things I want to eat when it's cold, snowy and my kids have been home from school for six days:

Mountains of spaghetti with homemade sauce, accompanied by garlic bread that's crusty outside and bleeds butter when you bite into it.

Chocolate pudding. The kind you cook on the stove and top with real whipped cream.

Beef stew and my mother-in-law's buttermilk cornbread -so sweet it could be birthday cake- slathered with satiny honey butter.

Giant bowls of spicy taco soup topped with an inch of melted cheese and a hearty dollop of full-fat sour cream. A generous fistful of cornchips crumbled on top.

Basically anything warm, creamy or dripping with butter.

Thank heavens for baggy sweaters and puffy vests.