Six ounces of chicken breast

It's official--I'm too fat! The cardiologist seemed a bit put out--people with cardiac issues are supposed to stay slim, optimally. And here I am creeping up on the weight of a truck driver--at 5'1".

So--I go to the library and thumb through diet books, looking for something barely palatable I can manage to get by on for four to six weeks, or possibly indefinitely. Since I really have no idea what I eat or how much, or what I should eat or how much, I bring home a bunch of diet books.

All of the diets are based on different theories: high carb, low carb, high protein, and so on. But they do have some things in common. First, eat breakfast. They recommend oatmeal, and I can live with that, although my idea of a nice breakfast involves French toast or pancakes, or possibly a runny egg and buttered toast.

For lunch, the diet books recommend half a turkey sandwich and half an apple or six grapes. I can do that. Not with enthusiasm, but with grumbling acceptance. Although I might have seven grapes or two-thirds of an apple.

It's dinner that gets me. Dinner on a diet always includes six ounces of chicken breast, grilled, accompanied by maybe one half cup of plain brown rice and a veggie or two. Or in the case of the high protein diets, the chicken breast and veggies without the rice.

I can't face the chicken breast. By the time I was 18 I had eaten a lifetime supply of chicken. We invariably had chicken every Friday night and all day Saturday, and I am sick of it in all its forms. Then, when my cholesterol proved to be high, I ate chicken about seven times a week--with mango salsa, with chutney, with hot sauce, with cold sauce, and it always tasted just like chicken. No matter what you do with six ounces of chicken breast--and the books have plenty of suggestions--it always tastes like chicken breast. The idea of buying, cooking, serving and eating grilled chicken breast five out of seven dinners a week is a total turnoff.

I will eat chicken soup, but only with matzoh balls floating around in it.

I guess I'll have to opt for the vegetarian diet. Or I could exercise for three hours a day. Yes, that's much better.