Eat the F*cking Bread
How to enjoy food on holiday without guilt, compensation or moral maths
I’ve eaten very, VERY well in Mexico.
Tacos. Mole. Big breakfasts. Late dinners. Food I’d never tried before and immediately wanted again.
For years, I could have sat at those exact tables and missed half of the experience.
Not physically. Mentally.
I spent years being physically present at wonderful meals while mentally somewhere else, calculating what they meant. I refuse to miss my life that way anymore.
Was that too much? Should tomorrow be lighter? Had I walked enough? Could I still be someone who looked after herself if dinner came with bread, fries and dessert?
Imagine travelling all the way to Mexico only to bring MyFitnessPal along as an emotional support animal.
What a boring use of a fabulous country.
I don’t do that anymore.
Not because I’ve stopped caring about my health or how food makes me feel. Because I care too much about being inside my actual life to spend a brilliant meal doing imaginary maths.
The best moments of the past 7 months have often happened around food. Sitting down somewhere new. Ordering the thing I’ve never heard of. Passing plates around. Laughing. Walking home full and happy.
Letting the meal be a meal instead of a referendum on my character.
That is what food guilt steals from you.
The food is over in 30 minutes. The mental invoice can last until breakfast.
Your brain opens a spreadsheet. Was it worth it? Should I be “good” tomorrow? Do I need to compensate? Is this what people who take care of themselves do?
And suddenly you’re no longer tasting the food. You’re defending it in an imaginary court.
Caring for yourself and enjoying food are not opposing teams.
Sometimes taking care of yourself looks like ordering something fresh because that is genuinely what sounds good.
Sometimes it looks like eating the tacos, full stop.
Sometimes it means stopping when you’re comfortably satisfied. Sometimes it means eating the whole dessert yourself with full commitment because sharing would be a personal tragedy.
You are allowed to consider your appetite, your body and how you want to feel without turning the meal into a test you can pass or fail.
The question that changed this for me was brutally simple:
What would I choose if I didn’t have to justify it tomorrow?
Not what is technically healthiest. Not what would earn approval from the invisible wellness committee in my head.
What do I actually want from this meal, besides getting it right?
Maybe you want pleasure. Maybe you want to try something you cannot get at home. Maybe you want connection, satisfaction or enough energy to keep exploring afterwards.
Maybe you want the bread while it is still warm.
And once you’ve chosen, you get to stay at the table.
No mental negotiations. No promising to be better tomorrow. No turning breakfast into penance because dinner was large.
The point isn’t to get every meal right.
It is to stop making every meal mean so much.
Some meals will be light. Some will be enormous. Some will be worth travelling back for and some will be a disappointing croissant you abandon after 2 bites.
None of them needs to become a verdict.
Eat the bread while it’s warm. Tomorrow is allowed to be an ordinary day, not a repayment plan.
The Unwritten Check-In
This week’s bare minimum: let 1 meal end when the meal ends. No compensation maths, no moral debrief, no plan to make up for it tomorrow.
Ask yourself: what would I choose if I didn’t have to justify it tomorrow?
Noemie x
P.S. If summer has turned into late dinners, unfamiliar food and vague calculations about whether you are still “on track”, I re-recorded my Summer-Proof workshop. It’s free, 45 minutes, and helps you build the few anchors that can survive heat, travel and a 10pm dinner.
Noemie Mooney is an ACE Certified Health Coach, ICF-trained Behaviour Change Specialist, certified yoga instructor, and creator of the MAKE SPACE Method™. Trained in design thinking at the Stanford d.school, she writes Unwritten Potential, a newsletter about evidence-based wellbeing, sustainable habits, mental wellbeing, and health behaviour change for smart, health-curious people who want to feel their best without making it a full-time job.
This is brilliant!
To be honest the best meals I've ever had were never the cleanest ones, they were the ones I was actually present for!
We've started living in a world where we're so busy counting calories that we forgot sharing the meal and experiences was the whole point.
I lived near San Antonio for 30 years! Food often came first but the music and friends were often a close second. Sure dont miss all the lard!