I've never met a potato I didn't like

Everyone has an Archilles heel and mine is the love of chips. I LOOOOOVE chips! I could go to AA and confess to my inability to resist their salty, fatty goodness. But I wouldn't give them up.

Some people have a chocolate addiction, or a coffee addiction or some other gourmet habit but I am unapologetically addicted to potatoes. I will eat them as fries, as wedges, as potato chips, as potato fritters, mashed, baked, you name it I love them.

But I must confess that my particular weakness is potato combined with salt and fat - and even more specifically I love chicken salt and chips. I'm not sure if chicken salt is called "chicken" salt because it is made from chickens, should be used with chicken or tastes like chicken (probably none of these things) but it adds an extra nuance (tongue in cheek whilst using that word) to the delights of hot chips.

I have been known to choose a meal at a restaurant based on whether it comes with chips or not - sometimes I even skip the meal and just order the chips because they are the best part. I have been mocked mercilessly for doing this but I have no pride when it comes to fries!

The picture above sums up my relationship with potato chips - the extended family knows that you do not sit me next to the chip bowl when we have get-togethers because I just can't resist their siren song. I nobly try just to have one or two, but as the conversation and socialising continues, the one or two becomes a handful or two and before I know it the bowl is empty. For the sake of my waistline I move the bowl as far out of my own reach as possible and do my best to distract myself. I also restrict my visits to any takeaway outlet or I'd be lining up all the time to order a large fries and be waddling out the door in no time.

When I was pregnant I tried to use cravings as an excuse to get my husband to go and buy me chips but he was onto my strategy and told me that wanting something that was bad for me did not count as a craving. Mind you, the amount of mashed potato I ate when I had evening sickness (as an alternative to morning sickness) has turned him off mashed spuds forever. I still have fond memories of them settling my poor heaving stomach and calming my roiling gizzard . My daughter loves chips as much as I do, so maybe all that mashed potato in the early weeks of pregnancy had an effect on her developing taste buds.

There are a lot worse things to be in love with than potatoes, so I will keep my romance with their deliciousness as my not so secret vice and as midlife creeps up on me and my metabolism goes sadly downhill, just try to keep my portions under control so I can stay healthy but still get to enjoy them fairly regularly.

Cresting The Hill