The cream-bun mentality

1785: 

Could it be that the omnivore is so obsessed with a childish connection to the soft, syrupy taste experience that they can't let go of it? What is ice cream and fudgey trifles and whippy caramel desserts if not an utterly, deliciously juvenile sensation? Take the classic fattening cream bun as an example. If you’ve eaten one you’ll know what it is - an indulgent taste and texture experience. And these days, there are other more exotic, creamy-cakey items which are made to look attractive to the consumer eye. How can you go past them lined up in their brilliantly lit display cases without being seduced by them? And this comes with the past experience of eating one of these comestibles, so firmly lodged in our memory. But, apart from the sugar content, what’s the most attractive element in this confection? Surely, it's the softness and even contrasting blandness of the cream. It's the richest part of the cow's milk.

But what is it really? It comes from cows who’ve lost their new-born calf, in order to make their milk (and cream) available for humans. But the product itself, the cream, despite it being unhealthy, is universally thought to be delicious to the taste, and when inserted into a sweet cakey-substance seems to make it doubly attractive to eat. Even irresistible. That attraction, multiplied a thousandfold across the range of equally seductive food items, represents one of the most reliably tempting items of, I almost said, 'food'.

If we are concerned for the enslaved animals who produce ‘our’ milk, then we have to choose to either satisfy our taste for this cream element or rise above it. If we avoid it, along with many other equally delectable creamy sweets, then we vegans do it for ethical reasons, for the sake of sticking to a principle, namely the need to boycott anything taken from abused animals. But the question is, if 'cream buns' are eaten, can the temptation be beaten?

Our job is to find ways in which denying oneself the figurative cream-bun makes sense, not merely to avoid putting on weight but for improving one’s ethical self-esteem.