Covid Chicken

I’ve been sick the last few weeks. I’m not sure what I might have; but I’ve had fever, stuffiness, and coughing; so, I'm sure it's something viral. Because it's been lingering for so long, my wife encouraged me to go get checked out at the doctor. So, I made an appointment at the urgent care and went in this morning. I guess because my symptoms cross over several different possibilities (or maybe because they could charge the insurance more), they decided to do a flu test, strep test, and Covid test on me. The flu and step came back negative immediately, but I had to wait for the Covid results.

So since I had some time to kill, I decided to go home and have some lunch. As I ate my leftover chicken, I became worried because I couldn’t taste any of the food. It was just like a bland, pulpy mass in my mouth. If you're at all familiar with Covid, you realize that this is one of the symptoms, so I immediately started having a panic attack. How could I possibly have gotten Covid? I'm vaccinated, and I'm usually so careful. Did I get one of the mutant strands? Who have I come into contact with? It had to be some moron who didn't think Covid was a big deal, so there's no reason to take precautions or be safe. Who might I have given it to? Will my wife and son get it now because of me?

All these thoughts were flashing through my mind, as I sat eating this tasteless chicken. Then, I took a bite of the green beans, and I realized that they were very flavorful. I wondered. Is it possible to only lose taste in part of your tongue? I tried something else...tasty. I tried the chicken again, thinking maybe my taste was returning...bland. I was confused. 

Luckily, I didn't have to wait long for my results from the doctor, which confirmed my Covid test was also negative. I concluded that my wife hadn't used a lot of spices on this particular batch of chicken, so it would have been tasteless either way. In general, Greek cooking uses the "blander" spices, like oregano, basil, rosemary; rather than being salt and pepper heavy like American cooking. Since I was raised on salt and pepper, it's sometimes hard for me to taste the subtler, yet wonderful, flavors of other spices. But this batch of chicken tasted like it had been plucked and thrown straight into the oven. That it happened to coincide with my Covid "scare" was an unfortunate coincidence.