I was recently knocked over by the flu — we're talking WWE Smackdown, the RAW Total edition (not that I know about such things, ahem). This time last week, I was shivering away in a sweaty tangle of duvets, in the grip of a fever the likes of which I have not experienced since childhood — this I know, because it was familiar. 'Ah,' my overheated brain informed me, 'We've been here before! But not in many moons.'

My regression was almost total. Not only was the desire to have my mother at my side pathetically strong, but I felt a deep, primal longing for the foods of my early youth. Not that I had much appetite to speak of, but the only things I would even consider eating held the promise of nostalgia and comfort — perhaps it was my brain's way of compensating for my mother's absence.

Marmite toast. Macaroni cheese. Jungle Oats. Fish fingers. Eet-Sum-Mors. Escort Viennas. Rice pudding...

Bland, comforting flavours.

I hadn't lusted after fish fingers since my teens, when I first examined the greyish, gelatinous block of fish mush without its coat of crumbs. But while I was convalescing, I could have devoured an entire plate of the things, with large puddle of All Gold tomato sauce on the side for good measure. Heaven.

I didn't indulge all of my regressive food fantasies, seeing that I was too sick to go to the shops (and too fussy, impetuous and foul tempered to ask the poor, beleaguered Guinea Pig to do it), so I basically subsisted on Marmite toast and biscuits.

My stomach still lurches at the thought of red meat right now, but I'm starting to feel the effects of too much beige, starchy food. I know I am close to fully mended because yesterday I craved a salad. Something green.

This was the first proper meal I'd had in over a week. Nothing fancy. Some caramelised roast potato chunks rubbed with dhukka, laid out on a bed of watercress, and sprinkled with feta, walnuts and pomegranate seeds... I only used pomegranate because I had one left over from my trip to Calitzdorp. It could just as easily have been chopped apple or sliced pear. It was simple and satisfying and easy to digest. Nowhere near as comforting as macaroni cheese, of course, but nourishing, which is just what I needed.