Claire Black: ‘I’m a pudding person. A sweetie-face. But now, without warning, I have turned savoury’

I chose to ignore it because I just didn’t know what to make of it. But the other morning over the breakfast table I could ignore it no longer.

The coffee was poured, the bread was in the toaster – browning on one side more than the other as ever, a trick that only toasters which cost more than a hundred quid can pull off. The table was covered in the usual array of spreads. For me: raspberry jam, honey, golden syrup, a really old jar of lemon curd that I bought at the farmers’ market some time last year (that’s my first mention of ye olde 2011) but that I can’t bear to chuck out, and black cherry conserve. For R: Marmite.

The toast popped. Or rather, it futtered. Again a design feature of overpriced toasters alone. We both buttered, R reached for her Marmite and I hovered. Jam? Nah, too sweet. Honey? Nope, too sweet. Golden Syrup? Yuk, far too sweet. You may have spotted a pattern here. Nothing was missed by R.

“What are you waiting for?” she asked.

“Nothing. I just don’t really fancy any of these,” I said. “They’re all a bit sweet.”

R’s eyes opened wide. This statement from me is akin to Yuang Guang turning his nose up at a fresh pile of bamboo shoots. Or Masterchef’s Gregg Wallace turning his nose up at, well, anything. It’s practically unnatural.

“Do you want Marmite?” she asked and, while she didn’t actually put her pinky to her chin and “bwouhahaha” in Doctor Evil style, she might as well have.

“Yeah, OK.”

So I did. And she watched. And I ate it. And she watched. And I liked it. And we were both, not to overstate it, utterly shocked.

I have always happily identified as an inveterate, unrepentant, unstoppable sweet tooth. I’m a pudding person. A sweetie-face. And now, without warning, I have, apparently, turned savoury. I should’ve spotted it coming when I stood lingering in the pickled items aisle of the supermarket a few weeks ago. Gherkins. Cornichons. Capers. Pickled onions. Those went straight into the basket and I’ve since been eating them directly from the jar with a teaspoon.

By the time you reach your late 30s you think you know yourself. You think you can rely on certain patterns that have been established over the course of your life.

Apparently not. I don’t blame you if you’re now worrying about what you might soon discover about yourself. I’m sorry, I wish I could offer you some kind of reassurance that you need fear nothing, that such a thing won’t happen to you.

But I just can’t. The emergence of my love for cheese over Chewits proves that anything can happen.

“You’re like a different person,” said R, watching me spread Marmite on my second slice of toast.

“What, like an imposter?” I asked.

“Yeah. I like this new version better.”