Fussy eaters do my head in; discuss

I've got to run now but wanted to start this while I remembered.

My brother is a fussy eater.

I concur. You do realise this is gonna be a clusterfuck, right?

it's their loss i guess, unless their fussiness is detrimental to people around them (e.g. vocal complaints, not joining in with mealtimes etc).

which it usually is.

I'm a fusilli eater...
http://tonetta.net/files/pasta_shapes_fusilli__1.jpg

people who complain endlessly about other people do my head in.

http://www.organizeit-online.com/images/ironingCompact6.jpg

People who post picture zings aimed at people who complain about people who complain endlessly about other people who do their head in do my head in.

You should do a thread about that.

Nah don't think I'll bother

people who don't bother do my head in

This is fine with me provided I don't have to cook for them or, worse, spend ages tramping around looking for a restaurant that meets with their approval.

Actually, people can like or dislike whatever they want provided they don't expect everyone else to reorganise all their plans on their account.

I am so sorry. I am one of those proverbial fussy eaters. :-(

Well, actually, I'm not when it comes to making and cooking mine own food - but I'm a terror to have to find a restaurant with. Which is why I try to have a selection of restaurants I know will be OK and always suggest we go to one of those so others don't have to be exposed to my fussiness and dithering.

It's totally a control thing, I fully admit, the need to have control over one's own food is central to the need to exercise control over one's life.

i think being a fussy eater is okay as long as you fuss about important things, like how good something tastes, rather than like, how many adjectives they use in a menu to describe the food.

I think the great problem behind my fussiness is that I tend to go into feeding situations with a pre-conceived notion or craving for what it is that I want to eat. So I will reject restaurants that do not satisfy this a priori foodwant.

Which is probably hellish for people with me who just want to go into a restaurant and be surprised by finding something new or different or exciting when I want my old favourites.

Fussy eaters are fine with me when:

1. They let me know if there is a restriction *before* I cook them a meal (U&K when someone might be kosher/halal/vegan/hater of a menu item I really like cooking).
2. When choosing restaurants, I'd like to consider their needs so knowledge aforethought also good.
3. They do not temporarily abandon their ironclad dietary restriction to snaffle something off of my plate because for some strange reason, their body 'needs' it. Wavering macrobiotic friends who have repeatedly violated point 1, I AM TALKING ABOUT YOU.
4. They pay attention to mine in turn - I loathe canned tuna wherever it lurks, won't eat liver or kidneys, and sweetcorn off the cob is not my friend either.

fussy eaters are good to go to restaurants with as long as there's SOMEWHERE they like - i am completely unfussy and indecisive when it comes to restaurants (though have a bias towards places i've never been) so any reason to narrow the field is welcome.

i've never knowingly been annoyed by anyone being fussy over food though.

wait a minute, what is a fussy eater?

I thought it must mean people who ate with great delicacy and table manners and the like. but Suzy's post is making me think it is about what they will and will not eat.

If I was going to cook for someone and they told me they were kosher or halal I think I would tell them not to bother coming round. But they probably wouldn't want to come round anyway. Would you? No.

I am fussy in that I don't like vegetarian food much.

I am a fussy eater but I do not and will not expect anyone to change their plans on my account.

SO THERE

Ex-girlfriend was (is) a fussy eater of the type that was in fact way into the realm of food phobia, which kind of did my head in but wasn't really something you could bitch about

also bad: people who go "OMG YOU EAT THAT?!??!" when you like, have something exotic like the fatty bit of bacon.

actually people who discard the fatty bit of bacon. bad.

I suppose that I am fussy, but in a bizarre way. I won't eat anything that is in the shape of an animal. So, for example, I won't eat chocolate mice, creme eggs, Lindt bunnies, jelly babies, etc.. But I will happily gnaw away at hot chicken wings or a plate of barbecue ribs, or any stuff that is made from the meat of a real animal. I guess that it comes from a larger fussiness of disliking people playing with their food. I detest such things as a plate of sausage, mash, and pea, arranged to look like a smiley face. Come on, this isn't the Turner prize, just serve up the food and then eat it...

If I was going to cook for someone and they told me they were kosher or halal I think I would tell them not to bother coming round. But they probably wouldn't want to come round anyway. Would you?

Not anymore now.

(xpost) Someone once offered me a jelly baby and I said "I don't eat this kind of thing, because I'm a awkward tosser metaphysical vegan"

Boy did I ever misread this thread title.

haha i only came here to post that too

(the thread is great reading if you decide to keep the misread title)

spend ages tramping around looking for a restaurant that meets with their approval.

Oh they say " oh you know whatever I don't mind" after rejecting the first four choices.

maybe your first four choices were really shit

My brother's diet now, at 38, is pretty horrific. He pretty much wont touch it if it's not toad in the hole, chips, sunday roast, or crisps. He keeps crisps with him at all times; often leaving a packet in each room in whatever building he's in, and having one crisp each time he leaves the room. wtf? He's very skinny and plays a lot of football, and to be fair, does eat fruit. But anything spicy, anything pasta, anything rice, anything foreign, not a chance. My other brother eats better, but very blandly; proper meat & 2 veg type stuff. When we go out for a family meal, Jim will have scampi and chips, and JR will have a mixed grill or something. There have been a few stand-offs in recent years when it's been my birthday and we've been trying to find a venue for a meal, and I've wanted to go somewhere a bit more exciting. Like somewhere that does something scary as fuck like a fajita, or lasagna, or something. My parents' diet is very... northern working class middle aged. Stews. Even in summer. Sunday roasts.

I was quite fussy as a kid, insisted on ham sandwiches EVERY day for lunch, and didn't like vegetables, but looking back I think this is because they were generally boiled to a mush by my mum. She CAN cook; she makes an amazing stew, and variations thereof, champion dumplings, a great flan (or quiche, or open pie, etc). But pasta was an alien in our house. Meat was always cooked WAY past pink in case it killed us. I think this is why I don't like steak or pork chops; my experiences of them require stamina. My dad had been quite ill as a kid and has a sensitive stomach which wont take anything too rich or spicy. I fucking ADORE rich and spicy food. My belly is proof. Mum and dad will go for a chinese meal pretty regularly. My dad likes a chow mein. But not spaghetti?

I like to cook. I like buying cookbooks and stealing / adapting ideas. We had friends down this weekend and on Friday I cooked a paella, and a tomato / potato / chorizo / red pepper side dish. On Saturday night I cooked a big chili, which we had with taco shells, guacamole, salad, etc. The leftover chili I last night turned into a chili lasagna, which we had for tea. It was ace. Today for lunch I have leftover paella with extra chorizo (removed the seafood bits, as they'll be like car tyres now), and Em has leftover chili (which has fake mince and LOTS of beans in it, no meat). I used to hate salad; these days I love a rocket salad with sundried tomatoes.

Fussy eaters piss me off a bit, I think because I enjoy food, and different types of food, and the whole stand-offs with my brothers is awkward. I'd love to have them round for dinner more often, but wtf do I cook? A roast every time? it's a lot of effort for not enough return.

i love spicy foods but i also love roasts! my bro and his wife are fairly fussy eaters who live interstate. they're moving home soon and i'll happily cook them a roast as often as they like because i'm really looking forward to spending some more time with them than i've been able to the last few years.

I get that fussy eaters can be a little annoying at times, but i figure... different strokes for different folks and it doesn't kill me to cater for their tastes. plenty of time for exotic food when i'm with my partner, who also loves trying new stuff.

Nick, what you're describing isn't a fussy eater, just a totally unadventurous one.

A genuine fussy eater would be more like "oh no, I only eat VEGAN MACROBIOTIC bean sprouts that have been harvested at the full moon so that the plants feel no pain, but oh no, I can't eat those ones, because the colour doesn't match my Anya Hindmarsh handbag, but last week I was reading about how the Dalai Lama said we should all become fruitarians, and I was thinking about it, but my dietician said I had a banana intolerance and should stick to kiwis and other fruits in the cool colour range..."

(I do actually know people like this, hence I don't feel so bad about mine own fussyness.)

"crisps" haha so cute.

i guess id be considered a fussy eater but its only because i like bland food. As long as its not spicy, spicy hot, asian, east asian, african, sth american, nonwesternized european or unhotified central american food im pretty good. look, just give me some white bread.

oh and ill eat seafood exclusively as long as its not fish

or american "shrimp" (WTF is up with this crap?)

Ha ha, I'm the opposite - I can't eat anything unless it's spicy, spicy hot - I'll happily eat Mexican, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, Malaysian (so long as I can find something with no fish in it), South American etc. etc. but I would just DIE if I had to eat at, say, some gourmet French restaurant.

But I am allergic to seafood so I have an excuse about being picky about that...

That said, I did go through a phase when I only ate yellow food for about a month, but I blame acid and reading too much Keats in a cornfield.

I am a fussy eater of the "raised unadventurous" kind (see Pizza Hut thread) but I'm making progress!!! Am v proud of self for eating Thai, Indian, sushi, asparagus, broccoli, guacamole, scallions, radishes, and all manner of foods I didn't grow up with. To everyone who has watched me fish peas and onions out of my entire dinner and shaken their heads: I'M WORKING ON IT, OKAY?

Cooked peas are vile, though.

I generally don't care about people's eating habits, but I have a nephew who is super-fussy: He'll only eat one or two things off of an Italian menu, doesn't like Mexican or Chinese (even the crappy stuff that passes for them at, like, Chipotle or PF Chang's), etc. I took him on a trip to NYC for the first time when he graduated high school, and he only wanted to eat at chain restaurants in Times Square. It's like, THERE'S A HARD ROCK CAFE IN CLEVELAND IF YOU REALLY NEED ONE NEPHEW.

But aside from that, we hosted Christmas Day last year at my house, and my wife set a great table with lots of options, and my nephew not only sullenly sat there and wouldn't eat anything, he as much as asked if he could have something else made. Sorry, kid, this ain't the fucking drive-thru window. You eat what's out, or go hungry, when you're a guest in someone's home. It's not like we made calamari and pate foie gras for Christmas. You can't eat a plate of mashed potatoes and fresh green beans, grab a Big Mac on the way home.

do you like toad in the hole, nick?

I wish that, like Laurel, I could feel proud of myself for eating Thai and Indian food. I would feel just fantastic and constantly ready to make myself feel even more fantastic.

My sister came to NYC to visit me and ordered calamari at a restaurant without knowing what it was. I offered to tell her, but she said, "I don't know what 'calamari' means in English, and don't tell me because I'm sure I won't eat it if I know." I was like, OH HAI MORE FOR ME! But I refrained for the pleasure of watching her eat squid.

This is the person who cried when I put scallions in the breakfast eggs on Christmas morning because it made them inedible for her.

what are breakfast eggs?

how old is your nephew, pancakes?

it does piss me off when i see parents indulge their super-fussy kids (like, under the age of 10), esp with unhealthy food.

nick, surely there are interesting variants on what your brothers will eat that you can present in a non-foreign, non-scary way? like, i dunno, a pie w/interesting stuff in it. if they don't like pasta or rice, i assume it's not weird flavours which scare them but the concept of "foreign" food that they're not used to.

the best thing about having irrational culinary dislikes as a teenager is that you can spend your adult life making up for lost time with eg avocado. i would eat all the avocados in the world now.

lex, he just turned 19 in June, so he was 18 at the time of the aforementioned NYC trip and Christmas.

ALso, OTM about making up for things as an adult. If Young Me had known how much Older Me would like beets . . .

I'm much fussier about cold food than hot food. dim sum makes me happy, turkish meze makes me sad.

Ugh -- fussy and unadventurous eaters, go jump in the lake. My favorite meal of recent years was a kaiseke dinner in Atlanta where I'd never tasted about 75% of the ingredients before, and never even heard of 25% of them. Even better, I've raised an adventurous daughter, who dove right ahead alongside me into the raw lobster and the monkfish liver.

I think I survived on avocados last summer, the lex! SO with you on that score.

ha, i still hate beets, but i think they're just about the only food i have visceral "ugh" reactions over. can't seem to bring myself round to olives either, but i'd eat them if i had to.

i think 18 is still well within the weird teenage years of inexplicable tastes (plus it's tough, if you're an adult and eating at someone else's house, your hosts will take your taste peccadilloes into account, but no one ever asks the kids). but it's also old enough to know how to behave as a guest!! hopefully he'll grow out of it in the next few years.

To everyone who has watched me fish peas and onions out of my entire dinner and shaken their heads: I'M WORKING ON IT, OKAY?

― Vampire romances depend on me (Laurel), Monday, October 6, 2008 8:49 AM (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i pull stuff out too! i find people get most annoyed when you do it to pizza. if its not hawaiian ive generally got a lot of work to do before eating.

OMG I LOVE beets

The only stuff I will ever pull out of food is sweetcorn. That shit has no business being anywhere except ON A COB.

However, I like going to dinner with people who pull, say, mushrooms, out of their meals because then I GET TO EAT ALL THE MUSHROOMS. Num num.

I didn't start appreciating olives until I was in my 30s. Avocado is a recent obsession. Beets however, are food of the gods and always have been - come ON they turn your mouth hot pink when you eat them, how can they not be great?

My next project for myself is winter vegetables like beets and squashes and parsnips and stuff.

The best way for me to get myself on new foods is to cook them myself -- I think I dislike the "mystery" of preparations of unfamiliar foods that I have no control over. So I guess I'll be asking for roasted squash recipes kind of soon....

I like everything apart from bananas and plantains, and it really bugs me that I dislike them no matter how hard I try to like them.

but no one ever asks the kids

That's one thing that was drummed into us as kids: if you go round someone's house and they've cooked for you, you eat it. It doesn't matter if you like it or not, you just eat it. That is basically how I expanded my palate from being a typical fussy child.

The only thing I still REALLY hate, is chocolate, which I got away with not eating as it's not so rude to turn down pudding, I guess.

Parsnips oh my god num num num - just roast them up like potatoes and revel in the numness. Or in winter soup, lightly mashed up with potatoes and swedes and leeks and things.

Oh yay, it will be winter soon, we can eat Winter Soup.

parsnips should be consumed roasted, pretty much exclusively either au naturel or with a crispy coating of parmesan or melted cheese, but definitely roasted.

xpost, I like parsnip soup but the parsnips have to roasted first, it concentrates the flavour.

That's one thing that was drummed into us as kids: if you go round someone's house and they've cooked for you, you eat it. It doesn't matter if you like it or not, you just eat it.

Yes, I had this drilled into my head from an early age, too. I did try. Except for fish, in which case a fussy child was generally deemed better than a fussy child vomiting all over the carpet.

Parsnip and apple soup is the way forward. Sweet parsnips. Sour bramley apples. Life = good.

i just googled kaiseke and omg i can't believe i went to japan this year and never had it!! fail. i'm doing a project w/some friends at the moment wherein we're trying to eat out in london for every country in the world and it's tremendous fun - i think my favourite recent discovery is bulgogi, a korean dish of raw beef in some kind of sweet soy/sesame sauce.

xps

See? ILCooking will be my salvation.

I have a mental block against cooked cauliflower but I understand it makes good soups, too.

Nick only started this thread to encourage the obvious parody thread, I'm convinced.

i hated chocolate as a kid and would have a fight with my brother every sept 20 because he would always ask for a chocolate cake for his birthday. so rude of him not to be catering to me on his birthday, right? anyway, ive def come around on this issue though.

That's one thing that was drummed into us as kids: if you go round someone's house and they've cooked for you, you eat it. It doesn't matter if you like it or not, you just eat it. That is basically how I expanded my palate from being a typical fussy child.

yeah we got this too but it had the opposite effect on me.

omg plantains <3

i hated bananas for a couple of years after leaving home cuz that was my mother's default "you kids WILL eat fruit" thing, but i like 'em again now. i was never keen on meat as a teenager - i think more cuz of the texture, the sudden bits of fat or gristle, than the taste. and i really like vegetarian dishes, mostly. and now i eat pig intestine and raw beef like it ain't no thing!

oh i will pull pickles out of anything, actually, but people are often grateful for those. weirdos.

conversely, now that i like avocadoes and peppers and so on, i've also completely lost my sweet tooth - i don't dislike chocolate but i never get cravings for it, like at all. 12-year-old me would be so disappointed.

I am curious about what sunny means by "American shrimp." You mean shrimp aren't shrimp in Britishes Land? I love shrimp just about any way you can serve it. Cold or hot, with or without butter, with cocktail sauce, hollandaise, or ketchup, broiled, grilled, boiled, baked fried, with rice, with pasta, in soup, in a casserole, in gumbo, stuffed, butterfly-cut, wrapped in bacon, dipped in coconut, covered in cheese... I am not a fussy shrimp eater.

I am generally not a fussy eater unless you are talking about non-Western offal and insects, which is not cuisine I encounter on a daily basis. I will likely try almost any food item at least once.

As a kid, I only hated peas. Everything else was good or edible. (Was never a big fan of pork chops, either, but that may have been because of the way my mom cooked them.)

i wouldn't call myself a fussy eater, but lately my body is having a hard time with foods that are heavy and/or more than mildly spicy. which is a damn damn damn shame.

i assume the shrimp thing = teh britishes eat PRAWNS

Ah. Prawns are fine, but if you cook them poorly they turn to rubber. They are riskier than shrimp.

pork chops without some fancy marinade is like chaka demus without pliers

the only time i was a fussy eater was when i was in nursery school/kindergarten. they served us such horrible food. i hated the microwaved bowls of canned beefaroni or canned corned beef hash that we were given. i still can't look at either of those foods, since we were basically force-fed if we didn't eat of our own accord.

Do not like broccoli, though I wish I did. And I don't eat pork/ham/bacon cause i'm muslim but otherwise don't actually care whether chicken, beef, whatever meat is halal or not. That's pretty much it as far as my food fussiness goes.

i don't get people who are fussy over which restaurant they go to. i mean, unless the place clearly has hygiene issues or something, i don't think i've ever found myself in one where i couldn't find a single thing to eat on the menu.

DUDES IM NOT A BRITISHER

oh, I guess I knew that. What are american shrimp, then?

I have been taught from a very young age to eat everything I was given thus making me a damn unfussy eater. I even remember once not wanting to eat a dish I was given for lunch. It was served to me again at tea, then at diner, at which point I finally ate it because I was starving. And it actually tasted quite good! The only thing I disliked was bananas (I guess I was fed too many of those as a child) but I'm slowly coming round to them.

american shrimp tastes like gasoline, kenan. i dont know why and i dont wanna know why. now australian prawns taste like little slices of stripey heaven. But even with those I need to spend a good 10-15 minutes inspecting the chef's devaining process for thoroughness.

That is truly, honestly a new one to me. Gasoline. Huh.

I had a great excuse for the legion of items I would not eat as a child: post-chemo nausea (the aforementioned sweetcorn, canned tuna and SQUASH avoidance are all that remain from this episode). Therefore I'm accepting of others' food idiosyncrasies up to a point, but when the idiosyncrasy is an attention substitute I baulk (and reserve the right to decide when attention is being sought).

Maybe Gulf shrimp tainted by Gulf oil?

Yeah don't order the Exxon Valdez Scampi, and you should be fine.

I even remember once not wanting to eat a dish I was given for lunch. It was served to me again at tea, then at diner, at which point I finally ate it because I was starving.

This was done to me as a child. :-( The same fish appeared on my dish until the next morning and I still refused to eat it.

To this day, my mum won't believe my fish allergy.

We have had this entire conversation before, I'm getting real deja vu here...

i don't know about gasoline, but frozen, farmed shrimp (which you often get in the us) don't taste like much.

Several years ago, In California, I ate my first clam and said it tasted "like a gonad dipped in motor oil." I would like to apologize to Bob 'n' Betty's Clam Fiesta, and especially to Bob, who I found out later had only one testicle.

I had clams for the first time this summer, with pasta! They were good, less "mystery meat" than mussels (although don't worry, little mussels, I still <3 you too).

I even remember once not wanting to eat a dish I was given for lunch. It was served to me again at tea, then at diner, at which point I finally ate it because I was starving.

This was done to me as a child. :-( The same fish appeared on my dish until the next morning and I still refused to eat it.

To this day, my mum won't believe my fish allergy.

We have had this entire conversation before, I'm getting real deja vu here...

― COOL in ze POOL, HOTT in ze DANCING SPOT (Masonic Boom), Monday, October 6, 2008 9:44 AM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

haha joan crawford parenting stylez

Maybe Gulf shrimp tainted by Gulf oil?

― jane hussein lane (suzy), Monday, October 6, 2008 9:38 AM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

ive actually considered this a possibility

some seafood do taste like gasoline. this is not a weird thing!

None of you can complain about fussy or unimaginitive eaters if you hold outdated and fascist standards for what can and can't go on a pizza

roommate is a bit fussy, but not to the point of doing my head in. annoying on two points: 1)loves to grill, has that 800 page BBQ Bible book chock full of tasty recipes, but has only done one of them (at my request) and sticks to the same marinade and only filets and potatos and corn on the cob. 2) inspects every morsel of food that he has not prepared. JUST EAT IT.
I think fussy eaters does = control problem

i mean, like, seafood's not SUPPOSED to taste like gasoline, but some do it's not weird to notice that.

Louis, what do il fascisti eat on their pizze?

My aunt once was on the business end of the repeat until you eat thing, only with oatmeal, and it lasted three days. She didn't cave.

My mother's favourite thing to do was to mention Unfortunate Starving Children, until I began addressing a small cardboard box c/o UNICEF and was about to clear my dinner into it.

Il fascisti not only refuse to top their pizzas with anything other than mozzarella, beef, pepperoni, pineapple, lettuce, and other old gold staples, but they express great disgust and disdain when someone else does, even if that pizza is (in the consumer's opinion) immensely pleasurable

I thought whatshisface was going to take an ILX break? Or are we not that lucky?

(xpost) According to those people, there are only four types of pizza: Marguerite, Neapolitan, something, and something else (I forget). These people piss me off. If I want to have spicy Chinese chicken on my pizza, then I will!

Lettuce!?!??!?

Yeah, my fussiness about food is def a mental thing EXCEPT where it's a texture problem. Some things I strongly dislike for certain textural qualities, like sauteed onions that are stringy and wormy (I always mince mine) and country-style green beans that are thick and squishy and squirt the little seeds into your mouth as you chew.

These problems are perhaps overly precious, but not actually control-related.

Yes, I wouldn't want lettuce on a pizza neither.

I wouldn't go for chinese / curry etc pizza - seems too much like mixing two good things to make a very dubious hybrid - but I would not see fit to assault or assail anyone else for ordering one.

I burn or bin all pizza menus which depict sweetcorn or pineapple on any illustrated pizza (my two closest pizzeria are Il Porchetta and Malletti, so WIN). I don't think CHICKEN belongs on pizza either, especially as a 'fusion item' eg. pizza tikka masala. You can eat that if you want, snoball, and as long as you don't pretend it's authentic apart from authentically enjoyed by you, we gots no beef.

LJ, I would be busting on you for reducing your entire persona to "lol pizza toppings" if the idea of a lettuce pizza wasn't so fucking funny.

i like horse on a pizza

if i want to put super tennents in my pizza i will. no-one's gonna fucking tell me jack

If you wanna ride
Ride the white pizza

arugula on pizza is quite good! no joke.

The very fact you're all finding the idea of lettuce (hint: rocket is lettuce) on pizza so hilarious is saddening. Also, tough luck Laurel. I won't be around much this week, though, so enjoy yourself. Really. Go wild.

(ah, JBR gets it!)

I like the contents of an entire munchy box on my pizza...

Spinach on pizza is credible, I guess. Not my choice, but not totally crazy.

who else thought this said pussy eaters

Radicchio, endive, spinach and rocket are all great for pizza, but I'd never call them lettuces as such, because that's just confusing and poorly worded in the greater scheme of things.

Ha ha ha, I just realised what Jagger was talking about. See, he says "lettuce" and we all think iceburg lettuce on a pizza which is totally nuts. When it's actually rocket on a pizza, which is totally credible.

iceberg lettuce on pizza would elicit a raised eyebrow from even myself

lies

Well yeah but I've seen iceberg lettuce on pizza with eurgh like, chicken or buffalo chicken. Which is prob why we all jumped there, and it looks DISGUSTING.

who else thought this said pussy eaters

I have been trying this whole thread to work out what the three or four references to this were actually referring to and coming up with nothing. That is poor form :(((

I agree with anti-pizza-fascist sentiment. Pizza crust is a perfectly good delivery system for anything that responds well to a short burst of high heat.

Also if it makes me irreversibly British to find pizza fascism hilarious then I'm just going to have to live with that

as long as you don't pretend it's authentic apart from authentically enjoyed by you, we gots no beef.

"mmm omg this pizza tastes so AUTHENTIC. bill, c'mere, this pizza's authenticity is gonna make you blow your tastebud wad."

i love how every ilx thread about food turns into a pizza thread

or tipping

TBH the only things I'm really fussy about are using PORK FUCKING MINCE for bolognese and overcooked meat. All that aside, I'm cool with more or less anything. No seafood is bad, ever.

i sure dont care if you eat your disgusting pizza. enjoy!

If pork mince is the same thing as ground pork, this is kind of an esoteric thing to be getting upset about, considering that most of this country probably makes bolognese with nothing but ground beef or possibly ground turkey in this health-conscious age.

Indian, sushi, asparagus, broccoli, guacamole, scallions

these are like all the best foods

It's an esoteric thing, yes, but an esoteric thing that has been served in the Jgr household roughly once a week for the past 15 years, despite great and repeated dissent

and my mum always cooks chops for like 10 minutes too long :(

Srsly tho it's not WHAT is cooked but HOW it's cooked that generally decides a dish for me. Snails, langoustines, liver, all great if done well.

Only celery is irredeemable, although if boiled to within an inch of its life it can often pass unregarded in a curry or somesuch

Bolognese and meatballs are *supposed* to be beef/pork/veal mixture if they are truly alla Mama!

Alla my mama, it's all about beef and pancetta. Your mama may vary.

Hey, this thread gave me a new screen name!

West Michigan wouldn't know an Italian grandmother if she slapped it with a wooden spoon.

xp I thought it'd be "Your Mama may vary."

LJ, rocket is not lettuce. What crazy madness is that? It's part of the cabbage family, like broccoli.

xp: That one is good, too.

my mom serves meat dishes without letting them "rest" so the juices can redistribute -- all the liquid spills out, leaving nothing but shoe leather. i used to hate steak before i tasted one that was done right. i still won't eat hers.

Only celery is irredeemable, although if boiled to within an inch of its life it can often pass unregarded in a curry or somesuch

― 100 tons of hardrofl beyond zings (Just got offed), Monday, October 6, 2008 10:37 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

This dog thinks youre a lunatic
http://www.dogsinthenews.com/issues/0209/pictures/celery_pissed.jpg

dogsinthenews.com?

what on earth would celery be doing in curry?

lying in AMBUSH

dont say that like dogs bringing you celery isnt news worthy (XXP)

Lauren, I can't guess that either.

My mother LOVES red-sauce Italian food but needs to season her versions a lot more.

i am one of the pickiest eaters i know, and i find it completely humiliating. i dread going to people's houses for dinner because i was raised with fairly good manners so will eat food that i hate, just to keep the host happy. but inside i am crying.

i also blame my upbringing: my mum exclusively used a microwave to cook everything from the time i was 3 onwards, and it was strictly meat and 3 veg (potatoes, frozen peas, carrots, pumpkin, cabbage, that was the range). she also made me sit at the table till i had finished everything on my plate (this could sometimes take until bedtime).

Sweetcorn shouldn't exist. Baby corn and corn on the cob is fine and dandy.

Celery I'm not keen on, but have eaten / will eat. I'd rather have some celeriac and make a soup, though.

Cucumber I find unpleasant. Like sicking a little bit of water into my mouth.

In some curries you can find celery. I guess "casserole" would have been an apter suggestion. Cucumber only any good in dressings such as tzatziki

jesus christ stop being so quotable, ppl

what is wrong
with all y'all

LOL @ the 8th Google hit for curry celery :D

I do have sympathy for people who are fussy and unadventurous because they were raised by a terrible cook. But I'm still going to point and laugh at you if we ever wind up at a meal together.

I think even for people with substantial mental blocks against new foods, if you LIKE food, in general, and you think eating is fun and food should be delicious, there's always hope for you to branch out, even if it still looks conservative to others. You don't care, you'll be enjoying something you didn't allow yourself before.

And I find that it's a cumulative enthusiasm, too -- I'm more into trying MORE new stuff than I used to be.

i have never found celery in curry! i suspect that this is the sort of "curry" that also contains apples and raisins.

What is it that people don't like about foods? Is it just early-life encounters with acid-reflux or something? Is it control issues? is it fear of the colour orange? Etcetera? I'm reasonably sure that I can find a specific reason for disliking most things I dislike. I'm kind of fascinated by REALLY fussy eaters; did anyone watch Freaky Eaters when it was on? I don't understand the psychology behind the people who can only eat handfuls of grated mild cheddar cheese and ready salted crisps, I don't get how they can psychologically make themselves physiologically sick? it's extraordinary.

I fear the unknown, I think. I don't like the unknown in my LIFE, either, so it makes sense.

Apples in curry = ace. But I dice them up real small so you don't know they're there (secret ingredient)

What is it that people don't like about foods? Is it just early-life encounters with acid-reflux or something? Is it control issues? is it fear of the colour orange?

One of the few foods I don't like to eat is avocado. Something about the texture kind of weirds me out. And then biting into it is just so. . .unplesasant. I don't really like guacamole, either. I will still eat it if you put it on my plate though--but I prefer not to.

my fussiness is a mixture of taste-dislike and texture-dislike. often i will hate a particular food item in one incarnation but love it in another.

Another way to look at having a parent(s) who were bad cooks is that the bar is set so low that anything that isn't actual shoe leather should open the Doors of Tastebud Perception and you should be walking around agog at all the beautiful tastes and colors.

she also made me sit at the table till i had finished everything on my plate (this could sometimes take until bedtime).

― Sarah Palin isn't dumb, she's post-modern (Rubyredd), Monday, October 6, 2008 10:46 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

my evil stepfather used to put a timer on me ie he'd put his watch on the table and threaten a punishment if I hadnt finished everything on my plate by the time the big hand reached whatever his chosen destination for it was. this happened every single night for years and it always had the same result - tears until time runs out then back o the legs smacks. and now, of course, i just adore food!

I think I'm like that, a bit.

x-post.

Another way to look at having a parent(s) who were bad cooks is that the bar is set so low that anything that isn't actual shoe leather should open the Doors of Tastebud Perception and you should be walking around agog at all the beautiful tastes and colors.

― Granny Dainger, Monday, October 6, 2008 10:57 AM (10 seconds ago)

If they're not hopelessly mentally broken in that they think that food is an unpleasant necessity.

which it is

re: gasoline shrimp, don't assume that whatever you consider "american shrimp" over there are, like, what all shrimp are like over here.

i was very picky and bland as a child, and now i will eat basically anything. the only things i tend to dislike are because of a texture thing, usually things that are unchewable (like tripe or some forms of banana).

My mum was one of the WORST cooks ever but she was nothing if not adventurous, so at least I did learn how to eat spicey/exotic food at a young age.

I used to go out with a person who thought that ketchup was too spicey to eat! So any kind of curry was totally out of the question. This made things problematic for me, who can, essentially, upend a tabasco bottle on my tongue and feel no pain.

Fruit in curry is a very '70s, Cranks sort of thing (I can see K's mom having a Cranks cookbook).

My fussiness was all about chemo nausea. Today it's about not eating offal which correlates to organs I've had surgery on, plus canned tuna, sweetcorn and SQUASH.

OMG sunny, your step sounds like a MONSTER.

Thing to do with banana is just squish it through your teeth with your tongue.

Another way to look at having a parent(s) who were bad cooks is that the bar is set so low that anything that isn't actual shoe leather should open the Doors of Tastebud Perception and you should be walking around agog at all the beautiful tastes and colors.

― Granny Dainger, Monday, October 6, 2008 3:57 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

OTM (for me)

I also think everyone should try a phaal at least once in their life.

phaal seems like dick-swinging machismo to me, not about real enjoyment.

he was kind of a dick, suzy

whats up with those lady finger bananas making your mouth all dry and sandpapery while all other bananas are delish?

i mean, i love really hot food but i hate that whole "how many chilis can you eat?" competitive bs."

Also fuck feeling pressured to eat foods according to someone else's whim, since we just agreed that can kill yr enjoyment of dinner at any age.

yeah making fun of my fussiness if we're out for a meal is a surefire why to make me feel super anxious and even more phobic about food, to the point where i can't eat at all.

Haha, totally dick-swinging machismo. First had it at a restaurant with some friends, all of whom had been there before, and who basically persuaded me into it (not that I was reluctant). It was intense. I had another one next time I went, though! Mmm. The trick is to not actually drink anything, just to bite the bullet and use your naan wisely.

Wouldn't she advise against eating it?

so if u loved it so much how come u still have, like, negative machismo? xp

(xpost) "LJ, don't eat that phaal. You'll know all about it in the morning."

Please to note that Mr. Que rejected my attempt to feed him celeriac mash, and in fact wrote a piece on how awful it was that was later published on McSweeny's Web site.

He also does not care for mushrooms and eggplant (I love both), but does not complain if they show up in his dinners occasionally. He is a good eater all around, which is but one of his many charms.

Although clearly wrong in the head if he feels that way about celeriac mash.

fuck you ed

It's not that I'm totally fussy, it's just I'd rather stick to what I know. Plus, I have hang-ups about getting food poisoning.

celeriac is fucking disgusting. and they're called MASHED POTATOES not mash.

HOWEVER, I have been, and I'm not kidding, to dinner with a person to a Polish/Ukranian diner, where his ONE PERSON'S dinner was this:

* order of mashed potatoes
* two plain bagels, possibly with cream cheese but I can't remember
* challah-bread toast
* vanilla milkshake
* plate of french fries, possibly with ketchup?

This person did not even eat pizza because of tomatoes or tomato sauce, as I recall, and basically hated life, food, and every good thing. Also had terrible hair.

To be fair the celeriac mash looked like mashed potatoes, and the fact that they were not was probably a rude surprise.

anyone else who reps for celeriac can kiss my ass as well

This person did not even eat pizza because of tomatoes or tomato sauce, as I recall, and basically hated life, food, and every good thing. Also had terrible hair.

Please tell me her hair looked like potatoes

I mean I don't want to be the person who makes Ruby feel bad over dinner but at some point on the spectrum of of food paranoia just stay the fuck home.

xpost to the Lex: Being one of the weird ones at a private school has its residual effects :D

Now this thread is making me sad.

xpost but not really

His hair was dark, curly, frizzy, out of control, and looked about as bad as his skin, probably from eating nothing but empty pale CARBS for a lifetime.

that doesn't sound like a potato

Actually fruit in curry is totally a South African / Cape Malay thing, but that's another story.

actually that mashedp, fries, bagel, vanilla shake meal sounds pretty good to me but i do <3 tomatoes big time. top fivers for certain

I mean I don't want to be the person who makes Ruby feel bad over dinner but at some point on the spectrum of of food paranoia just stay the fuck home.

― Vampire romances depend on me (Laurel),

i can usually always find something to eat, wherever i am, but it's people making a big deal out of it that stresses me out. like, i'm happy to keep quiet about my pickiness unless someone tells me to get so-and-so and i say 'actually i don't like mushrooms' and then it's 'OMG YOU DON'T LIKE MUSHROOMS WHAT'S RONG WITH YOU?? DID YOU HEAR THAT EVERYBODY SHE DOESN'T LIKE MUSHROOMS'

mushrooms are gross

Anyone who goes to an Indian restaurant and orders a phaal is an idiot. Ditto chilli-eating competitions.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1063598/Aspiring-chef-dies-hours-making-ultra-hot-sauce-chilli-eating-contest.html?ITO=1490

Hahahah yes I totally hear you.

At a work dinner once, an overbearing and embarrassingly ill-mannered businessman ordered starters for the whole table without consulting anyone and then tried to force me to eat the mushrooms. I was polite at first but he wouldn't stop, so I ended up almost shouting v strongly "NO THANK YOU. I DON'T CARE FOR THE MUSHROOMS." Jesus Christ, I am 30-some years old and I'M YOUR CUSTOMER and being offensive at dinner doesn't bode well for your business.

Did anyone see the programme on channel 4 (?) a couple of weeks ago about the 30-something guy who had never had a hot meal in his life? He subsisted on sandwiches, grated cheddar cheese and crisps (which, wtf man? wean yourself off with nachos!) He wasn't nearly as fat as you'd expect, but he did look about 15 years older than he was, and had a complexion like dulux primer.

It was by turns crushingly sad and bumsplodingly funny.

It's not that I'm totally fussy, it's just I'd rather stick to what I know. Plus, I have hang-ups about getting food poisoning.

yeah this describes my roommate. he'll actually try thai or indian (due to going with a large group at a work-sponsored lunch), and go okay that was actually good! But then that knowledge never transfers to thinking "hmm maybe Thai/Indian food is good in general, and I should try other stuff". Instead he'll order that one thing he knows is good EVERY TIME.

I'm mentally pronouncing your screen name as "succotash".
xpost

i'd def rather get food poisoning once a year than stick to "safe" food. it's not that bad. you feel bad, you puke, you're good as new in 24 hours.

i thought sandwiches and cheese were healthy? uh depending on whats on the sandwich, of course.

maybe he looked 15 yrs older because of all the stress from people badgering him to eat hot food

Rocket/Arugala on pizza is amazing but I'm pretty sure I've only ever had that in England. If I ever see it here I'll have that in a heartbeat.

Rocket is surely lettuce, no? Someone upthread seemed to think it was cabbage?

Only celery is irredeemable, although if boiled to within an inch of its life it can often pass unregarded in a curry or somesuch.

^^^ TRUE! Celery is the one food I really hate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arugula

check the family

it's classified by the fda as an herb, apparently. who knew?

I dunno if I'm fussy these days, but my family gets annoyed with me because I'll veto (or just not go, depending) a lot of chains - Olive Garden/Fridays/Chilis/Red Lobster etc. Overpriced bad food plus fam whining about terrible service (or just terrible service in general) = not worth the aggravation.

I'd rather grab a sandwich at the deli, thanks.

maybe he looked 15 yrs older because of all the stress from people badgering him to eat hot food

Or worse, hot badger! Actually, one of the non-lol saddest things of the whole program was his family being ultra-supportive and encouraging whilst he nibbled on a little corner of chicken the size of a pea. Then vommed it up.

xpost this rocket news is completely blowing my dome. Not lettuce? A HERB?

i knew a kid at primary school that would only eat dairylee sandwiches with the crusts cut off or mcdonalds fries. the only things he would drink were coke or water. he had to be on all kinds of vitamins to stop him getting scurvy or whatever.

true stories.

I once worked with someone who would only eat plain butter sandwiches and milk. His reason for doing so was that he had a stomach ulcer and anything else would make him ill. Due to his diet he was anaemic, but he attributed his anaemia to his ulcer.

I was a super-picky eater as a kid -- rarely ate vegetables, refused any meat that wasn't chicken nuggets, bacon, or popcorn shrimp -- and sort of resented my parents' attempts to get me to eat new things. but whenever I went out to eat with people who weren't family members (my friends, my parents' friends), I would get really embarrassed about my pickiness and order something CRAZY and NEW, and usually end up liking it. as I got older, I found myself in this situation more and more frequently, with the end result being that I'll eat almost anything now (although I still don't really care for most winter vegetables, cucumbers (pickled or otherwise), or ketchup). now I'm in the strange position of getting to do things like introduce my girlfriend to artichokes, or make fun of my roommate behind his back for going to a mediterranean restaurant with me and finding nothing that he liked except tortellini salad... and it feels great!

I had this weird thing as a kid where I didn't like ice cream and chips (UK chips). And I mean separately, not together! Although it was strange, it was never an inconvenience the way the standard "I hate vegetables" kid's thing is.

xpost: oh but wait, I'm still pretty particular about my condiments: besides ketchup, I also dislike mustard (although I'm okay with mustards other than the awful disgusting-looking yellow sort), and I don't much care for mayo and sour cream (although this is more a case of "this is gonna add HOW MUCH fat to my food? it doesn't even have any flavor!!!")

No ketchup, yellow mustard or mayo...what do you put on your hamburgers?

lettuce, tomato, cheese, onion (raw or grilled), maybe bacon, sometimes mushrooms, occasionally jalapenos

It's not that I'm totally fussy, it's just I'd rather stick to what I know. Plus, I have hang-ups about getting food poisoning.

yeah this describes my roommate.

I think it describes most people, actually. I've been all snarky and wtf about non-adventurous eaters before, but truth be told, it's not like it's an odd thing to be. I remember reading somewhere that if you have not tried a food by age 50, there's a 95% chance that you never will.

but most people aren't 50 yet, so that's all the more reason to try new things now!

hear hear!

I hope to spend my post-50 years eating mostly things that nobody else tried. I'll just live on raw oysters and tripe.

I'm still trying to get up the courage to go to one of the local Mexican places some weekend and try menudo. never tried tripe before, and that seems as good a place to start as any.

hmmm... depends. I've been sick from a local mexican place before, tripe or no.

I hope to spend my post-50 years eating mostly things that nobody else tried. I'll just live on raw oysters and tripe.

um...

I dislike fussy eaters I guess, though as someone who's had to avoid certain foods for health reasons I sympathise if that's the cause. It is seriously impossible for friends to remember you can't eat a pizza or whatever when planning places to go, can be really stressful when you have to break a dietary rule and give yourself a migraine just to be polite or something...

I'm still trying to get up the courage to go to one of the local Mexican places some weekend and try menudo. never tried tripe before, and that seems as good a place to start as any.

i don't know about that, the last menudo i had was a whole lot of tripe and not much else. i've liked it more in pho or tacos when it's been in much smaller pieces. but hey, maybe you'll love it.

No ketchup, yellow mustard or mayo...what do you put on your hamburgers?

why does every sandwich need dressing? is it always automatically assumed that the sandwich filling will be too dry?

Um. Yes?

I think sandwiches need a lubricant. It can be avocado or hummus or a soft cheese or mustard etc, and tomatoes and other veg help add moisture, but bread is a sponge and I think sandwiches need help with the mouth-feel.

lots and lots and lots of RELISH

i don't know about that, the last menudo i had was a whole lot of tripe and not much else. i've liked it more in pho or tacos when it's been in much smaller pieces. but hey, maybe you'll love it.

― Jordan, Monday, October 6, 2008 9:12 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

also, I really really like hominy, so finding a new way to consume it would be totally gr8

you already up on pozole?

I was remembering last night as I went to sleep: the first time I stayed the night at a friend's house, her mother made a large and delicious breakfast of scrambled eggs and blueberry muffins. She handed me a plate with all of the above, but had put butter on top of the muffin.

At that age I did not like butter (simply for its appearance, I'd never even tried it). I burst into tears. Her poor parents. They were very sweet about it; her mother gave me a new butter-less muffin and her father said, "I'd be a lot healthier if I didn't like butter." But thinking about it, man, that's th kind of curveball that's not so great to throw at people.

I'll eat anything now. (Except sour cream, whipped cream and mayonnaise, mainly a texture issue but also appearance.)

I eat a lot of mayonnaise. Salad leaves without mayo is like eating dry twigs.

Ah I also hated ice cream as a kid (appearance) but I was very happy if someone trying to serve treats from the freezer would just let me eat a bag of frozen vegetables, which really amused everyone. Ate them straight out of the bag like they were Doritos.

I don't know what it was about ice cream that I disliked. I don't think it was appearance or any physical quality, probably more likely it was because I viewed ice cream as being for kids, and the less child like I seemed the less crap I'd get from the adults around me.

Which kind of makes me think, how many of these food dislikes are a result of, er, psychological effects, rather than bad experiences directly resulting from, say, rotten food or bad cooking? For example, I wouldn't eat gooseberries because my dad told me that they were sheep's eyeballs.

I'm not nutty over sour cream, but it does add a little somethin' somethin' to a nacho.

And I unapologetically love mayo. A sandwich just isn't a sandwich, etc.

It melted and turned into glop that was like the molasses monster in Candyland and how do I know that shit wasn't sapient. Plus other children, when eating it, would get it all over their faces. That is disgusting and therefore the food is disgusting by association.

I still have this problem, but most adults don't have these issues, and if they do, I just have to look very far away from them during the meal. This can be awkward if someone is right across from me and talking to me, but I have to retain my appetite, although I know it's odd for you that I am looking at the ceiling or sky.

This re: ice cream.

yeah, i stick with pozole now (same spicy broth + hominy).

Candyland was designed in the 1940s by Eleanor Abbott, while she was recovering from polio in San Diego, California.

!!!!

I hated Candyland, too (a board game, not a food), but this was because my neighbor who owned the game would always stack the deck to get the Queen Frostine card and win. That game is great: nothing like a children's board game that involves no choice, strategy, or randomness (ie dice). Kids love determinism?

Pozole is the SHIT, and I love hominy.

Tripe is a little too fluffy and chewy but it isn't bad.

Abbots I once ordered pancakes at a diner and it came with a tiny ice-cream-style scoop of whipped butter...which I of course THOUGHT WAS ICE CREAM and TOOK A BITE. I'd forgotten until you told your story, but now I remember feeling immensely betrayed, cheap whipped butter being NASTY.

Oh that shit gets chucked off my pancakes SO FAST.

I think I have one friend who is vegetarian, gluten intolerant AND hates mushrooms. Way to make it impossible to cook for them.

I find food fussiness a bit sad, for food is an absolute joy to me. Kosher/halal/vegetarian/coeliac or allergy issues? Not a problem, and I like the challenge of having to think up a meal that accomodates such things.

People who wont eat anything but plain meat and plain veg, or chips and macdonalds, or white bread and lollies? People who go "EW GROSS THATS FOUL AND I REFUSE TO EVEN TRY IT" about even the most basic tasty things like simple roast veg, or garlic, or mushrooms, or fruit or CHICKEN ffs? I think thats ... well, its sad. They're going to be malnourished for one thing. You *cant* live on white bread sandwiches and chips and plain spag bol your whole life.

I'm reminded of that Jamies School Dinners show. I know kids can be fussy eaters, I get that (there were varoius foods that grossed me out as a kid, like pumpkin and creamed corn). But these kids were all, ALL, completely in the dark about natural good foods. They wouldnt eat anyhting but greasy fries and processed chicken meat, but it was because they didnt fucking know any better! Anyone's gonna be fussy if they're never exposed to well cooked, simply flavoured quality veg, fruit, meat and grains/legumes.

It was a revalation when I first tried lentil soup, figs, real italian coffee, strong cheeses, steamed broccoli sauteed in garlic. Things my mum had never made. It was like "OHHHHH so this is why food is good!"

Its all in the way its made, really. I've even forced myself to keep re-rying the few foods I still dont like in the hope I'll adjust. It has so far worked with olives and feta cheese.

About the only thing I'll turn down is sweets (cake, choc, etc). And thats the one thing that ppl will PUSH AND PUSH about. "oh go on just a little bit". NO I DONT LIKE CAKE THANK YOU.

In Dave Barry does Japan, he mentions a fellow flight passenger on his flight home from Japan, who was a Japanese gentleman. When given his meal, he ate the butter patty in little bites. I imagine he felt quite sad.

I think tripe is a lot like tofu -- the texture is all depending on how it's prepared, and the flavor is all depending on what you cook it with. Tripe can be totally chewable and fantastically spicy.

Offal strikes me assomething only as good as its flavourings/sauces. Brains I liked as a kid but I realised later it was the bechamel sauce I liked, not the brains (brains are ok, but theyre bland and kind of floury).

About the only thing I'll turn down is sweets (cake, choc, etc). And thats the one thing that ppl will PUSH AND PUSH about. "oh go on just a little bit". NO I DONT LIKE CAKE THANK YOU.

Ah yes, this makes birthday parties and office birthday celebrations harsh as hell. People simply can't stand if someone does not eat some of their birthday cake. I try and eat a noticeable amount, and mush some crumbs off it for the stealthy having-been-eaten appearance. I can't touch the frosting though, that shit makes my teeth scream.

Fortunately our wedding cake was quite tasty, but that's bcz the cake was not exceptionally sugary and was thickly layered with fresh raspberries and lemon curd of dear god num. The top layer was 'chocolate mocha' and it kind of tasted like meat. (???) But that's still better than tasting like cake.

YES YES, fucking office birthday cake! Barely a week goes by without SOMEONE's birthday being on, and off to the tearoom for cake we go. Now, I'll enjoy a small piece of really good black forest or cheesecake once in a while. But they always buy shitty, dense mudcakes, and serve them up at 5pm on a friday. Why would anyone scoff down a large slab of cheap supermarket mud cake BEFORE DINNER.

I say "I dont really eat cake" with a smile every time this happens. Ive been at this job six months and I still get asked every time we have cake :/

Whem my bday next comes round I'm going to request crackers and antipasto, HAH.

cake haters just take the slice and mail it to me next time sheesh

I realise I've totally undone my "wtf at fussy eaters" post earlier with my "EW CAKE" rant but eh. Im not ew about cake because Ive never tried it or I think its gross, mind. I just lost my sweet tooth many years back when I had braces on my teeth and wasnt allowed sweet food. It never came back. Gimme that umami flavour any day.

YOU KNOW, I've had a sinus infection for about a week and I haven't been able to smell, and most foods don't taste like themselves AT ALL. And I knew that already, everyone knows that smell affects taste, but this time I was thinking "Is this what lentils taste like to Abbot????" because I've been eating stinkier cheese and curry-ier lentils and stronger things to try and taste them again and still...nothing. I wonder if that affects your feelings for various foods, Abbs?

But anything spicy, anything pasta, anything rice, anything foreign, not a chance.

lol @ pasta and rice = alien

I like cake. I don't like bad cake.

Ya Laurel Ive had some stuffy-nose probs recently and at one point noticed I couldnt taste much either. It is so frustrating when food is rendered kinda nothingy.

I think the only things I'm fussy about, within the limits of my diet (pescatarian), are eggs and milk. I like quiche and some scrambles, but I can't deal with anything eggier than that, including omelettes. Oh, and I'm still getting used to raw fish in sushi. But I'll eat pretty much any vegetable you put in front of me.

i love cake, but i'm not crazy about cream-intensive cakes like strawberry shortcake (however, REAL strawberry shortcake, with just a small dollop of fresh whipped cream and voluptuous in-season strawberries, that's the STUFF)

and cream puffs are yum, but i mainly like them for the choux.

what's black forest cake?

i love the way it sounds

when i was at jobs that gave cakes to ppl on their bdays, i always requested a pie instead. it always made everyone happy

Black Forest Cake AKA Black Forest Gateau AKA Schwarzwalder Kirschtorte...
http://www.retrowow.co.uk/retro_britain/60s/black_forest_gateau.jpg

Yeah, buttercream frosting is sometimes a little too much for me.

Best thing abt blackforst cake: the juicy cherries all through, the combo of that and dark soft choclatey cake is just right.

There are so many things that can go wrong with cake, starting with the cake part (from the supermarket it's always parched and corrugated, it seems), on down to the icing-cake ratio (from the supermarket the icing is always slathered on like some kind of snake-oil salve on a cake that cannot be cured), the sweetness of the filling (please stop trying to fool me by putting more and more sugar into something that tastes shitty to start with)... the more bad cake I eat, the more I respect how much it takes to make a good one.

Aye. My fav cakeis one I make myself, I have a recipe for something called "Granny's cake" which is basically a very dense, buttery bundt cake. Butter vanilla flavour, not at all fluffy light like a sponge. Closer to a madiera, I guess. Keeps well, and tastes nice toasted too.

Man I havent made it in years. I should make one to suprise my bf when he gets home from work.

i have this thread to thank for my new name!

OMG I love Schwarzwalder Kirschtorte!!

Changeable screen names is such a pure simple pleasure. (xpost)

I should post to the "what do you look like in your underwear" thread to show how much I love food. But I'm not.

i used to be a fussy eater.

i try to like more things i really do.

but god i just can't stand onions. like they actually make me gag...physically....

it really sucks, i hate hating onions. it's the most annoying thing in the world. i see all this tasty looking stuff that i can't eat....onions are in everything...it sucks SO MUCH I HATE IT

so yeah this weird idea that ppl want to be fussy or not like the way things taste is weird to me...i honestly would pay like a grand to be able to like how onions taste/the texture of onions...it would be worth it over a lifetime of eating.

jeeze, that sucks. onions really are wonderful!

for what it's worth, olives used to do the same thing to me. then, after years of scrupulously avoiding them, I started gradually eating trace amounts of olives in things, and somehow I ended up coming around. I don't love 'em or anything (I think the taste is kinda overpowering in a lot of things), but I look forward to eating the single one that comes on top of my hummus. so fear not, there's still hope!

I have tremendous pity for onion haters, but only a small amount of sympathy due to how insufferable they make EVERY POSSIBLE FOOD-RELATED SITUATION. They're worse than vegetarians (who generally tolerate onions) because at least vegetarians will shut up once they get something to eat (low blood sugar) and try not to make too much of a fuss. Onion-haters are also karmically prone to finding onions in their food even after they have already ruined the table's relationship with the waiter/waitress by aggressively insisting that their meal be prepared onion-free. And then cue the sending back of the meal with onions in it, more bizarre shit ... As a result onion-haters are given to subtle manipulation of food-related social gatherings in a way that makes vegetarians look like regular, down-to-Earth people.

As onion and garlic are verboten in krisna diets (possibly buddist too, not sure), there are ways around it in meal prep - the main one being the use of asfoedita (sp?) which is a resin that apparently stinks, but does impart an oniony/garlicky taste to food.

So non-onion types, check out yr local Krisna Crossways veg restaurant, they do a nice curry.

Which kind of makes me think, how many of these food dislikes are a result of, er, psychological effects, rather than bad experiences directly resulting from, say, rotten food or bad cooking? For example, I wouldn't eat gooseberries because my dad told me that they were sheep's eyeballs.

most of my dislike of mushrooms is that they're a fungus, and the thought of eating fungus is a bit off-putting, although I also dislike the way they feel when they're bitten into.

when I was about seven I was at a friend's birthday party and we'd just had pizza. not long after, one of the guests barfed her pizza all over a couch. that put me off pizza for quite some time afterwards.

Oh yes, vomiting up a food can have negative effects on one's relationship to the vomited food.

see: tequila

Yeah it put me off meat pies for years, as I ate one in primary school and barfed in the car on the way home. Food poisoning I suppose. Oh! I had the same with a pot noodle once so I hated pot noodle for years as well.

(In all honesty most pot noodle is shit anyway. But meat pies I can handle now as long as they're decent home made ones).

A member of my family is autistic and eats a pretty small range of foods. At this point he's old enough that he cooks his own dinners, and nobody who's cooking takes that as an insult, but he's hard to eat out with. We have to go to very bland places. Otherwise, I don't know any fussy eaters so fussy that you can't find something interesting to cook (unless you're living with them, in which case your repertoire can get pretty limited).

Also, I'm in the ranks of those who don't love cake. If there's ice cream with it, I'll take that, thank you.

who else thought this said pussy eaters

― s1ocki, Monday, October 6, 2008 10:21 AM (12 hours ago) Bookmark

I HAVE BEEN READING THIS WRONG ALL DAY

i don't eat pork.. i am mostly vegetarian these days. it's some kind of ethical concern that gets in the way. but sometimes i go back on it, and will eat just about anything except turnips and rutabaga.. my mom used to cook this hash of rutabaga/turnips/carrots/potatoes etc when i was a kid, basically when we were broke and nothing else to make. always hated it. don't like celery much either.

i have ordered natto a couple times trying to convince myself it is good, but it's not.

oh and a colleague cooked up a bunch of crayfish at a party.. i couldn't watch them going into the pot and couldn't eat any either, in fact i haven't had shellfish for over a year.. ugh.

Natto is the most disgusting thing I have ever eaten but YAY SAKE for being there to completely strip the taste from my mouth.

You have sake with breakfast? ;)

Oh yes, vomiting up a food can have negative effects on one's relationship to the vomited food.

Avoidance of vomited food is actually an evolutionary adaptation.

The difference between us and our pets, presumably.

i miss meat pies but i really miss sausage rolls

i like sausage rolls at the time of consumption but i HATE the way they repeat on me so i never eat them anymore

1-2-3 REPEATER

eww

so yeah this weird idea that ppl want to be fussy or not like the way things taste is weird to me...i honestly would pay like a grand to be able to like how onions taste/the texture of onions...it would be worth it over a lifetime of eating.

― M@tt He1ges0n

be zen, matt, I spent the first 25 years of my life avoiding onions at all cost because they also made me gag - I don't know what happened but one day I wanted to eat something with onions in it and I have never looked back, I love them now.

I can not think of a single food I will not eat on taste grounds.

I mean I don't eat processed stuff much, but thats just a preference.

For the most part, I'll eat anything (at least in theory), but I'm not totally out of sympathy with fussy eaters -- there are a few things I won't eat, though almost always for health/safety reasons rather than personal preference. I won't touch raw shellfish, for instance, because I just don't think the risk/reward ratio pans out well; more generally, I don't enjoy sushi enough to justify eating it (let alone paying for it). There are very few foods I find revolting enough that I have trouble forcing them down, though plain mushrooms (raw or cooked) come pretty close.

Having said that, there's totally a hierarchy of fussy eaters:

People who literally can't eat a particular food, i.e. food allergies, severe lactose intolerance -- no worries, it's not your fault, we'll deal

People who are on a particular diet for general health reasons -- ditto, as long as you're upfront about it and take the initiative to get what you need

People who won't eat certain foods for religious or ethical reasons, like vegans, or Krishnas with garlic/onions -- again, as long as you're upfront and helpful, no problem

People in the preceding two categories who don't make an effort to plan ahead, but who make a big fucking production if something doesn't go their way -- grow up, you'll live; I'm more sympathetic to (say) a Muslim who finds out his chicken sausage is wrapped in pork casing than I am to (say) some spoiled upper-middle-class vegan kid who finds out her lentil soup has a trace amount of yogurt in it and who pitches a hissy fit

People who won't eat certain foods for reasons of personal aesthetic preference ("I don't like X") -- well, OK, if we're making plans together, I'll take that into account, but if you have a lot of "issues", though, it's going to be a pain in the ass, especially if they're common foods

People who won't try new things, even if they're totally innocuous -- get a shrink, or get "I'M NO FUN" tattooed on your forehead

People who don't like certain foods, and make a big eye-rolling production about it, especially in group situations -- grow the fuck up; perhaps you ought to trade places for a few days with someone who's starving to death, you'd eat just about anything after that

People who get "cravings" and get pissy if they're not met -- see above x 10

People who get "cravings", and make it clear that they'll be (and act) totally put-upon unless they get exactly what they want, but who DON'T KNOW WHAT IT IS THEY WANT and expect you to stand there and figure it out by making dozens of suggestions until you guess what they're craving -- the lowest of the low, the worst of the worst

i used to be wayyyy picky about eating certain foods but when i left home to go to school i started eating a whole wider of variety of things that i couldn't easily find in my hometown (eg thai, vietnamese, indian) and that my mom would never dream to cook. i inherited a lot of that pickiness from my family, from my dad especially who's one of those "i want everything cooked like my mom used to cook it" types, and i didn't eat very much in the way of vegetables or seafood growing up and consequently it took me some time to get over my irrational dislike of either (i totally adore seafood now). my family recently came into the city for my birthday and finding ANY place in my neighborhood that they'd eat at was a pain (my parents specifically requested "we want to eat italian, but nothing weird")

dating someone with a really adventurous palate helped me to get over food-related fussiness also. i tried octopus and eel at his behest (fourteen-year-old me would've been like wtf get out of here)

People who don't like certain foods, and make a big eye-rolling production about it, especially in group situations

By this, I don't mean something like what Laurel described, i.e. being pushed into eating something she had already politely refused.

(xpost)

I mean, basically, anyone who says "Let's go out to dinner!", and then expects you to make endless suggestions while they shoot them down (while offering none of their own) -- "No, THAT'S not what I want..." -- can go fuck themselves.

Eating more adventurously has made me LESS instead of MORE tolerant of other people's food issues. Now when I go home I want to scratch half my family members' eyes out over their pickiness.

i wonder if people just do that sometimes because they don't want to impose their preferences on you for fear of seeming pushy. but yeah, it's annoying because it's usually obvious that it's a specific type of cuisine they're aiming for but they leave the guesswork up to you. if i'm aching for a certain kind of food i will usually throw it out there with the caveat that if it's not to everyone's liking that i won't get butthurt about it if i don't get my way. not like i can't just have a ham sandwich tomorrow or anything.

xpost feelin' you on that, laurel. falafel ain't gonna KILL you, guys

i wonder if people just do that sometimes because they don't want to impose their preferences on you for fear of seeming pushy.

I think the M.O. of people like that is usually a little different. With the people I'm thinking of, it seems more to be more of a perpetual-sense-of-entitlement, expect-instant-gratification issue. Some of them aren't that way across the board, however -- only about food: they expect to be able to eat whatever they want (and ONLY what they want), whenever they want. Coming from a large and somewhat-poor family, this idea is totally alien to me, and reeks of entitlement.

one of my friends (who came from a very large, poor family) is the pickiest eater i've ever known. will not eat vegetables, when we go out she mostly eats burgers with absolutely no toppings except ketchup. likes hot sauce, but no greenery whatsoever (and forget any kind of vaguely interesting non-American food).

ha - i feel like i should apologize to laurel for incredulously asking, "you don't like onions, either?!?" the other day when we had lunch. i was just a bit surprised but should have kept it to myself.

Question: If you are getting a burger, can you settle with Chiles, Applebees, Fridays, etc... or do you only eat a burger at one or two (maybe 3) specific places?

Nylund OTM, esp. his heirarchy of fussiness, which should be engraved into the scalp of every fussy eater.

This full-blooded Italian girl at work hates both onion and garlic. I just don't understand how that can happen!

ha - i feel like i should apologize to laurel for incredulously asking, "you don't like onions, either?!?" the other day when we had lunch.

OMG I forgot about that! Yeah, I was sort of embarrassed that you asked because, well, yr a food person and I'm a dope! Some people I don't care what they think, but I don't want to be a food idiot in Lauren-land. Big stringy onions, though, they challenge my best intentions.

Is this the thread where I say that two of the three men in my fam won't touch eggs unless they're a) scrambled and b) scrambled into little chips of yellow rubber, ie totally dry. God forbid you add milk, cream, or water, whichever is yr preference, because all they want is DRY DRY EGGS.

I may or may not have thrown the pan down and said, "Fine. Then YOU can overcook your own eggs" and left the room.

i THOUGHT it was weird when you loudly announced to everyone that the onions were in fact "grilled and delicious" but you were not going to eat them so the rest of us should take your onions away. hahahaha omg.

they just seem so innocuous. also, i was worried that at some point i had forced you to try a bite of something onion-laden.

it's totally not weird to dislike onions, i don't like raw onions unless they are chopped up very small and into a pico de gallo or guacamole, for example. i'm sorry you felt bad about it laurel! i had no idea, it didn't strike me as terribly strange to see you remove them tbh.

Another category of fussiness is people who worry inordinately about finding a bone in their fish. After I made delicious walleye fillets in tempura batter, it made my BLOOD BOIL to watch my fussy brother spend 15 minutes dissecting his to the minutest shred with with knife, fork & fingertips. Disgusting to witness, and infuriating after I really took some time to fillet the things correctly & cook them in such a way that the texture is important.

how hard is it to take a bone out of your mouth?

Yeah I mean there are things I've never tried, like okra, or eggplant, because they just SEEM gross; this is totally my mental bad and I'm trying to give these things a chance but it's kind of a lot of energy to be psyched up to try them. I have to be feeling really open.

And then there are things that are in foods I eat all the time, like onions... if they're small, I just say "fuck it" and eat them, but big chunks or strings: no.

If texture is the problem with okra, then pickled or fried is the way to go. Fried is better for actually tasting the okra (which is great).

Fried anything is a good gateway to new foods

liking eggplant took some doing for me: i've had amazingly good eggplant but i've also had terrible, rubbery, full-of-seeds type which grosses me out somewhat

xpost YES

http://seriouslygood.kdweeks.com/images/fried-okra-400.JPG

NOM NOM NOM

deep fried zucchini is a treasure

ugh you guys, okra is so so so nasty, wtf

hated okra til i had it in fried form at indian places (just had some for lunch, actually). tasty treat.

uh oh, I got us off topic. (But Dan you are RONG.)

I'm pretty sure I'm not, is the thing.

ok then, that's more for me.

See? Everyone wins!

To add to Charlie's hierarchy, I also can't stand ethical veg*ns who impose their beliefs upon everyone else in the room, EVEN WHEN IT DOESNT AFFECT THEM DIRECTLY.

Case in point: whiny militant vegan acquantance of mine, has bunch of friends crashed at her place (large share house). Visitor dude goes out and gets McDonalds, comes back with bag in hand, and she literally screams at him "GET THAT FILTH OUT OF HERE I WILL NOT HAVE IT IN MY HOUSE".

Nnggghhh. Be happy all you like about your moral choices, but dont insist the rest of the world follow your lead AND be abused for not doing so.

uh, but it was her house

I mean, I'm person #1 to make fun of someone else's eating habits but ppl can be as odd about food as they want to be in their own homes.

I would say if the guy was eating it around her and she could smell it then yeah, she could ask him to go into another room or something. I hate it when people eat meat around me because I don't like the smell.

Was the guy in question her personal guest? If so, that's one thing, but if not, since it's a share house (not only hers), she was way out of line.

In general, I don't have tremendous sympathy for the smell/odor issue. There are foods whose odor I dislike, but I'm not going to ask that other people refrain from eating or preparing them, since no harm can come to me from it (unlike, say, really strong perfume, or cigarette smoke, which can mess some people up).

That being said, I'll gladly accommodate a polite request, but someone who acted like the militant vegan in Trayce's story would get told in no uncertain terms -- wait for it -- to go fuck themselves.

but then there's the opposite situation when people ACT like vegans are making a big deal when they're not, eg. my bf is vegan, and never ever makes an issue out of it, and will never mention it in an eating situation unless someone ASKS him about it, and even then he's reticent about making anything out of it - he'll answer people's questions, but never act all preachy. but the person who raised the subject will get all pissy about it. that is pretty annoying.

Picking a food fight is fucked up in both directions, yeah.

if louis took up charlie's no uncertain terms policy any lesbians acting like that would get told to go scissor themselves.

but then there's the opposite situation when people ACT like vegans are making a big deal when they're not

Oh, sure, that sucks too -- some people will take another person's veganism as an implicit criticism, which is ridiculous.

I mean, basically, the moral of the story is that people need to STFU, tend to their own needs, and mind their own business. Which is usually the moral of the story, after all.

if louis took up charlie's no uncertain terms policy any lesbians acting like that would get told to go scissor themselves.

"I know those words, but that sign makes no sense."

How do you define sex? [Started by jaymc in October 2008, last updated Yesterday by Abbott] 63 new answers

Yeah it was a share house, was partly my point: it wasnt only "her house" to be such a bossyboots about. As it turned out I think he only had chips or something anyway.

I was in no way passing any judgement about vegetarians in general with that post, I hasten to add.

In general, I don't have tremendous sympathy for the smell/odor issue. There are foods whose odor I dislike, but I'm not going to ask that other people refrain from eating or preparing them, since no harm can come to me from it (unlike, say, really strong perfume, or cigarette smoke, which can mess some people up).

This is so obviously coming from a person who has not smelled dead rats before.

Dude, smell is an offense in and of itself. When I'm repulsed by cigarette smoke, it is the SMELL of it that does me in, not the bad health effects which are only comprehended by my logical (non-smelling) mind.

But yeah, Trayce, I didn't understand it was a shared house, so that does put a different light on things.

When someone eats meat around me where I can smell it, it's like saying "hey, want a trip to the garbage dump?"

is there a purpose to this sort of hyperbole?

why is it hyperbole?

because it sounds like it. i'm consistently baffled by the use of the words 'repulsed' and 'disgusting' when it comes to cigarette smoke. and if properly cooked fresh meat smells like a garbage bin to you, i'm concerned for your sense of smell more than anything

well, you obviously aren't a vegetarian. nuff said.

Cigarette smoke is unendurable to me. No reason why you can't respect that.

i'm not talking about respect for fucks sake - i don't expect you to have to endure anything. i'm saying i think such descriptions are invariably over the top. but whatever.

then again, i am talking to the grand poobah of hyperbole

well regardless of whatever you think I'm the grand poobah of, I don't see why I should have to try extra hard to prove that I happen to find the smell of cooked meat disgusting (though I admit I do eat fish occaisionally), and I find cigarette smoke even more repulsive and will move away from it as best I can under given circumstances. I don't see why you think I'm lying about these things.

steak does not smell like garbage imo

I mean, it's silly to get so out of whack about someone else's eating habits, yeah? For example, lots of people love pickles. I CAN'T STAND PICKLES especially when someone put them on my sandwich and I didn't ask for them. ETC ETC ETC But who gives a shite?

fish smells more like garbage imo

what a beautiful world it would be if rubbish did smell like steak

I.G.Y.

well anyway i was going to concede i could conceive of the meat point but the smoke one is still baffling to me. but maybe i'm just used to it from being exposed to smokers my whole life? i don't know. how do you cope being around an open fire?

An open fire is beautiful, man!! For the real, an open fire is 18 zillion times more preferable than a cigarette. Me and my best friend in the early 90's used to just stare at an open fire in the back yard all night. Then his parents would get mad and it would all be over. But we did a great job with our campfire in the backyard, it was cool.

This is so obviously coming from a person who has not smelled dead rats before.

I don't know about rats, but I've smelled plenty of decomposing animals through the years, mostly dead sea creatures that wash up on shore. I've also smelled other horrible things, one of the worst of which was rotten potatoes. Nothing anyone has ever eaten in my presence has ever come close to the intensity or inherent badness of those odors.

Still, though the smell of a decomposing animal might make me gag, it can't harm me per se -- the worst it can do is make me puke -- whereas cigarette smoke or super-strong perfume can give someone an asthma attack, allergic reaction, or otherwise cause bona-fide respiratory distress.

If someone finds the smell of cooked meat disgusting (which is totally their prerogative, of course), I figure it's probably a reaction that's heavily informed by their personal beliefs. That doesn't make it less legitimate, but it does mean that they're not terribly likely to be accommodated by their friends and co-workers, except as a special favor.

i am kind of the opposite of a fussy. i like so much food. but not anchioves.

Bimble you wont ever want to meet me, I'm a smoker and I love the smell of a BBQing steak, heh sorry!

I (and my parents) have a list in the kitchen of foods my girlfriend won't eat. Including: cabbage, broccoli, cream, nuts, salmon, baked/mashed/boiled potato, raw tomato, blue cheese, salad, pea soup, noodle soup, prawns, green bananas... etc etc.

By contrast, I used to be fairly fussy when I was young (nothing in sauces, absolutely no wiggly fat, onions, egg, blue cheese and others). Now I'll eat almost anything except egg (on its own - fried, boiled, poached etc - but I will eat omelette!) and blue cheese.

Reading this thread, I feel so lucky that I like all food stuffs. I feel bad for those of you who cannot eat some things for whatever reasons. To those of you who wont eat a certain type of food, do you feel like you are missing out on something, or do you just accept it and dont really care that you wont ever eat any of that stuff?

I (and my parents) have a list in the kitchen of foods my girlfriend won't eat. Including: cabbage, broccoli, cream, nuts, salmon, baked/mashed/boiled potato, raw tomato, blue cheese, salad, pea soup, noodle soup, prawns, green bananas... etc etc.

heavens. i honestly don't think i could spend much time with someone so exacting. that's like a nine-year-old's shitlist. i don't get people who don't want to try new food. even the foods i don't much care for - mushrooms, celeriac, anything where the investment is siginificantly greater than the return - i try once a year to make sure i still feel the same way. that's how i discovered mushrooms aren't actually so bad after all!

I wish people wouldn't heat up food at work.

Why not?

It's annoying to me to work around the smell of food, even if it's good food. At best, it's distracting. At worst, well, I don't much care for the crap that people are usually reheating, so the odor is disgusting. I don't even like to smell my own lunch, so I always eat something cold. Even food I wouldn't mind smelling after work is awful. E.g., anything with reheated tomatoes smells like vomit to me at work.

Folks at my work tend to (re)heat what smells to me like instant Chinese food, and it's just NASTY. I have nothing against Chinese food in general, but it's terrible to smell at work.

but then there's the opposite situation when people ACT like vegans are making a big deal when they're not

oh, man. that is so annoying, and it happened a lot when i was vegan. in my experience, there are quite a few people who like to pick fights with people who don't eat animal products. i started to dread the subject coming up, because it usually meant a lecture from someone about why my habits were wrong, unhealthy, and hypocritical.

god, i remember doing a volunteer event, and afterwards a pizza lunch was served. the coordinator saw me leaving without taking any food, and asked why i wasn't eating. i told her that i didn't eat dairy products, and she said (REALLY snidely) "well, we can't provide special food just because you don't want cheese." um... did i ask for a special meal??

you don't like eggs?!!? EGGS! EGGS! EGGS!

If I had a surprise vegan volunteer I'd be angsting about finding her something to eat if I was supposed to be feeding all the volunteers. Basic manners, yo.

Veganism nestled in amongst spoiled-brat demeanour and feeling entitled to boss others is just bad PR, as I have informed rude vegans x a million.

people ate some food

Ask Sara RC about the time when we were in college and I asked her why she stopped eating meat. That was a fun argument!

god, i remember doing a volunteer event, and afterwards a pizza lunch was served. the coordinator saw me leaving without taking any food, and asked why i wasn't eating. i told her that i didn't eat dairy products, and she said (REALLY snidely) "well, we can't provide special food just because you don't want cheese." um... did i ask for a special meal??

― lauren

yes! this happens to my boyfriend a lot.
despite his eating parameters he's STILL way less fussy than me - he's way more adventurous with new foods, yet will happily eat the same thing every day (i make him the exact same lunch every single day).

smelling food at work can be annoying, but fucking deal with it. people need to eat. the world isn't and should not be set up so you never have to smell anything you don't want.

OTFinM.

If someone else's lunch is the worst thing you smell all day, man, just count yourself lucky.

I assumed lib was being sarccy because he's normally so...normal. Practical. And More Goth Whatsit up there was being v mockable all morning.

i also keep misreading this thread title

I do deal with it, though, see. I haven't mentioned being annoyed with food-reheating to anyone at work, and I'm not about to try to deny anyone the ability to heat up their food. There's probably something I do that annoys others at work, and this annoyance is pretty minor, all told, so it all works out in the end. I just thought I'd share my special little annoyance with y'alls here since I don't have any good fussy eater stories (aside from the normal vegetarian pseudo-"fussy-eater" ones).

I thought that I was the most cooperative vegetarian in the universe until recently I went out for a going-away lunch for a colleague at Chili's, and a vegetarian colleague just sort of casually discarded X years of not eating meat by getting a chicken sandwich, since Chili's has virtually no vegetarian items. I'm pretty easy to go out to eat with, but I'm not that easy.

y'know, i really appreciate that sort of flexibility. being a vegetarian isn't an endurance test. if you choose to suspend being a vegetarian for one lousy chili's chicken sandwich, it doesn't mean that you can't go right back to being one immediately afterwards. you don't have to reset the clock for the vegetarian police or anything.

that person gets A++ Not Fussy Eater award.

yeah my mini-rant was primed by your post but was directed more at people I've encountered who truly do feel that they should not be imposed upon by anyone at any time at any place, w/r/t to food or anything else. There's a clause in the lease at the place I live now that forbids any "cooking with pungent spices", which is such whitebread midwestern b.s. You live in an apartment. You may have to deal with sounds and smells from others. (while I'm at it, FU to mofos who instantly complain when they can hear any noise from another apartment.)

Since Chili's has virtually no vegetarian items.

This is so not true, btw. For one, at every Chili's I've ever been to, you can substitute a black-bean burger for any of the burgers on the menu.

There's a clause in the lease at the place I live now that forbids any "cooking with pungent spices", which is such whitebread midwestern b.s.

lol racism

I do appreciate my colleague's flexibility, but speaking only regarding my own vegetarianism, if I started to make exceptions, I'm quite sure I'd toss the whole enterprise out the window shortly thereafter. It's actually quite easy to be a vegetarian and eat out with folks who aren't, I've found after 22 years: Most restaurants have something vegetarian on the menu, and if they don't, they'll often make you something quite good if you just ask the waiter for "something vegetarian".

Yes, I did get the black bean burger @ Chili's. This seemed to be the only vegetarian option on the menu, and I have to admit that it was the finest cardboard sandwich I have ever had.

lol racism

That doesn't seem like racism so much as not extending one's self into someone else's personal space. The same reason most apartments have rules like "No loud noise after 10" or whatever.

I thought that I was the most cooperative vegetarian in the universe until recently I went out for a going-away lunch for a colleague at Chili's, and a vegetarian colleague just sort of casually discarded X years of not eating meat by getting a chicken sandwich, since Chili's has virtually no vegetarian items. I'm pretty easy to go out to eat with, but I'm not that easy.

― (libcrypt) (libcrypt) (libcrypt), Wednesday, October 8, 2008 5:36 PM (31 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

wow that's incredible! My best friend is a 15 year+ vegetarian who is easygoing enough to pick pepperoni slices off of pizza and have a "cheese slice" and I thought that in itself was award-worthy - but a chicken sandwich!

I have to admit, I actually ate a couple small strips of prosciutto on a brie-and-grape pizza a couple weeks ago, after forgetting to tell the waitress to leave it off. To be fair, I was also somewhat drunk.

I won't pick apart a pizza, but if a small amount of meat finds its way into something I've ordered, I'll usually just eat it or around it if it's not too much trouble. The way I figure it, that's not an "exception".

the grape part was a bigger crime imo than the little pigmeat
xpost

here's a clause in the lease at the place I live now that forbids any "cooking with pungent spices"

Not sure I would categorize this as racism, tho I won't argue too hard about that. Wd DEF say it's part of an overall xenophobia, just your everyday garden variety rejection of the unfamiliar. What if you made garlic chicken? French onion soup? Any curry of any kind? Banning cooking smells is just insane, plus who decides what's "pungent"?? It's like saying, "anything I don't like" where the "I" is completely undefined.

Laurel do you want to live next to paki or what

think Laurel is OTM, more xenophobic than racist. fyi there are a lot of Indian/Pakistani people moving into the area, and area that until very recently was almost nothing but upper middle class whites.

lol already did! Well, Yemeni. The mom had an awesome DIY garden on the roof behind their apt, she planted tomato plants and special hot peppers and stuff in old spackle buckets. I bet they ate pretty well. xp

And obv I've cooked "pungent" stuff many times, fuck that noise.

I mean I think they were kind of poor and they had like 6 kids to house, clothe, and feed, but that still doesn't motivate a lot of people to plant their own gardens so I give them "thumbs up" for rad. Also the kids were cute & friendly. I liked being their neighbor.

my sister has a coworker who has complained to her about the smell of indian food people reheat at work. my sister frequently brings in leftovers of indian food i've cooked for her lunch.

Actually it is low-level racism, as Somali, Mexican, Vietnamese and Ethiopian families are a big part of Minneapolis and their home cooking involves bringing the spicy. I think you'd move into a whole other level of cockness if you tried to enforce the clause, which might not even stand up in court.

wow that's incredible! My best friend is a 15 year+ vegetarian who is easygoing enough to pick pepperoni slices off of pizza and have a "cheese slice" and I thought that in itself was award-worthy - but a chicken sandwich!

I really can't tell how sarcastic this is supposed to be.

Not sarcastic at all.. I think my best friend is a champ and I think this person is almost past champ status. Is that so hard to believe? Bravo for non-fussy eaters!

FWIW I will eat almost anything, but I have never been convinced to eat a McDonald's filet-o-fish sandwich because it looks so very gross.

It's not that it's hard to believe, it's just that the effusive tone is something that usually I only see on things that are really, really sarcastic, plus I'm tired.

just stopping by to say that filet-o-fish sandwiches are AWESOME

I haven't eaten one in years because I used to love them and am now afraid that they would make me hurl.

nah, I'm Canadian and thus naturally effusive!

I still don't know about those filet-o-fish sandwiches though. Does it taste like a Chicken sandwich but with fish inside? It just doesn't seem appealing to me.

It tastes like a fish fillet with tartar sauce that happens to be on a bun.

Yeah it takes like chicken if chicken tasted of fish...
Actually I've never had one, but I always suspected that they tasted of cotton wool? Anyone confirm?

Hmmmmmm. I didn't consider tartar sauce. Maybe one day! When I'm stoned. I think this is part of the reason I am not a fussy eater - pickle slices and cheddar cheese on a Triscuit? Damn right!

Well I knew fish wouldn't taste like chicken - I was referring to the breading on the meat, the bun, the mayo (tartar sauce evidently), lettuce..

No lettuce. Breaded fried fish, tartar sauce, american cheese, bun.

dammit now I want one

more foods should adopt the "_____ O' _____" naming template.

"What you grilling there, Bob?"
"Why Ribs O' Pig, of course. "

mmmm, with some Cob O'Corn and Salad O'Potato on the side

More truth in advertising needed, tho.

Burger O' Crap
Fries O' Mold
Coke O' the soda machine broke wtf do you want me to do about it?

This girl I used to work with was the pickiest eater, she could eat say burgers or ham sandwiches but with NO mayo or toppings - just plain. Not just preferred them like this - if the cafe got it wrong and put mayo in the burger she wouldn't eat it. Also wouldn't eat all kinds of other foods. She didn't really make a big deal out of it but after a while it began to seem quite weird.

I used to be pretty picky as a child but again I think that was because meat was gristly or was liver, beans were stringy, etc - eating meals was more of a chore whereas I LOVED all puddings, cakes, any sweets, and stuff like breaded turkey drumsticks(probably full of sugar, I remember them being quite sweet) or any such frozen food.

Now I love food so much and will eat pretty much anything, unless I deem it slimy (some seafood). I even learned to like mushrooms (well cooked) and olives (after going to Greece and eating bucketloads of tapenade). I never even tried avocados until a couple of years ago, now I love them (can't think why particularly, they don't have a strong flavour).

Btw I had arugular on a pizza in the USA but I didn't know it was rocket so asked them what it was and they said it was a type of lettuce. I still ordered it despite expecting some crazy iceberg lettuce pizza or whatever.
Generally agree re pizza toppings should be classic, although a good chicken tikka pizza is awesome and even better is a fajita pizza with chicken and guacamole and sour cream.

Burger O' Crap

LOLZ

I wish people at work wouldn't heat up leftovers that smelled yummy. It makes me hungry.

I just heated up sausage and lentil casserole IN THE WORK KITCHEN. hah.

it's taken me three days to chew my way through this thread ... which reminds me of the time my mum tried doing home-made pizza back in about 1987. fuck me. i still have nightmares about that.

i, too, was a fairly fussy little shit when i was younger: didn't like red meat (fat, gristle), didn't like sauce (messy, cf abbott's comments about ice cream), was positively freaked out by the idea of cheese that had been cooked in any way. but i have this vague memory of being ill (nothing more than a bad cold, IIRC) and suddenly fucking starving, and, as i was getting better, wolfing down a plate of meat stew my mum had made. and from that moment on -- i'd have been six? seven? -- it was like, woah, food rules.

there's pretty much nothing i won't eat now. i had a bad experience with an aubergine in 1993 but i'm over that now (indeed: perhaps the single greatest thing i've ever eaten was a baked lamb and aubergine concoction in greece). cauliflower cheese is something i'd avoid, though -- i think that's just because i remember my mum making it for herself and it looking so fucking rank: big white lumps of brainy whiteness in an off-white sauce. boak. love cauliflower, though, and love cheese (although i'm still not so big on the smell of cheese being grilled, say). whatever: i know these are just associative problems from childhood, so they don't bother me at all.

the only thing i've refused to eat in the past fuck-knows-how-many years was a dish mrs F made, from a recipe in a normally very good book, the other week: spagetti with spinach and quark cheese. christ on a bike, that was honking. mrs F wouldn't touch it, either. the only thing that tasted worse was the quark cheese on its own. hard to describe ... almost like an aggressively bland anti-taste, as if it was scraping off your tastebuds.

amusingly, and completely coincidentally, i've just this second read the sentence "quarks are hypothetical constructs" in the book on research methods over which i'm toiling. wish that fucking cheese had been a hypothetical construct.

Maybe it wasn't salted enough? I made a quark cheese in high school and it was kind of awesome.

indeed: perhaps the single greatest thing i've ever eaten was a baked lamb and aubergine concoction in greece).

was that a moussaka?

U&K with cauliflower cheese (and also macaroni cheese) is that the cheese must be strong mature English cheddar. Anything else is either tasteless or smells too strongly. Also important is the addition of breadcrumbs on top, plus a bit of freshly grated parmesan, both of which must be browned properly under the grill.

Worst dish I've eaten for a long time recently was some kind of pasta dish with lemon sauce. We had to keep piling on the black pepper. I kept eating it, even after other people had given up, saying "you know, it's OK, you just have to add lots of black pepper", before I eventually said "you know what? fuck this, it's disgusting".

Worst dish I've eaten for a long time recently was some kind of pasta dish with lemon sauce.

― snoball, Thursday, 9 October 2008 14:41 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^anti-Sicilian comment, thus suggested ban

oh I have to retract my statement about eating almost anything; I loathe eggplant so much I forgot it existed!

I also had a few pieces of tripe once at dim sum and didn't care for that. Kind of like eating elastic bands.

Yeah I don't know that I'm ever going to get around to giving eggplant a shot. It kind of disgusts me with its purpleness and fleshiness. I might have eaten it once by accident and been severely disappointed that it wasn't something else (cf the "celeric does not equal potatoes" story up-thread).

thai green chicken curry is the best delivery method for eggplant that I've encountered. eggplant parmigiana being 2nd.

I could probably handle eggplant parmigiana.. what bothers me about the few bits of eggplant I've had in my life is it tastes/feels like overcooked mushy zucchini. Smothered in tomato sauce and cheese, I might not mind so much.

Probably the best eggplant I've had was in an Indian dish; not only was it flavored awesomely, but it practically fell apart in my mouth.

A lot of the eggplant I see in Thai cuisine is actually green eggplant:

http://www.recipetips.com/images/glossary/e/eggplant_thai.jpg

Lots and lots of good Indian dishes w/eggplant in them. The bhaigan barta at my local Indian place = yummm!!!!

xp

guys you obviously never had this beauty
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/25/64564603_61e8aa08f0.jpg

ken, "beauty" isn't necessarily how i'd describe that but i do imagine it tastes fucking lovely. what is it?

it's aubergine and meat with sichuan chilli sauce

Now I want indian for lunch and there's nothing near my office. :(

i only like to eat bananas is they're still a little bit green.

or pink

on the bbc's loltastic Freaky Eaters, what happens to the big mountain of food they show the hapless schmoe in each episode? is it just dumped or do they give it away?

they make them eat it all. like people's dads in tv shows when they catch them with cigarettes.

Also, on topic, fussy eaters are fucking clown-shoes.

the one who was confronted with a bathful of Pasta - all the pasta was out of date, so you'd hope they didn't eat too much.