It’s true that I have a handful of foods I don’t like, and am very vocal about it. But I don’t consider myself to be super-picky. Ya know? True super-picky eaters irritate me, and I don’t put myself in that category. Some things I don’t like:
Mayonnaise I will never ask for it to be added to anything, but don’t generally ask for it to be excluded either. If I go to Wendy’s, for instance, I just roll with it. However, if it’s oozy and sloppy I’m disgusted and scrape that shit off with a plastic knife. There’s very little subtlety with mayonnaise. It’s seems to be administered with an ice cream scoop, more often than not.
Garlic Again, I live with it if it’s subtle and just a part of the overall seasoning situation. But that’s rare, as rare as a co-worker you had no idea has unlimited data. It’s almost always the only thing you can taste. And smell. Blecch. It makes me sick just thinking about it. Garlic comes straight from the devil’s window box.
Fast food pickles These I do ask to be excluded, on account of their nastiness. If I bite into one of those things my lower jaw retracts, as the pre-vomit sequence is launched. I don’t like the taste, and I don’t like the consistency. And the sliminess doesn’t help, either. If I’m in a slightly fancier place, and the pickles are firm and higher quality, I don’t react so violently. But I’ll still peel those bastards off. They’re too dominant, throw off the entire texture profile, and are often garlic-infused. Garlic on a burger now?? We’re very near the end, my friends. I was almost arrested once because of pickles on a Big Mac. I was pulled over, berated by a cop, and given a full battery of sobriety tests. I told him I ordered my burger with no pickles, as God intended, and bit into one anyway. And that’s why my car crossed the center line, and nearly went onto the sidewalk. But he wasn’t buying it. I like sweet pickles, especially with grilled cheese for some reason. But dill pickles can go fuck themselves.
Shrimp These are simply bugs. We’re supposed to love ’em, because society has decided we do. But I ain’t playing along. You guys go ahead and eat your big plates o’ grub worms, and smile at each other in a knowing manner. I’ll just have a corndog or something. Sweet sainted mother of Conrad Bain!
There’s other stuff, too. Like gyros. I think I’d rather eat one of Andy’s yard crullers. And I’m not really a fan of curry or asparagus. But I generally go along with whatever is on the docket. Toney would surely disagree, but I don’t believe I’m a picky eater. I roll with it, almost always. I just have, you know, several dozen things that are an automatic no. Ha. I’m kidding. Sorta.
The kind of picky eater that annoys me are the ones who can’t have their foods touching each other, or have never tasted common things like tomatoes, or who just simply refuse to roll with it. I can’t accept overpowering garlic, but adapt to almost everything else. Pickles? I just shout the f-word, and pluck that grossness off. It doesn’t ruin anything, it’s just a speed bump on the boulevard of gluttony. Or whatever.
Another thing that irritates me is when people REFUSE to try things they’re unfamiliar with. What are you, seven years old? I’m always ready to try new stuff, but will admit when I don’t like it. I’m not buckling under to societal pressures, goddammit. If it smells like August ass, or tastes like dumpster run-off, I’m gonna say it. Many people won’t.
Do you have anything on super-picky eaters? Do you consider yourself to be one? Who’s the pickiest of all picky eaters you’ve encountered? My brother won’t eat an omelette because he doesn’t like the sound of the word. And I had an uncle who would become nearly physically ill if somebody put cream in their coffee and didn’t stir it. He’d practically do a shoulder-roll with a spoon in his hand, shouting “STIR IT! FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT’S HOLY, STIR IT!!” He’s gone now, but his legacy lives on.
What items are automatically a no for you? And at what point does that list become the ravings of a picky madman? I’m convinced I’m not anywhere near.
I had no idea what I was going to write about today, but it turned out OK, I think. I hope you guys feel the same.
But I have to go to work now. Good stuff. I’ll see you again on Thursday.
Have a great day!
Now playing in the bunker
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I won’t eat seafood. And I don’t like garlic either.
I make superb curries (both Indian and Thai), a household staples is 40 cloves of garlic and a chicken, in local asparagus season it stinks of sulfurous (sulphurous) pee here, and last night I had a beef and lamb burger full of Greek toppings that was basically a gyro burger. Guess I’m not inviting the Kays over 🙂
I agree on the shrimp (prawn), especially the imported ones raised in pools of chicken shit and dead birds under Chinese chicken farms.
Corn dogs! I haven’t eaten a corn dog since 1976. A girl in my 1st grade class peeled the skin off of one in front of me in the lunchroom. Scarred me for life.
I wil eat just about anything, except mushrooms. It’s like eating dirt. Growing up in a large family, food fussiness was never an option.
My younger son, however, took the cake for pickiness. In his early years, he would want the point cut off his pizza, and the ends cut off his hot dogs. Even a garnish on a plate of buttered noodles would set him off. To this day, at age 28, he will not eat anything green; no veggies or fruits.
I was all set to say I didn’t know any picky eaters then I recalled my son who between 2 and 3 would only eat peas, fish sticks and fruit. Gradually we added ground beef, Omaha steaks boneless chicken breasts, potatoes. He didn’t, and still doesn’t eat most condiments. All my friends would boast that they got their kids to eat anything if it was drenched in ranch dressing – no luck here. For a long time he didn’t eat butter. Doesn’t eat pickles, olives, relish.
When he was 6 a doctor finally noticed that he had GIANT tonsils that made it hard for him to swallow. They were removed, we crossed our fingers but things didn’t really improve. He is a grown man now and does eat more ethnic foods but I know I always get his cole slaw at the diner.
I will eat most anything…raw oysters, pickles, garlic. I raised a picky eater that is now currently worrying about the fact that her daughter is a picky eater. I have a son-in-law that does not eat vegetables, or seafood, or anything remotely ethnic (non southern cooking foods).
I know an adult in his late 40’s whose diet is basically chicken nuggets. There may be a candy bar or bowl of cereal or similar sometimes, but nothing as wild as a vegetable or piece of fruit.
I can’t wrap my head around that. How the hell do you get that far in life and not eat some veggies? F’in snowflakes…
He’s very much not a snowflake, it’s just his diet never got past a picky 6 year old’s diet. Blame his parents. It was chicken nuggets and heroin for quite a while, but he’s ditched the unhealthier one now.
That’s fortunate because I understand heroin isn’t all that tough when you really put your mind to it.
jtb
Yeah, I know: only you and Larry Bird turn down the easy ones.
I’m glad to hear that he’s given up the nuggets
Being picky wasn’t an option in our house growing up. You ate what was on your plate or you didn’t eat. We were all allowed a thing or two that we just couldn’t stomach (for me it was liver and onions and sweet potatoes), but that was it. My parents were very adventurous and loved to try new things so I grew up with a pretty varied palette. We’ve carried on the tradition with our kids and they eat what we have and must try everything.
I have a niece that would only eat Lunchables and cold hot dogs. Oh, and chicken McNuggets — only from McDonald’s though; knockoffs not allowed. She’s in her 20’s now, and although her tastes are slightly more varied, she still orders hot dogs when you take her to dinner and the most ethnic food she’ll eat is grits (but only with a lot of sugar).
I have never understood the sugar in grits or cornbread thing…
Give me salt, pepper, and butter in my grits.
I have never understood the appeal of grits at all, regardless of what’s in or on them.
Amen, sister! Sweet cornbread is an abomination. I don’t understand sugar on grits, but I don’t find it quite as offensive, just confusing.
And some shrimps!
“Being picky wasn’t an option in our house growing up. You ate what was on your plate or you didn’t eat.”
That was my household too!!! the old man once forced me to eat a Braunschweiger sandwich for lunch, which within a minute, I promptly regurgitated all over the kitchen table.
I despise Peaches and Fruit Cocktail, because for 17 years that I lived I the house, we had one or the other every. single. night.
Now that I’m old, I relish the fact that I can eat what I want (I don’t like relish). I’ll eat tomatoes, lettuce and onions on a burger, but that’s pretty much all the veggies I will eat. I don’t voluntarily eat fruit either.
The warden eats all that veggie shit, only time I will eat some is if I’m pissed off at her, then I will eat as much broccoli as I can stuff down my pie hole, so she will suffer from the resultant sulfuric ass gas.
Pickles – hate em. If McDonalds gives me some on a burger, they end up as pickle races on their windows. I like the long dill pickle spears though, go figure.
Oh, and I won’t eat white dip. Picante and some cheese dips are ok. but NO WHITE DIP. Yes, I probably have some issues.
One more thing, this is psychomatic, cannot eat, or even smell watermelon. As a kid, got sick at the state fair after eating a huge slice which was probably poisoned, and can’t get near it since.
I don’t drink white milk. The only eggs I can eat are scrambled or omlette, and no mayo or sour cream, unless they’re mixed in (tuna salad).
Oh, avacados and guacamole can kiss my ass too.
Picky eating was not allowed when I was being raised. I did not allow it in my daughter either. If I cook it, you will by-God eat it or go hungry. She and I are both very adventurous eaters to this day. My ex-husband tried that picky-eating shit on me. I refused to cave. I recall this snippet of conversation:
Him: “What are you cooking?”
Me: “Okra.”
Him: “Well, what am I gonna eat?”
Me: “OKRA!!!”
Heh. That may have been the true beginning of our downward slide.
You can’t pay me enough to eat raw oysters…its like a loogie on a half shell. I will eat them fried, but only at my mother-in-laws house.
I can’t do extruded chicken ie. mcnuggets or the BK original sandwich. Any chicken bits that have been ground up, run through a machine into a mold and formed into a new shape is off limits. That’s pretty much my rule for most meats. No bologna here either. Hot dogs get a pass, but only if grilled or at a sporting event, and only certain types…natural casing hotdogs, the kind that snap, or those pink “wieners” make me nauseous. Gross. My husband has introduced me to Conecuh sausage. I like it, but other link sausage is forbidden.
Neither my husband nor I will eat brussels sprouts, and while he will only eat cooked mushrooms when necessary, I could eat them raw right out of the container…after a rinse.
Lew, I enjoy your writing; seems to me that you should be the one putting together the new Rules of the Senate. Only in America would it occur to us to exclude from our diet “extruded chicken”; and hot dogs get a pass — which I assume means they don’t get a pass — only if grilled at certain types of sporting events: you didn’t specify, but I assume rugby, lacrosse, punkin chunkin, octagon fighting, and demolition derby. And it’s nice to hear that Conecuh sausage can be served at your table. I have some good friends who wear the six-pointed star.
I’m perplexed only about the conditions under which your hubby will eat cooked mushrooms. “When necessary” could mean anything from the day before payday when the Frigidaire is on empty, to “the day after” when North Korea has finally over-responded to this administration’s vitriol.
I hope you will one day post a pic of your mother-in-law’s house. It would be fine to know what kind of architecture would cause you to eat fried oysters.
John
A question for the mushroom haters – why? Is it that they are fungus? That they grow in poop?
Mushrooms are umami bombs.
Mushrooms are like oysters. Too rubbery and chewy and have a not pleasant taste. I will tolerate them if very thinly sliced or chopped up so they end up being somewhat crispy, but other than that, no thanks, I’ll push them aside.
Regarding mushrooms, I can vouch for duxelles being a really kick-ass omelette filling. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duxelles
Maybe add a little Parmigiano too.
I’m a decent cook but I hate making omelettes. Half the time I just say fuck it and turn it into scrambled eggs. Velvety soft French style omelettes are difficult – I wish I had the skill!
It can be tricky. I screw it up as often as not, but they still taste good.
I seem to recall a story somewhere that was about a family or someone who only ate pizza all the time.
About two months ago I stopped eating all junk food, bread, dairy, pasta, potatoes, etc. I do have to say I feel much better.
Number one on the do not eat list for me is seafood. Any seafood. My father was a lobsterman here in New England and I pretty much grew up working on the boat. It was the bait that did me in. Generally it was fish racks (The carcasses of fish from the processing plants that had the fillets removed). Freshness wasn’t a big concern as lobsters are not really picky eaters.
During the winter, while the weather sucked more, the cold would keep the bait from getting too nasty. August was another story altogether. Going out after a 3 day storm and hanging flounder racks that had been fermenting on the boat the whole time was a real treat. 6′-8′ seas on a 40′ boat for 8 hours plus the grayish soup sloshing around in the baitboxes was the perfect recipe for seasickness. The only thing the old man would say was “Don’t puke in the bait.”
Like it would have ruined it…
All seafood is bait.
You painted that picture quite nicely, Dave.
I won’t eat mushrooms. I also don’t eat moldy bread. Fungus and mold is on my do not consume list. I swore off mushrooms the day I saw Clint Eastwood die from eating them in The Beguiled. I don’t care for fish except lake perch and Long John Silvers once in awhile just because the coating is so damn good and the fishy flavor is masked. No trout, bass, catfish, tuna etc.
I also don’t eat liver after being forced to eat it every Thursday night when I was a kid. You could not leave the table until you were done and I spent many a long evening choking my share down. I was allowed to stop when I got a paper route and started buying my own meal for that night. I have not had it since and my kids never even had to smell that vile organ cooking in our home.
When I was kid, my dad loved his liverwurst sandwiches. Whenever I caught a whiff of it, I just about gagged. Nasty.
Strikes me that there’s a fair amount of child abuse and neglect being relived in this week’s edition. Having to spend one’s childhood in terror because the old man has a small dick or a small brain sounds ghastly. It’s not your fault.
jtb
I recall being made to eat liver also. I have not ate since it I was a kid. I don’t care for mushrooms either.
I think I may like just about all the things Jeff has named. I agree that fast-food pickles are not very good, but that’s true of fast-food anything. But a nice garlicky *real* dill pickle? Most excellent.
I don’t like bananas or sweet potatoes. I’ll eat brussels sprouts if courtesy demands, but given the choice I’ll skip them. Lobster is not disgusting to me, but the ratio of flavor to price is unacceptably low. I like pretty much any fish or shellfish, and I make a very fine clam chowder (much better than what my cousin makes, IMNSHO). I like almost any veg, and any meat except liver, except if it’s in the form of foie gras, which is awesome.
Of course the goodness or badness of any food is dependent on its being prepared properly. Chicken or anything else can be sublime or disgusting, depending on what the cook did with it.
I see a plate of pan fried liver, fried onions, bacon, mushrooms, sweet potato fries, and roasted Brussels sprouts in my future.
I dread to ask about kidneys. If you haven’t had a steak and kidney pie (snake and pygmy pie) you haven’t lived.
The way I see it, most picky eaters aren’t really hungry. If they were, they would tuck in like hobos at a free buffet. Within the picky eater group, there are folks whose dietary choices are goddamned nuts and, over the long term, likely fatal. Sort of a slow motion Darwin effect I suppose.
Some foods I’m not fond of but will eat, depending on the circumstances…fondue, bone marrow, quinoa, chow mein, tofu, etc. Usually, it’s not the food..it’s how it was cooked. On the other hand…
The US Navy routinely served us fried liver. Organ meats are at the bottom of my list of protein sources and this stuff was memorably disgusting. Over 1″ thick, served medium rare with all the blood vessels and fibery bits still attached…it was like performing an autopsy for supper. There wasn’t enough catsup, Heinz 57 or Texas Pete too cover up the metallic taste and squeaky texture. For this, I was picky.
Organ meats, otherwise known as offal, will never touch my plate.
No liver, no kidney, no tongue, no heart…
Tongue? It’s been in somebody else’s mouth! Eeyuchh!
My grandparents used to give me tongue (wow, does that read wrong!) when I was a small child and I remember liking it, but I wouldn’t eat it today. I accidentally ate calf brains once, and I didn’t like those much, and then even less so when I found out what I’d eaten.
Vegetables taste like sadness.
I only eat eggs in omelette form and stay away from organ meats (except real goose liver pate which is excellent). Otherwise I’ll eat it.
I also like any meat raw that can be safely served as such. Beef, lamb, fish, oysters all are fantastic raw. Lamb ground with cracked wheat and spices is called kibbee. It’s a real treat. Steak tartar or carpaccio are favorites and sushi and nigiri are always tasty.
And here in the little Middle East they purée garlic with a little salt and sunflower oil and whip it into a fluffy mayonnaise-like consistency. It is the best condiment for lamb or chicken and sometimes beef. But you’ll reek of garlic the next day.
There’s so much great food out there. I don’t understand why people reject the stuff that really tastes good.
Embrace flavor you jug blowing Cracker Barrel-loving heathens! Embrace it!
“jug blowing Cracker Barrel-loving heathens”. Hahahahaha!!!! That is right up there with some of Jeff’s best descriptions.
Thanks to sister penguin mary, I will never eat egg salad again. She found me tossing out my sandwich, fished it out of the garbage and forced me to eat it. I won’t even eat a devilled egg to this day.
I can’t look at sushi. Raw fish?get it thefuck off my plate.
Most things I’ll try but the aforementioned is not even on my radar.
Hubster and I were anxiously awaiting Septemberrrrr , Oyster season!! Now that we live next to the ocean we eat fresh seafood all the time. Shrimp right off the boat, there is no compare. Cleaning them is a bitch, I clogged the sink with those long assed feelers they’ve got.
For some reason I’m not a fan of Italian or as I pronounce it Eyetalian. Not a fan of McDonalds either. I love grits, butter and sugar, (don’t hit me) and sweet cornbread.
Beside being a picky eater, my best friend can’t eat alone. She has to be on the phone with someone when she has lunch and NEVER go to a restaurant alone. I told her that she was such a egotist to think people care to notice. I love her anyway.
Oh crap…I guess I must be a picky eater! I have a l-o-n-g list of foods I don’t like. Perhaps it’s because I worked at a meat-processing plant for two years, who knows? However, many of my unlikable foods are not meat at all:
Mushrooms–Yes, there IS a fungus among us!
Tomatoes–I like tomato sauce, soup and ketchup, but not tomatoes themselves. I think the seeds just gross me out too much.
Shrimp–and any other crustaceans, for that matter. I have a rule about meat: It can have no more than four legs and had to have walked on dry ground at some point!
Bleu cheese–if I wanted to know what a moldy basement wall tasted like, I’d lick one!
I also know a lady in her 60’s who would almost curl up in the fetal position if items on her plate touched. One time I asked her, “what do you think it does in your stomach?” She got kind of pale after thinking about that!
My dad used the stomach line on me when I was crying about food touching. It made sense to me, and I soon started mixing up the food on my plate to freak out my siblings, cousins, neighborhood kids. What power!
I recall the opposite situation. One of us kids might cry because a piece of food was broken. And my mom would say “it’s all in one piece in your stomach.”
Oh man, nothing worse than a broken cookie; they never tasted as good. Excellent mothering skills there.
At Long John Silvers you could grab and eat the broken filets. We were like vultures.
I think this is as true for me as for anyone else, but, for a bunch of meat and potato eating, Seinfeld-watching, dickjoke-making, political correctness-hating, hard-working-when-the-the-boss-is-watching, first-world slackers, we seem to be a little la-dee-da about our food.
I like pie.
John
Agree on fast food pickles….Chick-fil-a is the worst, as they hide their nasty ass pickles on the bottom of their chicken sandwiches and I forget to remove them. I bite into the fucking sandwich expecting bun, chicken, and cheese….and instead get an unexpected and overwhelming taste like I’m eating a slice of Shrek skin. It’s a sensory clusterfuck. Even after removing the remnants of Shrek’s ass, the pickle stains the bun and obfuscates the taste of the remainder of the sandwich.
Limey,
I know you didn’t intentionally sneak in under the wire with the comment about German fatalities per mile vs American. You were just in the correct lane when the new log entry dropped.
It’s not just the drivers. The Germans also know how to engineer roads to maximize visibility, minimize impact, expedite clearing, and evacuate victims.
The crap freeways the Americans build through our cities make it unsafe to exceed 85 MPH. Bad driving doesn’t help, but it’s hardly the sole cause.
John
Because of hurricanes, tornadoes, tornedos, flooding, and the election, I’ve been unable to download my email, so I suspect I’m the onliest reporter who doesn’t know where Jeff is. If he’s looking for WMDs, I wish him luck, I think. In any case, I wish him well.
John
Mmmmmm, corn dogs!
They’ll be no new update until you’ve eaten those lima beans. Yes, every. single. one. of them.
But Dad, they make my wiener hard.
Those are Adriana Lima beans.