Disgusting Stuff At My House and Yours

[mrissa]

markgritter made Soup That Smells Nasty for lunch today. It had been ages since he'd last made it, and I was okay with that, but now the weather is inching towards fall, which means more STSN for the foreseeable future.

Tonight I'm making asparagus (roasted, with garlic, mmmmmm) because C.J. will not be here for dinner. If he was here every single night, I'd get to the point where I said, "Well, tough; the rest of us like asparagus, so you can dig carrots out of the veggie bin or frozen peas out of the freezer or make yourself a salad or whatever." (Anyone who doesn't get their RDA of fruit and veggies in this house is a total hoser and not even trying.) But he doesn't eat here every night, so it's easy enough to make sure asparagus is around when he isn't.

The problem with STSN is that it doesn't actually make me ill, so I don't feel it would be reasonable to ask him not to make it. There are things I will ask him and timprov not to make because the smell of it will put me off food for days. timprov also has a few quirky ones -- my poached pears in white wine, for example, will put him off food indefinitely. (He likes pears. He likes white wine. He likes the spices I put in it. It's just the combination heated on the stove that's problematic.) But we all gross each other out from time to time, just not enough to put in anti-requests.

If you live with people, what do your housemates make that grosses you out? Is it bad enough for you to ask them to eat it when you're not home, or is it just something you flee from personally? If you live on your own (or with people, why not), was there something your parents ate that was truly vile? (seagrit: there is a limit on how many characters can go into these posts, so just pick a few Dave Favorites. :) ) And what about school cafeterias (college or before): what really grossed you out there? The very thought of my grade school's canned peas is enough to make me glad I've already lunched. What's the worst stuff in your food world?

Comments

[merriehaskell.livejournal.com]

dannimal likes White Castle sliders.

(sigh)

That's the only objectionable food. There are foods that make objectionable things happen to him. Like, the time he ate a slab and a half of pork ribs and got "the meat sweats." You know, this gets gross fast, so I'll stop.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The meat sweats.

Thank you for not sharing the misery with me any further.

The meat. Sweats.

[wilfulcait.livejournal.com]

J is a "picky eater," defined as someone who doesn't like what the cook likes. The things he likes that I don't like are beets, in every form; crunchy green beans; eggs; floppy bacon, the floppier the better; and Kraft dinner. The only thing he really cooks is Kraft dinner, and then he only does it when I'm not home (because if I'm home, either I cook, or we go out or order in).

K will eat all kinds of food. The only thing she like that grosses me out is fried eggs, sunny-side up; she sometimes cooks those when I'm gone, because the smell of egg protein frying makes me turn green.

My mother used to make fried liver and onions and I couldn't stand the smell. Now I don't mind it, but I won't eat it; there's still something about the texture (and the fact that it seems impossible to salt it enough) that turns me off. On the other hand I have learned to like braunschwiger, especially with green onions and cheese.

Of the people in my house, though, I'm the one most like to cook stuff that nobody else wants to smell or eat, starting with the baked yam I had with dinner last night, and progressing through all kinds of seafood. If K doesn't like something, she'll just decline to eat it, but J is sensitive to the smells, and so I don't cook seafood when he's in the house.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

My grandma was horrified that I'd never had liver and onions when I came to stay with her when I was 8. So she made some. I had two bites and made myself a pb sandwich. When I talked to my mom that night, she said, "How's it going?"
Me: "Oh....ummmmm......fine...."
Mom, with the Mommy radar going off: "What is it?"
Me: "Grandma made liver and onions for dinner."
Mom, grimly: "Put your grandmother on the phone, please."

Until I was talking to dd_b last week, it didn't occur to me that anybody would like green beans and not like them crunchy. I've been known to eat them raw.

[palinade.livejournal.com]

Spam. It doesn't quite make me gag, but the mere mention of it and I can't help making a facial squinch that's a cross between an "ew" and a wince.

Canned vegetables, although understandable for its storage, gross me out. I much prefer frozen when I can't get fresh. At least flash frozen veggies still retain their color, shape, and general flavor. The only canned veggie I will tolerate are artichoke hearts, certain asian mushrooms, tomato (diced, pureed, whole, whatever), and corn. But no canned beans or peas or carrots will ever again be ingested if I can help it.

Green bean casserole with those friend onion things on top should be stricken off the list of edibles. Forever. In fact, most "casseroles" with a can of creamed soup in the list of ingredients should be removed to a far off place.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

THEY MAKE CANNED CARROTS??? Not, like, pickled carrots in an artsy assortment with pickled other things, but canned carrots? That is just disgusting on such an unnecessary level.)

(Okay, so I was 12 when I found out about cake mix and 16 when I found out about jarred gravy. I'm still affronted by the jarred gravy, actually.)

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

I'll eat almost anything, but my love of sauteed onions, peppers, and mushrooms is resticted to eating out, because the smell of it can make caresern ill. And she's allergic to onions so I avoid using them at home.

I do have a few food things I cannot stand. I had a roommate once who liked kipper snacks, which I find generally nasty. I can't abide pineapple in any form, and I think pineapple on pizza should be a feloney. No tiny fish and no pineapple please.

I guess being a kid living in the country made me able to stoically swallow just about anything. If I whined about how I didn't like that night's dinner of liver, stewed squash, boiled potatos and white bread, I was invited to not eat it, but nothing else would magically appear to replace it on my plate. So it was deal or be hungry. I never did learn to deal with lima or wax beans though...

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Pineapple bad. Tiny fish good, as long as they're pickled herring. That's one of my things that markgritter and timprov really can't stand. We have a house rule that any holiday herring not eaten by 12/26 is thrown out.

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

The gf doesn't like "anything that comes from water" (seafood, except crab cakes), "fungus" (mushrooms), "fluffy cheese" (as far as I can tell, this means ricotta and maybe bleu cheese), or "cheese that smells like feet" (swiss). Oh, and garlic makes her sick (although she really likes garlic).

There's only a very few things that put me off. Spam is one. Gefilte fish (aka fish-Spam) is another. Oh, and crab legs. Ick. Nasty, nasty stuff. There's other stuff that I don't care for, but nothing else that really puts me off like that. At least that I can think of at this moment.

Veal sometimes puts me off, too, but it's more of a mental thing on my part than something intrinsic to the meat. If it was made from adult chickens (for example), then I'd have no problems at all. But it's baby cows, so sometimes it bothers me. But sometimes it just tastes good, though.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Do crab legs put you off while they are still legs, or does the meat in them also disgust you when someone else has removed it and chopped it up and made it into crab cakes or crab alfredo sauce or...dammit, now I want some crab.

[carbonel]

I had a Korean roommate during one year of college. We were incompatible in a variety of different ways, but she did introduce me to the joys of roasted dried squid. I can't eat more than small nibbles at a time, but I like those nibbles.

On the other hand, I was completely grossed out that she preferred Spam to any other meat for doing stir-fry.

[wilfulcait.livejournal.com]

What goes in Soup that Smells Nasty?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It's Campbell's Chicken Broccoli Cheese Potato. All of which I like independently and in other soups. But it smells like canned Satan.

[baronlaw.livejournal.com]

Corn beef and cabbage, I like it the wife can't stand it.

[songwind.livejournal.com]

There is nothing that anyone else in the house makes that will actually make me ill to smell cooking. There are things that they eat that I wouldn't touch with someone else' tongue though:
Green beans
Chicken liver
Pickled pigs' feet
Tofu

One of my friends used to run and hide at my house when his mother made chitterlings. (Chitlins)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

There is a perfectly lovely tofu at Rice Paper in Linden Hills up in Mpls. It's crunchy and makes pameladean happy (me, too). I think it might convince even tofu haters, though I could of course be wrong.

I really like the expression "wouldn't touch that with someone else's tongue."

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Whatever is the soup?

(I'm not reading this comment thread because I don't want to read about nasty food experiences, so if you feel you can reply at all, a vague description will suffice.)

TIA.

K.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It's Campbell's Chicken Broccoli Cheese Potato. I like all of these things separately. I even like them in soups in some combination. But this particular incarnation smells truly horrible. (Nitrates, I think.)

TIA?

[stillsostrange.livejournal.com]

Pineapple is a noble and tasty fruit. Pineapple on pizza is an abomination, the smell of which makes me real queasy real fast.

Raw green beans rock.

The sight of pickled pig's feet floating in their jar of mysterious cloudy fluid at the truck stop is oddly intriguing. In the way the slides in my forensics class are intriguing. The thought of anyone really eating one is just scary.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

My grandma and my Onie get pickled pig's feet in their Christmas stockings, little colorfully wrapped jars that unwrap to produce milky floaty nastiness. Merry Christmas. They love them and would be crushed if a Christmas lacked them.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

Recently, most anything involving tempeh and a lot of things involving tofu. I'm not all that vegan-friendly.

Historically, anything involving sauerkraut, even the wimpy version presented in school cafeterias. It'll make about a one block radius uninhabitable.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I'm not all that vegan-friendly.

You know how much commentary this sentences leaves open for you, don't you? And how restrained I am not to be making any of those comments?

As usual, I am Just Sayin'.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

TIA=Thanks In Advance.

K. [HTH]

[greykev.livejournal.com]

A former roommate's girlfriend prepared a number of things I refused to taste, including a self-liquifying creme brule, romanian borsht, and a dumpling-esue pile of things that were visually repulsive in the extreme.

At one point the thought/sight of a portabella mushroom sandwich made my stomach queezy. I'm much better about fungus now, though I prefer it in small doses. I do not eat bugs, even expensive ocean-dwelling varieties, even when covered in batter to disguise the buggness. Small bits of crab meat are okay in rangoons, but I suspect I'd like a spiced (non-crab)sweetened creamcheese filling just as well.

I will eat both broccholi and colliflower when fresh, but the smell of them steamed turns my stomach. Hmm, and I won't eat fuzzy fruits either.

Spam though can be very tastey, especially fried for sandwiches.

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

Fried spam is the work of the devil, and I might have to re-think our friendship now.

[wshaffer.livejournal.com]

I can't stand most kinds of melon, except for a nice fresh slice of watermelon on a hot day. I particularly hate canteloupe, though I keep trying to eat it now and then, because it always looks to me like it *ought* to be delicious. Daniel loves the stuff, which is actually nice, because if I get served some in a fruit salad someplace, he can be relied upon to instantly pick out all the nasty melon bits. Though if the fruit salad is not very fresh, the other stuff will have melon-cooties all over it and not be edible anyway.

An old roomate of mine was totally squicked when I cooked okra, which he referred to as "the snot vegetable." I had to double-scrub every pot, plate, and utensil that touched the okra, lest there be minute traces of "vegetable snot" left behind.

Roasted dried squid actually sounds yummy. I wonder if the local Asian market carries it...

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

My roommates are felines, so the only thing they eat that I can't stand is Regurgitated Kibble. If they're going to barf, I can deal. But I don't want to see another one eat it.

[seagrit.livejournal.com]

Actually, Jeff eats this chili soup that they make at Calvin. He really likes it, and I cannot stand the smell of it. I'm not a chili fan in general anyway, but I have a hard time eating lunch when he buys that stuff. I did ask once if he could *not* buy it, but I was told "No, I like it" very firmly.

[carbonel]

I used to be a much fussier eater when I was a kid, and I particularly hated things that mixed into other things. If my corn touched my mashed potato, I couldn't eat the parts that intersected, for example. That seems to have mostly passed, and I enjoy a greater variety of textures than I used to.

There are a lot of things that other people eat that I don't like, but as long as I don't have to eat them myself, it helps alleviate the oatmeal shortage, as it were. The few things that I hate being around when they're being cooked or eaten are items with a strong (and to me, obnoxious) smell.

High on the list are sauerkraut and baked beans. Those are on the "I'd really have to be starving to eat these" foods, and the aromas tend to be awfully gregarious.

As for foods that I like that others might find objectionable, I can't think of much except for the time that Steve Bond, Jean Mornard (then Messer) and I drove out to Boston for a weekend trip and brought all our own food so as not to waste time in restaurants. I had what I thought was garlic mustard, and Jean just hated it. Turned out it was actually pure garlic spread. Went very nicely on roast beef sandwiches, I must say. But Jean complained every time the jar was opened. I can't remember if she has general opinions about garlic, or if it was just that brand.