Everybody has something, food-wise, that they don’t like. And as diverse as these dislikes are, the reasons for not liking a particular food item are even more varied. From a bad childhood experience to a texture issue, people are passionate about why they dislike a certain vegetable, condiment, drink, etc.
Take my friend
Randy. He hates eggs. It doesn’t matter what kind; sunny side up, hard boiled, over easy or fried. He really loathes the almighty egg. Even if
Nancy Silverton herself spent 30 minutes constantly stirring and whirring and adding crème fraiche and French butter to make her
famously luscious slow-scrambled eggs for Randy, he’d say “Thanks, but NO.”
Eggs are not Randy's friends
The reason? When he was just a wee child, the egg turned on him and he will never, ever forgive it. It was a sweltering 99 degrees outside and little Randy was out playing in the yard. He played so hard his throat became hoarse and dry and desperate for something to quench the desert that was his mouth. He ran into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator door, hoping to find something to drink. He spied a tall pint glass full of orange juice on the top shelf, quickly grabbed it, and gulped away. Wait a second…this isn’t…wtf?? (OK, he probably didn’t say “wtf” as a little kid but I’m paraphrasing here). Turns out his mom had a bunch of egg yolks left over from a baking experiment and put them in a pint glass to save for tomorrow’s breakfast. Poor little Randy had ingested a good amount of the thick, raw, runny egg yolk before he realized what he’d done. Can you really blame the guy for hatin’?
Mayonnaise is something a lot of people don’t like. It’s creamy but there’s no cream in it, and American restaurants generally overuse it on sandwiches so it squirts out the backside of your perfectly good BLT whenever you take a bite (ewwww!). There’s not a lot to love about mayo, but my friend Nancy has a very specific reason for hatin’ it. Let’s just call it “A Nightmare on Mayo Street.”
Mayo = evil
Nancy was walking down the street, minding her own business when a truck passed her by. The truck hit a pothole, which sent a few items in the truck bed flying out onto the street. The items just happened to be industrial-sized containers of, you guessed it, mayonnaise. When the vats of mayo hit the pavement, they exploded like big atomic bombs full of oily, eggy cream. The unintended target? Nancy. Before she could say “Miracle Whip,” she was down on the ground, slipping and sliding around in tons (literally) of mayonnaise. I mean, does it get any worse than that?
Me…I like almost everything, but I just don’t like olives. YES, I know…it’s humiliating to admit it. And yes, I’ve tried all kinds, from the green ones to the black ones to the purple ones, to ones with garlic and ones smashed up with other likeable condiments. I just don’t like the base flavor of olives. To me, they taste like salty erasers. I used to chew on those little erasers at the end of my pencil in class, and every time I try an olive, it reminds me of that pencil eraser dipped in salt and olive oil. Try and try as I might, I take a bite and just think, “Eraser! Eraser! Eraser!” I wish I had a story about a mean school bully pelting me with olives, because at least then I’d have a logical explanation. But I do not. Forgive me, but I just cannot love these little balls of salty rubber things they call olives.
They do too taste like olives!
The little bits:*My coworker Joey won’t eat artichokes because he thinks they’re ugly. He also hates the idea of artichoke hearts, because, in his mind, it reminds him of a human heart (something he’d rather not eat). Same goes for liver. But an additional reason he won’t eat liver is because of the Fonz. “In ‘Happy Days,’ liver was like Fonz’s kryptonite,” he says.
*Joey’s son Joshua is 9 years old, and dislikes soggy food. Most of us would agree, but here’s the funny part: He refuses syrup on his pancakes and waffles in fear it will make them soggy, and he will not have milk on his cereal. He also prefers a “choke sandwich,” as his dad so eloquently puts it, meaning no condiments of any kind. Joey said that Joshua frequently asks for “a bread and meat and cheese sandwich, please.” Hold the mayo.
*Dallas’ uncle always hated tomatoes so, as a child, she decided she hated them too even though she’d never tasted one before. One day, her grandpa made her eat a raw tomato, and she promptly threw up all over him. But it is her grandmother who is to blame for Dallas’ dislike of beets. When Dallas was a little girl, her grandmother told her that beets “make your pee turn red.” It will be a cold day in hell before Dallas ever tries beets.
*Rudy won’t eat cooked eel at a sushi restaurant because he is convinced that his small piece has a tail. We have pointed out that an eel is actually quite large and his little piece is merely a section of a bigger fish, and that they do not serve the tail at sushi restaurants. But because of the narrow shape of the cut, he is certain that he is being served the tail. He admits he has never actually tasted the eel flavor because he can’t get over the (faux) tail aspect.
"Rudy, I am going to eat you!"
The tart; and the final plate - lots of color!
