The Pink Shoe Diaries

There should be a word for weird food aversions.

I don't mean food allergies, or simply not liking a certain food (one of the most annoying things to me on earth is a picky eater. I don't mean like "I'm allergic to dairy" but more like "I hate Italian food". How do you know? Have you tried every kind of Italian food on earth!?". But that is a story for another time).

Anyway, I was discussing weird food aversions with some friends yesterday. My good friend Jeanne can't drink tea on an empty stomach. She likes tea, it just makes her feel ill if she doesn't eat something with it. My brother loves cheese, but not if it's melted. He will eat a slice of American cheese plain but can't deal with a grilled cheese sandwich made of the same stuff. I can't drink soda from a can. Soda in a glass with ice? Yes please. But soda directly from a can makes me feel like I just ate week old Chinese food.

Not Good.

I also know a lot of people who, like me, can't eat breakfast first thing in the morning. If I eat within an hour of waking up I feel nauseous all day. It's always been that way. This may be the root of my semi dislike of breakfast foods. I mean I love eggs and bacon and hash browns...but I would rather have them for lunch or dinner.

I call these "Food Isms". If we refer to this post you will remember that an "Ism" is signature habit that is done unconciously, by animal or human. I think we can apply this term to weird food habits as well.

I have a few:



I definitely have a food ism with mushrooms, and have actually met several people in my lifetime who also share this problem. It's not the taste, or how they are served. It's PURELY a texture thing. I really try to like them because the dishes they are used in usually contain other things I looove like this dish that Erin blogged about yesterday. They are quite the gourmet ingredient and the fact that my apparently plebian palate can't stand them dissapoints me greatly.

Same with scallops, which also breaks my heart a bit since I love almost all other seafood. To me, they may as well be the mushrooms of the sea, texturally speaking.




And on the immature tip, I can't drink apple juice because it looks like pee. My brother made this comment to me when I was 7 and had just peed in a cup at the doctor's office. I placed the labeled cup on a tray where a few other labeled cups were perched and he said to me "It looks like a cups of apple juice!" and that imagery has stayed in my head for the past 19 years.

Some may find these food isms annoying, but I enjoy them. It's like little personality quirks but with food. I think that everyone has them, whether or not they would admit it. And who knows, maybe someday I can overcome my aversion for weird textured food and urinesque fruit drinks.

But in the meantime, it's fun to talk about.