Shocking culinary tastes
 

For a couple of weeks now, there's been a middle aged Chinese woman filling in for the owner at our local Chinese take away. When she was serving me for the first time, I asked for my usual - Large chips and egg fried rice, no sauce. Apparently, the sauce is what qualifies this otherwise rather nondescript meal as being Chinese, and it was therefore quite inconceivable that I'd be in there ordering it plain. They make good chips. Sue me.

Anyway, the Chinese woman, a traditionalist, was so taken aback by my queer preferences that she temporarily lost her mathematical faculties, and was unable to calculate the cost of what I had ordered. There she stood over the till for a few moments in complete shock, until she collected her thoughts and could resume normal service.


Do you have any quirky tastes in food? So quirky that when people hear of them they react with exclamation marks?

In Mexico, we routinely save pork skin, pickle it in white vinegar with vegetables for a few days and eat them. Like seriously eat them. Now, to us, this isn't really something to be of concern but apparently outside of our culture this seems to be some kind of taboo! If only you saw the looks on people's faces when I explain to them exactly what "cueritos" are, you'd probably laugh.

I've had the idea to make a picture book called "Culinary Shocks" for a while that would basically be a series of photos of people's faces when they're told exactly what some foods are. Balut, "huevos de toro" and fried crickets would be among these.

I'm kinda shocked that they sell chips at a Chinese restaurant in the first place...

I should totally turn the tables and walk in there, take a look at the menu and open my mouth agape, then just leave shaking my head.

I'm sure that some of my preferences are indeed shocking but I suspect that preferences tend to be regional; what is typical in my location is possibly outlandish in another region or climate. Some regional preferences may be based upon availability of ingredients or ethnic backgrounds. In an area with very little Polish influence, kluski and pierogies might seem quite alien. Here around Buffalo, these foods are as common as Wonder bread and Heinz ketchup.

A good example would be British cuisine. I'm no fan of blood sausage but it's regularly eaten in England. I find them rather disgusting even though I'm descended from the Brits. Likewise, I've also got German blood and I detest sauerkraut. I cannot fathom people who put sauerkraut on other foods such as hotdogs or sandwiches.

I guess some may be shocked by my fondness for Tabasco sauce. I look for excuses to put it on as many foods as possible - eggs, chicken, Italian sausage, mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, clam chowder - whatever doesn't completely clash with the heat. Some people have weak stomachs.

Says the part-German dude who hates SAUERKRAUT... WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU, MAN?

I can keep it down just fine. It's the taste that makes me cringe. Take everything that is good about cabbage, which isn't much, take those parts away and steep the remains in a horrid brine until it barely resembles its original form.

Oh yeah, delish.

I have a bold taste for imari...

Seriously, I enjoy pretty much every food that I come across. My friends usually are kind of grossed out when we get sushi and I am eating eel skin, though that's pretty mild on the gross factor in my mind.

I also like to eat really spicy peppers (such as habanero) and cloves of garlic whole. Other than that, I think my palette is pretty standard.

Chips as in ... potato chips...?

Sauce as in soy sauce or something?

The strangest food in the world has got to be CHEESE! Yes, there I said it. How can white people just eat blocks of cheese and like not throw up??? It's disgusting, the smell, the texture, the taste.

The strangest thing is the volume of cheese you white people eat, it's on EVERYTHING! Meat, bread, grain, i can't think of a single thing you white people don't put cheese on.

Haha, I'm not quite that extreme (I rather like mozzarella <3), but it seems like Americans really love their cheese.

I shared a room with two girls my sophomore year in high school, and was rather surprised at how much cheese was in the fridge. Not just the quantity, but the type! There was American cheese, swiss cheese, string cheese, spicy pepperjack cheese, etc.

In terms of slightly odd tastes in food, I LOVE mint. If I could, I would put it in everything (I try my damnest though). I also don't mind when things are bland; in Italy, a lot of restaurants give you this bread that has no flavor, but I LOVE eating it~

Actually, a few days ago, my current room-mates were talking about cereal, and they really dislike soggy cereal. Dunno if it's just them or a relatively common preference, but I like it when the little cereal bits are SOAKED in milk <3 (they're good crunchy too, I suppose)

I personally love cheese. I wouldn't call myself a connoisseur by any means, but I'm pretty fond of it. Cheddar, American, colby-jack, that stuff's all great. Pepper jack is nasty, though.

Marmite (or Vegemite) and honey sandwiches.

People won't believe that it's what I'm eating unless they watch me make one, and even then their reaction's usually somewhere between "oh my god" and "what the fuck".

A lot of the older Chinese takeaways in England are just glorified chip-shops. In other words, they have a kitchen out back where they make Chinese food, but out front they have a deep-fryer where they can serve more bland take-away staples.

My dad's from Georgia and growing up we've always had grits for breakfast. I remember the first time I asked my girlfriend to make me some grits and she looked at me like I was one of the craziest motherfuckers alive.

Needless to say, a Californian girl trying to make grits was a horrendous disaster. I could've cut that shit with a knife.

Microwaved Kool-Aid. Ahhh nice and warm on frosty winter day. Bliss.

Spam. Any other member from HI (CHz, Kairyu, DarthSavior) will agree here. Spam is fucking delicious, especially when used in a Spam Musubi.

http://mt.laweekly.com/sea/reverb/spam-musubi-thumb.jpg

Oh so yummy.

Oh god, spam is awful. ;_;

We've always had this meal here at home..its Corned Beef mix with Pork and Beans eaten together with dried fish (dipped in vinegar). I love the face my friends give when I say that :D. Also I have this quirk when eating. I have to be chewing my food when I drink. I cannot finish my meal then drink. My family eats a lot of international dishes... I love sauerkraut (we have a big jar of it). Love having a raclette grill lunch. (with all the sauseges, pickles and of course sauerkraut). I also like umeboshi on rice....takuan is also good on rice.

As disgusting as that sounds, that's actually pretty tempting based on the photo.

I've been getting a lotta comments lately from my Starbucks coffee preference of late.

Venti iced coffee, 3 shots of peppermint, room for cream.

Wait, peppermint? You mean peppermint mocha?

Nope, just peppermint. I dunno, I like that refreshing cool kick of peppermint with my caffiene in the morning. A lot of folks hear that when they call my order and go "Peppermint?". Some even ask me how that is, and just tell em it's an odd preference, and I like it, no explanation for it really.

The first thing that comes to mind is that unlike most of the people I know, I don't put soy sauce on everything. I don't like food that's too salty, so they usually find it odd that I'm Asian, but I don't use soy sauce a lot. Another one is that I never eat fried rice alone. Even if the fried rice has vegetables and chopped pieces of meat already, I still need to have something else with it like chicken.

Ya'll are some crazy fuckers, honestly.
Sauerkraut is awesome, especially with olive oil. In fact, I made some from raw cabbage about two months ago and I ate some for dinner a while ago. It's just salt and cabbage, nothing horrid about it.
Now, odd taste? Don't know, but I do know I love cheese (any kind, really) and I only eat it with proper dried bread (not toast or this North American shit you call bread, real fuckin' home made bread), so, cheese dipped in 1/2 olive oil, 1/2 salt, and bread. So good.
Also good with that is dried, salted fish -- I could live on that alone for YEARS.
My grandfather used to make it (he was a fisherman) and that stuff is absolutely ridiculous.

Also figs. Dried figs are good, really good.

I guess none of those are really weird. I like pig brains. Hey, fried pig brains are really delicious.
What else ... hmm. Can't remember much, honestly.
Tofu maybe? Aye, that stuff is good with tons of salt.

Mild stuff. I do want to try raw fish, though I'm not sure how that's going to work with the bacteria present inside of it.

Diet Pepsi is my absolute favorite beverage. :(

I don't eat anything I consider shocking. I like eel sushi, I guess that could be shocking to some people. I remember seeing chicken feet at a Chinese buffet for the first time not too long ago and so onto my plate they went, they were ok tasting just not much meat on them. I guess that might have shocked some bystanders.

I don't think it's shocking for people to eat crickets either, I'll try some as long as it's done in a restaurant.

I bet it is. Do you know how much cholesterol is in pig brains? (Being totally serious btw)