I have in my drafts folder something that I was going to post today, about what people will and won’t eat, any why. I used to be a vegetarian for years but now there are very many things I won’t try and I’m fascinated with the barriers and fear we create in our diets. I’ll post that other one tomorrow and we can discuss, but for now, Travis has linked to a meme set up by Andrew at Very Good Taste, listing 100 Foods every Omnivore should try eating, and being a list junkie and food-lover of course I have to see how I measure up.
A couple of them I’m sure I must have had at some point, but I can’t pinpoint the exact occurance, so I’m leaving them as un-tried.
Rules:
1) bold those you have tried
* 2) Asterisk any items you’d be interested in trying but have not yet.*
3) Italicize any item you’ll never eat again.
4) Strikethrough those you wouldn’t eat on a bet.
1. Venison
*2. Nettle tea*
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
*5. Crocodile*
6. Cheese Fondue
7. Black Pudding
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
*30. Bagna cauda*
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jello
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
*46. Fugu*
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
*63. Kaolin*
*64. Currywurst*
65. Durian
*66. Frogs’ legs*
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
*76. Baijiu*
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Toam yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
*84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant*
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
*89. Horse*
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
*97. Lobster Thermador*
98. Polenta
*99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee*
100. Snake
There’s also a couple of similar lists on Lists of Bests:
BBC’s 50 Things to Eat Before you Die.
“Buster McLeod’s” 10 Things I think you should Eat before you die.
and “Missy Wombat’s” 50 Vegetarian Foods to Eat Before you Die.
If you do it yourself, leave a comment so I can see what yours look like!
*UPDATED Sept. 8th, 2008
*UPDATED Oct. 2nd, 2008
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22 responses so far ↓
KimHo // August 18, 2008 at 7:40 PM |
Out of curiosity, for Roadkill and Hostess Fruit Pie, is that a yes/no/won’t try? ^_^
I will have to think about the list myself, though there are a couple of things I would definetely NOT try, like cognac with a cigar.
degan // August 18, 2008 at 7:48 PM |
I would try them, but I’m not in any hurry to. a Hostess Fruit Pie sounds gross, but I would eat it on a bet, whereas roadkill has some disgusting imagery attached to it but there are situations where if the animal was freshly killed, not mangled and prepared properly, that I would give it a try.
I’m curious about your not wanting the cognac and cigar though, what a great combo!
KimHo // August 18, 2008 at 8:53 PM |
(About roadkill and Hostess Fruit Pie, they are not in bold, italics or anything like that – that’s why I asked!).
I used to live in Panama and once in a while my mom procure the whole carcass of some animals, including but not limited to, iguanas and armadillos. Sometimes, I hesitated when they were served, as there was no sure way to find out how these guys obtained it (it was a “don’t ask, don’t tell”-like situation), and I will not rule out they being roadkills.
Although I ocasionally drink some beer or a glass of wine, other liquors do not really entice me. Probably it is because I have a low alcohol tolerance; I could fall asleep after one bottle of beer… As for cigars, it does not entice me at all.
degan // August 18, 2008 at 10:40 PM |
mmm, what do iguanas and armadillos taste like?! interesting. I would definitely try that.
foodosopher // August 19, 2008 at 5:14 PM |
Very interesting topic!
Im curious – based on your list, you leave very little out – you would definitely fall in the top 1% for adventurous in my mind. How did the change from vegetarian to willing to eating horse occur?
Was it some epiphany, or a slow change?
Apologies if this is too personal of a question. Feel free to ignore.
degan // August 19, 2008 at 5:47 PM |
I think it was a variety of things that made me want to be a vegetarian – the cows disappearing, the lack of culinary diversity, the poor quality of the cooking…and so as soon as I was allowed to be a vegetarian (around 13), I decided that I was. And I was kind of militant about it, only eating vegetarian with very few exceptions until I was in college.
Then I visited some friends in the Queen Charlotte Islands who prepared an amazing spread of fresh fish and shellfish and NO vegetables that I couldn’t in good conscience not try. It was so good that it almost broke my heart.
And then I decided that I would try all the other things that looked exciting that I’d missed out on. Some of them were bad, some were amazing, but they’re always fun to try. I’m a pretty adventurous person in aspects other than food, so once I got over the vegetarian restrictions, it’s not much of a stretch to be experimental with food either.
I do feel that we as a culture eat too much meat and that meat is not handled very well and so I try (sometimes harder than others, admittedly), to buy organic, free-range, grain fed, etc. I also try not to waste meat and don’t often cook it at home other than for special occasions. That’s my compromise. I wish I could do more, but at the moment there are too many meat dishes that I really enjoy and there are still several un-tried items on my list!
In the end I think we are truly omnivores, we just need to be more mindful about our food, and that is definitely coming around.
That was a bit of an essay, forgive me.
jason // August 19, 2008 at 6:52 PM |
In the interest of symmetry shouldn’t there be a dimension that captures would eat again?
degan // August 19, 2008 at 6:55 PM |
yes…unless it’s implied by being *not* something you’d never eat again.
foodosopher // August 19, 2008 at 8:18 PM |
No essay at all – i appreciate the insight. I just am curious about these sorts of things. I’ve had a few friends who followed a similar path to you – vegetarianism during periods of idealism as bright teenagers, and then breaking down during University (one friend broke down in the middle of seminar when offered a piece of moose jerky – he hadn’t eaten meat for 8 years, and can’t stop eating it since). I also know many people who seem to be going the other way – the older they get, the less meat they eat. To the point where they are basically vegetarian now, with the exception of occasional seafood for some, or beef for others. Interestingly enough, observationally, it seems to be mostly women who lose their appetite for meat.
Anyway, i’m in agreement with you with respect to meat not being handled very well (commercially), and food in general is wasted too much as a society as a whole. On tv and in popular culture, i think there is a growing movement in trying to educate people where meat comes from, and to understand and identify your food. While you think it’s a small compromise, i believe that by expressing these attitudes, you share a little knowledge with other people, who might slowly start to see a healthier way to approaching food. Not to mention, tastier!
What Won’t You Eat and Why? « Ethnic Eats - Sampling the World’s Cuisine Without Leaving Town // August 19, 2008 at 9:48 PM |
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KimHo // August 19, 2008 at 10:22 PM |
I second foodosopher’s comment. At the same time, you brought something I want to check other people’s opinion (Degan, I apologize if you feel I am hijacking the topic): Since waste seems to be an issue, what do you think about offal? Browsing through the list quickly, only foei gras and sweetbreads are offal; well, haggis too, if it is made “the traditional way”. But what about other things that can be consumed? For example, blood (for blood sausage), heart, liver (this one is tricky as it decays really fast), etc.
One incident that I always bring as an example is a lunch I had with my colleagues – all Asians, except for our then boss who is Caucasian. We went to a HK cafe and I ordered ox tongue, which freaked my former boss out. Something similar happened when we had “bone soup” and “phoenix claws” (aka, chicken feet) – the later in a Dim Sum. His excuse for his reaction was exactly what has been mentioned: he was brought up in an environment where there was no reason these “wastes”, as you could have just the steaks.
(Just in case: I am not advocating the consumption of offal; just don’t look at it as, well, waste.)
Now, going back to the topic, about iguana is not that different from snake (which you already had). As for armadillo, unless my mom played mind tricks with me, think of it as a gamier version of pork.
degan // August 19, 2008 at 10:38 PM |
Well, offal is definitely making a comeback. People seem to be more open to trying new things and chefs do seem to be putting more parts of animals seem to be appearing on the menus. I’m of 2 minds of this. One is that it’s probably not going to increase people’s meat consumption. People who weren’t going to have meat for dinner, aren’t suddenly going to have offal. So it’s not going to cut down on meat consumption necessarily, but it will cut down on waste, which is definitely a good thing.
I’ve always thought it admirable of other cultures to make use of more parts of the animals they slaughter, but you’re correct to point out that it’s more to do with economy than noblesse.
foodosopher // August 19, 2008 at 11:18 PM |
I think the whole concept of offal is really to do with the latter statement you make – IE cutting down on waste. When you kill an animal for food, i feel you have a responsibility to use any and all consumable pieces. Any piece of an animal, prepared and cooked properly, can taste quite good. I’ve always liked offal, but more importantly, i think there is an obligation to eat more of it. It’s a matter of respect.
It is a double-edged sword though. Imagine if something like heart were to become de rigueur. You’d suddenly have an issue of scarcity (only one per animal, as opposed 100′s of lbs of meat), and the end result would likely be more slaughtering, or (the horror), some new hormones designed to enlarge the heart to maximize return on a slaughtered animal, the way chicken breasts are handled these days. Ugh.
There is some hope for society though. Yesterday’s cast offs (squid, for example) are considered mainstream today. Maybe offal will reach the same kind status in the next generation. I doubt it, but maybe
degan // September 2, 2008 at 5:10 PM |
This past week I had carp, heirloom tomatoes and whole insects. Progress.
degan // September 5, 2008 at 9:15 PM |
OK, last night I had durian – so vile! never again – and just now I had a salted lassi. Steamrolling through this, actually much faster than I intended.
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Miraj K // February 9, 2009 at 1:42 PM |
interestingly, i had the last item on the list. i was a child traveling with my dad. it was considered a delicacy and was prepared by the Bedouins, in a remote Lybian desert.
degan // February 9, 2009 at 4:40 PM |
oh wow, that sounds like a story!
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