Saturday 26 November 2016

It's a texture thing...

I was doing my usual Saturday morning with coffee blog reading, luxuriating over the time that I had, not having to rush around, get dressed in something presentable, and go to work. One of my usual blogs that I enjoy was Cro Magnon's blog in which he was discussing the virtues of an egg. From how he was describing the process and the timing of the boiling, I presumed he was enjoying soft boiled eggs.

Not wanting to comment because I thought it would be rude to say, "Ewww, gross. I can't stand soft boiled eggs", it did get me thinking. About eggs. And other food. There is just something about the texture, or maybe it's even the thought, of slightly uncooked eggs that sends me. A fried egg with the chance of anything remotely runny initiates my gag reflex. A soft boiled egg in which you might dip a piece of toast also, to borrow a younger phrase, "grosses me out".

Cro did inspire me to have eggs this morning however.


They may have started out like this in the bowl,


but they quickly got scrambled.


Then they were cooked to within an inch of their lives with nothing runny or jiggly left at all.

It really is a texture thing. There are a few other foods that fall into the "gross out" category for me. Certain types of seafood are just too chewy, rubbery, or just plain slimy for my liking. We have travelled to the east coast of Canada a number of times. When in Prince Edward Island, one must eat mussels, oysters, clams, or lobster. I managed to dip mussels into garlic butter and perform an obligatory couple of chews before choking them down. I wanted to love them. I really did. But I kept trying not to feel them in my mouth the whole time. Lobster is great, but god help me if I get served up a female complete with eggs. My poor sweet young daughter at the time received this at one of the famous P.E.I lobster suppers. She was, and still is, an adventuresome eater (I have tried to be somewhat silent in my disapproval of certain textures so as not to pass on my issues to my children), but even the sight of those tiny red eggs made her think twice.

I even forced myself to put my big girl panties on and try a raw oyster on our most recent trip (husband and daughter were in there having a feast!) I'm not even going to tell you what that blob of raw oysterness felt like sliding down my throat. (It's giving me the shivers even now). I don't care how much hot sauce or lemon you are going to squeeze on that thing, that was my last oyster event.

Clams. They just stay there. You can keep chewing till the next day and they never change, or go away. They are giant rubber bands to me.

As a child going over to the farm where noon meals were essentially "supper" as was the practise of farming families who had been up and choring since well before 6:00 a.m., I was used to meals that had not one, but sometimes two choices of dessert. (Did I mention I was a fat kid?) Sometimes it was custard pie, or it was apple dumplings, "store bought" donuts sprinkled with sugar, even a piece of bread swimming in real maple syrup, and sometimes, yes, sometimes it was a bowl of tapioca pudding. Shudder...  Could you get more "eating of fish eyes" than a bowl of tapioca pudding?

Fat on meat, anything less than completely crispy chicken skin (and even then, skin... bleh), the tiny bones in canned salmon, the jellified top coating of pate, the thick cream that rose to the top of our straight-from-the-bulk-tank-non-pasteurized whole milk, the little globules in breakfast sausages, chunky bits of pulp in orange juice, wine gums, bacon that is even remotely wobbly, jello... the list goes on and on.

I know this makes me sound a bit like a princess, but I don't voice my disgust because I know it's just my own personal issues. I don't send food back in a restaurant, I don't make requests of a hostess when invited to dinner, and I don't go on about it (except for it being the topic of this post). I just quietly trim the fat off my beef and leave it in a little pile at the side of my plate.

What about you? Are there any food textures that send you packing?


18 comments:

  1. You've hit on all my foods to avoid. I once ate a snail to save my job, but it was floated down in a soup spoon of garlic butter.

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    1. Oh gag. Husband has eaten those as well. Quite frankly, you could put anything in garlic butter to make it taste better. But who decided you should eat something that leaves its own slime trail??

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  2. So funny that I'm seeing your post this morning....I, too, am enjoying a quiet alone morning and wanted "eggs". For I love them. Kinda addicted to any type of egg even tho as I age, I'm beginning to think my stomach doesn't tolerate them as well. But I just fixed myself a rocky mountain toast. NO idea how we named it that except when my now 36 yr old son said the egg looked like a mountain top.....that's what it became!
    Cut the hole in toast. Brown the toast in skillet and then break egg into hole. Cook on both sides until whites are done. Sop up yolk with the toast.
    Yum. I love em but I think the memory of eating them with my young sons, oh so long ago, is what I like the best!!
    Thanks

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    1. It's called "toad in the hole" here. (Isn't that name enough to put you off eating it??) Ha, ha, I know I'm in the minority here of egg lovers. Rocky mountain toast is a much better name.

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  3. I totally understand. I've had to quit ordering fried eggs out as I always say no runny white and they always do. Until I was an adult, I had to remove those white cords, chalasma, or something gross sounding like that, in which I learned they were not umbilical cords, but were to keep the yolk floating in the center of the egg. I still don't like them there. All that being said, they are the perfect food for us humans.

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    1. Oh hilarious!! I used to do that (until we got our own hens and I thought, I know these are fresh eggs, I'll be o.k.), but my sister still does remove them!

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  4. That's a really good question that I've not really considered. I like my eggs soft, but I don't think of it as a texture thing, though I suppose it could be. But I"m with you on the oysters and squid doesn't do much for me either. (Lobster, on the other hand? Bring it on!). I'll have to think about this one...

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  5. I'm with you on fat or skin of any kind. Grosses me out totally.
    I can eat smoked oysters but forget raw live anything. Having watched them cook a poor live lobster one time, I put that on my forbidden list.
    I love eggs, any way shape or form. Our neighbours have chickens. We mind the girls at every opportunity and get our chicken fix - sort of. I'm still asking Santa to miraculously drop a henhouse into my yard.

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  6. There is one food I have this problem with - avocados. I have tried and tried, but there is no way I can eat them. I'm not sure if it's a texture thing or a flavor thing or maybe a combination of both, but immediately the gag reflex is triggered. It's too bad because they are a great superfood. Oh well.

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  7. Thanks goodness I'm reading this after we had dinner because I'd totally lose my appetite. You have hit upon everything that makes me gag. Except for lobster. I love lobster. But not if it had eggs in it. That would totally freak me out, too. And soft eggs...BLEAH... My husband and both my daughters love dipping toast into soft boiled eggs or eggs made sunny side up. I swear just the look of it leaves me sick. My husband loves snails and oysters and mussels and clams and every disgusting thing you can imagine. I as him how in the world he can eat that stuff without gagging. He...nom...slurp...nom...slurp...smiles and offers me some. And I want to run away screaming...LOL...

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  8. My husband has the same problem. Yogurt sends him packing. I guess I haven't hit anything I cant handle. I don't like crawfish, but that is because their eyes are watching me!

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  9. I've been a vegetarian for so long that all meats (or almost anyway) will make me sick just smelling them up close. One of the reasons I became one was that I never liked meat except like pepperoni and maybe a few more. I don't think I ever had steak, but a lot cheap meats just had a texture that I could not tolerate.

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  10. Bananas. Pudding. Tapioca. Even the word tapioca sounds like e type of vomit.

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  11. in my teens i was famous egg eater in my family .they were so fascinating to me because when i used to watch the tiny chic coming out of them after 22 days hatching it was most adventurous thing then.

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  12. OMG, Jenn, you must be my lost sister...kid sister(lol).. I get an icky feeling when I see and think I might have to eat those slimy egg parts, and other things..I do just get grossed out to the max. My parents mixed the whole can of salmon when making patties, of course I was a starving kid and ate it all...today,I scrap that blackish meat , skin and those bones out completely. I dip those white pieces of ooky stuff out of the eggs before I use them in anything. I will never eat an oyster..nasty. I saw a young man actually eat the same oyster about 4 times once...it kept coming back up. LOL. that was so blasted gross in a sea food café. If I ever fix you some eggs, you can bet they won't be slimy. LOL. Blessings, xoxo, Susie

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  13. Sorry, I`m not in the same camp as you and most of your commentors. I can eat (and enjoy) most foods, slimy or not. Having said that I am currently not eating anything as I am sick to my stomach from last night`s dinner - probably something slimy I ate!

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  14. Eggs are the reason I can NOT be vegan, I really enjoy scrambled eggs & only enjoy eggs over easy at home because egg phelem makes me gag. Ah yes memories of hot fish eyes for dessert.

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