Item #3 - New foods (Round 1)

I may not have kids. I may never have kids. I may never find a girl that would be willing to have my aforementioned kids. But if I do, I will force them everything that can legally be considered "edible."

Those that know me, know I'm a terribly picky eater. Well, sort of. Within the foods that I do eat, I'm incredibly easy to please, and I'll rarely complain about a food I do enjoy. BUT, the realm of the foods I do eat is limited to say the least. No eggs. No salad. No rice. No shellfish. Minimal soups. The list goes on. Its sad really. And I blame my parents dammit!  

Supposedly, as the oldest child, I was never force fed. I didn't like it, I didn't have to eat it.  When my brother came along, he was force fed more. And when the baby of the bunch, my little sister, cam along, they made her eat everything. And 30 some years later, here we are, with the same eating habits we had as 1 years olds (see Chart 1).

So, to all the parents and soon-to-be-parents out there, here's some advice from someone who can often barely take care of himself - make your kids eat everything. In fact, have them eat dog food. Have them eat bird seed. Have them eat shit that will make broccoli sound awesome.

And with that said, as a food pansy, I think I can justify simply trying new foods as list items. Granted, I don't plan on counting things like "tried salad for the 10th time and still don't like it", but this weekend's wedding provided multiple opportunities for new (and exotic (to me)) foods, so I'm counting this 3-pack as an item (its my list dammit, I'll add what i want to).

New Food #1 - Butternut Squash Soup

I've never had squash, and I've probably tried 4 soups in my life. So this was really a double whammy. And luckily, while I wasn't drunk, I was enough beers deep to say "fuck it, let's do this" (yes, i know its pretty sad that i'm trying to sound like a bad ass while trying new foods, instead of say, jumping out of a plane).  So I went for it and . . . meh. Not terrible enough for me to gag. Not good enough to down the whole cup. But I made it halfway through, without even having to plug my nose during it. Hooray me.  So we're going to give the butternut squash soup . . . .2 out of 5 "Blech's".

New Food #2 - A Flower

Yes. Item #2 was a flower. I have no idea what kind besides "white and purple-ish." (what can i say - I'm a boy and thus, rarely buy flowers (reason #28 why I'm single?)). 

So the flower came out on top of the giant hunk of delicious non-exotic good-ole-fashioned American chicken, which was itself on top of a mound of good-ole-fashioned American mashed potatoes (fun fact - I didn't eat mashed potatoes until I was about 24 years old. seriously, i could write a blog post a day for a year on foods that I don't eat (or didn't eat) that normal Americans do). I figured it was just aesthetics, but my friend Walter informed me (or duped me into thinking) that it was in fact edible. So after watching him down it first, making sure he didn't immediately turn purple from an allergic reaction, I took my turn at it.

 

The verdict? More harmless than lettuce (again, I don't eat salads, and people who say lettuce has no taste obviously don't have the refined palette that I do, but since everyone has tricked themselves into thinking it has no taste, we'll use that as the comparison here). No taste at all. Not something I'd order (if that's even possible), but because it was so benign, it merely warrants 1 out of 5 Blech's.

New Food #3 - A Pumpkin

With 2 foods down, and me on a roll (and me a few more beers deep since the butternut squash soup), I decided to give the cheering onlookers a gift.

The centerpieces were bowls of mini squash and mini pumpkins, and since it is the season of the pumpkin beer (which is sublime, and if you disagree, you may hate America), I decided to bite into one of the pumpkins like an apple. It was . . .

 

. . . a poor decision.  For my reaction, please see any of the pictures that now represent the Blech Scale. Not surprisingly, this new food didn't make it's way to my stomach, but instead into the nearest coffee cup (always a classy move at a wedding). It was instantly gross, but since it didn't result in a gag reflex, it deserves 4 out of 5 Blech's.

Upcoming Endeavors

• Barring a change a plans, Item #4 (the blind date) will be taking place tomorrow. This one has already elicited a weird mix of utter excitement and total fear and anxiety. 
• Anyone interested in seeing Salem during October? Doing a lot of these list items solo is perfectly cool.  Doing a haunted house alone makes me the creepy weird guy who parents will probably hide their children from. I don't want to be that guy. 
• And if you need an explanation of what the hell of writing about, see Post #1