It’s not as though I have a particularly unusual diet that provokes a lot of comment, and I can’t begin to explain why, but it really bugs me when people comment on what I’m eating. This is more understandable when you get some twonk going “eeeuw, I can’t believe you’re eating that, gross!” or similar remarks, but I don’t even like it when it’s a positive remark, even an innocuous “that looks nice” as I’m putting my lunch together in the work kitchen (which I try and do at less busy times when there are fewer prying eyes).
It’s possible the latter reaction stems from an only child’s inability to share - “yes, it does, and it’s mine, so stop oogling it” (I’m a joy at tapas restaurants) - combined with an extreme need for privacy - it’s none of your business what I’m eating, nosy. But that doesn’t make it any more rational - especially as I’m quite happy to post in the “What’s for dinner?” threads on here, and would feel very disappointed if I’ve cooked for someone else and they don’t comment on it.
Yes. I want to tell people to mind their own F’ing business. The same thing holds true at the grocery store. “It looks like you’re going have frozen lasagna!” Ugh. Drives me nuts.
I am not a big fan of that either. I find it happens most often at work, when everyone gathers around the lunch room table with their brown bags. The first 20 minutes is spent with everyone inspecting each other’s lunch and making little comments about it.
Growing up, I think I narrowly escaped developing an eating disorder by this much —> <— so I’d prefer to keep my eating habits and proclivities off the table, so to speak.
Add this to my dining pet peeves: My dad is notorious for jamming his fork into your plate and snagging a bite of something. I learned to eat like a jackal, haunched over my plate, guarding it like a submissive dog. I once stuck my fork in his hand for trying that. My now ex-BF did that to me a time or two until I fired his ass up about it. I’m all for sharing food, especially in a romantic situation, but I’d rather my dining companions wait until I offer a bite to share (and then I will put some on your plate) rather than just reach in and steal my food.
So yeah, when the administrative assistant sticks her big hook nose about four inches above my plate to sniff, inspect, and make an editorial comment about it, I am totally put off my food.
I’m not a fan of it either, although it’s probably more touchiness because I’ve been overweight all my life and my mother would always comment on my food choices.
I get it at work quite often because I always have a fresh salad for lunch which looks and tastes delicious. People will either say ‘That looks so tasty’ or ‘That looks so healthy’. I’m not sure which irks me more.
To be clear—and to keep myself somewhat on topic—I don’t mind if others comment on my food; if I’m eating right in front of them then I hardly see why I should react as if it breaches my privacy. Opinions will differ, I suppose. And it’s true that if they kept harping on how gross it looks and how can I eat that then it would annoy me.
But the vegetarian thing … wow, yes, I can’t agree more. My mother is a sorta kinda vegetarian and I must have internalized it, because many people act like it’s the strangest (and sometimes most fascinating) thing they’ve ever heard. As if I’m visiting some rural deep-south farm and regaling everyone with tales of sushi and caviar and tete de veau. It amuses much more than annoys me, but I really don’t understand what’s so novel about someone being a vegetarian. It’s not hard, I’m not militant about it, there’s always plenty enough to eat to keep me good ‘n portly.
What irritates me a bit, I guess, is when I’m ordering food—this happened at Five Guys a time or two, but at classier establishments as well—and the person taking my order is baffled that I don’t want meat. I mean, you offer a grilled cheese sandwich, why are you so incredulous that someone wants to order it? Is it because I’m male? (Probably yes; at least half the time my SO mistakenly gets the diet coke …)
It doesn’t bother me, but it drives my wife bonkers. She has the same thing all week for lunch, then changes it up the next week, and again the next week. So she will be assembling her lunch in the lunchroom on Monday and someone will make a comment, then on Tuesday, another comment, by Friday she is going bonkers about the comments, especially when sometimes it is the same person! She eats VERY healthy and has lost a ton of weight and kept it off for over 8 years, and these folks that makes comments are typically eating some pasta dish with chunks of sausage in it and complaining how they aren’t losing any weight. So I think it is the combination of their total lack of clueing in that maybe their diet has an impact on their weight + the constant amazement that you can produce healthy good looking/tasting food day after day just drives her bonkers.
At least she can vent to me. As for me, it never has bothered me. It sort of draws attention to my food which I don’t like much. The only time I can think of it bothering me was when I got a sub sandwich which has ham on it. This guy who was on this ‘no-pork’ kick came in and kept going on and on and on about how dirty pigs were and blah blah blah. He had this bizarre theory that the closer you get to the ground the more unhealthy the animal was or some weird ass shit. Finally I said to him, well you know ‘you’ aren’t eating it, I am, and I am going to eat it so you should probably go away if you don’t want to watch me eat my swine. I should see if he is still eating things high up in the air, I swear I still don’t understand his theory.
Yeah, if it is something like, “Oooh, that looks good, what is it?” that’s cool. But if it something like, “Man that looks greasy, how can you eat that shit?” then that gets an eff off.
Because you never know if that friendly, positive comment is truly such, or if it’s really just a thinly disguised passive-aggressive swipe. In my family, you had a 50% chance that the comment was truly positive.
I don’t comment on anyone else’s food choices. Ever. I might ask for a recipe for a dish I tasted that someone else prepared. But comment on what someone else eats or how? No.
I think with me I just have “food issues.” I am very overweight and while I can’t say that anyone has ever harassed me with “ooooh, you shouldn’t eat that!” I have definitely developed a sensitivity to people commenting on my food. I will freely admit that it’s a mental issue.
My dad is bad at this. Real bad. If I go to their house around dinner time he insists on preparing dinner for me. But sometimes I just want to make a sandwich or a salad. If I do not let him prepare dinner for me he follows me around and comments on all the food, and offers me lists of add-ons (Do you want ranch dressing? How about Italian? Do you want olives?) Even if I let him prepare dinner for me I have to answer a whole worksheet of questions about what I’d like to eat.
My roommate also has a habit of commenting on things. I know he is 100% not judging (he happens to be a vegan!) He is simply being nice. But knowing that he knows what I am eating makes me feel very anxious. I try to avoid being in the kitchen when he is in there just because … I dunno.
One time I had to put my groceries away while roomie and girlfriend were cooking in the kitchen and I almost had a panic attack. They saw all my things! (And I swear to god it wasn’t Twinkies and Pizza Rolls. It was just milk and eggs and boring stuff).
Conversely, I have absolutely no problem going to a restaurant with friends and/or cooking and sharing food with friends. It’s just the hovering dad does and the consistency with which my roommate comments that makes me feel real bad.
I don’t know, I’d just rather people not comment at all on what I’m eating. I did say I know it’s weird.
I’ve realised that I have another slightly weird thing - I don’t like my husband to watch me get dressed, and if possible would rather he wasn’t in the room at all while I do so. It’s not a modesty thing, because I have no problem with him watching me get undressed, or seeing me nude, it’s the putting on of clothes I prefer to do in private, even though I know I’m only going to get positive comments.
Maybe the two things are related, though it’s hard to see how!
I’m going to guess here… But some people may just not be comfortable with anyone calling attention to their food at all. As soon as you do call attention to it, even if it’s positive, what’s on their plate has become “significant” to some degree. Suddenly “people are paying attention to what you’re eating” and if you’re self-conscious, then it sucks.
I had a similar shyness when I had to go back to school after getting my ears pinned back. It wasn’t a planned cosmetic job, I nearly lost an ear in a skiing accident due to horsing around, so we had the otoplasty done on the other to even them out.
I don’t know why, but I really would have preferred it if everyone had pretended not to notice. I was really self-conscious about it and even complimentary stuff made me feel really awkward. Kind of like if you get a bad haircut. You don’t want people reassuring you: “It looks good! Really!” You just want it to be a non-issue that no one notices.
This. And the corollary: I was always a skinny little kid. Didn’t eat much. My sister was always a little bit overweight. Meal time comments to me were always about how I didn’t eat enough. Did I get enough to eat? Why don’t I have another helping of ___? Etc. My sister got: whew, you sure you can eat all that? Maybe you should slow down.
To this day, I cannot stand it when someone else calls attention to how much or how little I ate. It makes me feel like I have to justify my choices to someone else so I don’t have to disappoint them. “Oh, I ate before I came; I just wanted to sample the appetizer.”
I don’t want to explain to anyone what I ate, why I chose to eat it, or justify how much I did or didn’t eat. These days, I just point to my six-pack abs and say, “Yeah, well portion control is how I got this body.”
It used to annoy me, but I realized that I occasionally notice what others are eating it it’s out of the ordinary, so now I don’t care. If people make disparaging remarks, well, obviously, they’re wrong, so who cares?
I’m weird like the OP, too. I eat my lunch at my desk most days. It takes me maybe 20 minutes out of my workday. But I sit by the door, so everyone walks past me, and I get comments every day. “Oh, what do you have? That looks good!” I kind of want to be left alone and not bugged over my food. It’s diarrhea of the mouth, I feel. You can’t leave me alone and not feel obligated to say something for 20 minutes?
I hate even more when I am trying to eat lunch and people hover near my desk talking to each other. Go away! I am not the office water cooler.
When I was growing up, my dad would get on my case just for the simple fact of eating. He would say, “You’re eating again???” whatever I ate, whenever I ate. Even if the last time I ate was breakfast at 8, and now it’s 12:30 and I’m having a sandwich for lunch…because, you know, it’s time for lunch, not such an alien concept…I would hear, “You’re eating again???” At the time, I was around 135 pounds at 5’4", a healthy weight, and was not a particularly big eater. I don’t know what his problem was.
When I left home and went to college, I found myself completely unable to eat around people I didn’t know very well. At parties, etc., I would force myself to nibble on something just to have something to do with my hands, but I could not eat properly until I was back at home alone. Part of that was due to general social anxiety, but another part was due to feeling that vague sense of shame about eating. Eventually I got over that quirk, but I still instinctively freeze up when anyone comments on my food, regardless of whether it’s positive or negative, simply because they’re bringing attention to the fact that I’m eating again, and I hate that.
I don’t think it’s terribly weird; we have all kinds of emotions and emotional behaviour wrapped up with food and eating. I don’t care much about someone commenting positively on my food (but I will kind of mentally wonder why it’s any of their business), but I don’t like negative comments at all.
