My stepdad had cancer last year and had to go to Atlanta for extensive chemo treatment and when he and my mom came back two months later, they brought back some thousand year old eggs from a large ethnic market there. I had no intention of ever eating the things but I was so curious about them that I grabbed one, cracked it open, and took a tentative sniff.
I immediately dropped it and ran to the bathroom. Horrible.
And Mr. Niceguy, do you eat chicken? If so, you’re eating an animal a hundred times worse than pigs. As aruvqan said, pigs are dirty only when we force them to be – left to their own devices, they’re pretty clean – but chickens are as disgusting as any pig you will find in any farmer’s sty because it is their habit.
I’m trying to remember Samuel Jackson’s line about hogs in Pulp Fiction. “…Yeah, and sewer rat might taste like pumpkin pie but I’ll never know cuz I’m ain’t gonna eat the mf”
It might be a shock to the system, but the sensibilities should handle it just fine.
If you really want to gross out Japanese visitors, I’ve got one word for you: licorice. Whenever one of the gaijin in our office goes home or gets a care package, we make a point of bringing licorice to the office as a souvenir specifically to creep out everyone else. I have never met a person in Japan who could even tolerate the stuff.
Root beer’s an odd one: my wife’s developed a taste for it, my co-worker’s thought it was gross (probably because they couldn’t get over the shock of the first taste when they were expecting to be like real beer).
I don’t know if can’t-watch-it-eaten disgust is typical, but many (if not most) Asians are lactose intolerant and therefore, eating cheese is not just something inadvisable from a “this tastes weird to me” standpoint, but also from a health standpoint as well.
I don’t consider swine disgusting. I said they were filthy. I still eat them all the time.
Love chicken. And yes they are nasty creatures.
My point being, if you can eat pork, knowing the typical perception of swine (and chicken, knowing the same) why should anything be out of the question ? I’ll try anything once. I don’t dismiss anything out of hand just because it sounds “gross”. Swine are gross. Chickens are gross. Oysters are gross. All good to me.
Vincent : Want some bacon?
Jules : No man, I don’t eat pork.
Vincent : Are you Jewish?
Jules : Nah, I ain’t Jewish, I just don’t dig on swine, that’s all.
Vincent : Why not?
Jules : Pigs are filthy animals. I don’t eat filthy animals.
Vincent : Bacon tastes gooood. Pork chops taste gooood.
Jules : Hey, sewer rat may taste like pumpkin pie, but I’d never know ‘cause I wouldn’t eat the filthy motherfucker. Pigs sleep and root in shit. That’s a filthy animal. I ain’t eat nothin’ that ain’t got enough sense enough to disregard its own faeces.
Vincent : How about a dog? Dogs eats its own feces.
Jules : I don’t eat dog either.
Vincent : Yeah, but do you consider a dog to be a filthy animal?
Jules : I wouldn’t go so far as to call a dog filthy but they’re definitely dirty. But, a dog’s got personality. Personality goes a long way.
Vincent : Ah, so by that rationale, if a pig had a better personality, he would cease to be a filthy animal. Is that true?
Jules : Well we’d have to be talkin’ about one charmin’ motherfuckin’ pig. I mean he’d have to be ten times more charmin’ than that Arnold on Green Acres, you know what I’m sayin’?
Hershey bars , yeech. Particularly the Cookies and Cream, I’m afraid my New York souvenir went in the bin.
People outside the States don’t have the love of peanuts like the Americans do, so you’ll find that a lot of foreigners don’t like peanut butter, Reeses Pieces and that kind of thing.
And what is it with sausages and maple syrup? that sounds revolting to me as well.
I remember reading on this here MB a while ago that peanut butter in the US is quite different from peanut butter in the UK. I seem to recall that it was jjimm who wrote that, maybe now that I’ve written his name he’ll come back and verify my memory.
It’s common in the US to have all breakfast foods on the same plate, so if one is having sausage and pancakes for breakfast, the syrup will sometimes get on the sausage. Some people enjoy this combination. I should note that a big complicated breakfast like this that requires cooking would be pretty unusual in the US and be reserved for weekends.
Sublight, count me in with the Japanese on the licorice thing. I hate licorice.
An Israeli friend told me that my home-fried potatoes with the skins left on were gifa, which sort of translates as “ghetto.” But I noticed that after making a few grossed out faces, he started sneaking them. Like I’d take culinary advice from someone who waxed nostalgic over mayonnaise sandwiches anyway. I mean, ONLY mayonnaise. Hilariously, when I made a face at the thought of this, another friend explained to me that Israelis consider it rude to express disgust over someone else’s meal. Sure they do - refer to the beginning of the paragraph! Oh yeah, and on a hiking trip, some Israelis were grossed out by our s’more making (s’mores: little sandwiches of graham crackers, chocolate, and marshmallows roasted on a stick over a campfire, an American camping tradition).
Daftbugger, it was sausages and maple syrup that grossed out my Indian coworker. I don’t dig on it either, but it doesn’t gross me out that much. Besides, once he mentioned it, I felt obligated to swirl the sausage around in the syrup and eat it right in front of him. Not that pleasant to taste but fun to watch his face.
I remember hearing about the reactions of some unsuspecting Germans to jalapeno slices. Wow. I got to find out what *Gift * meant in Deustch. The only thing they liked about it was the thought of watching their friends try some.
No cite I’m afraid, but I do remember reading about how most africans regard cinnamon as overpowering and nasty. I could see that. It is a pungent flavor.
Also, somone mentioned the bright artificial colors in much of our food. It would be nice to return to somewhat more natural-looking cuisine, but I’m afraid that you’d have to change American culture to a degree it’s not willing to go.
In England we add salt to peanut butter, not sugar, so it slightly different, but not that different. I’ve had Canadian peanut butter (Kraft) which I assume is the same as the American stuff.
Cadburys tried to sell ‘Craze’ which is the same as Cadburys ‘Crispy Crunch’ (not to be mixed up the the Nestle Crispy Crunch) a peanut based choccy bar and it sold really badly. A shame because they stopped selling them Peanut based things just don’t sell over here, sweet, or salt.
More and more people are deathly alergic to peanuts it seems. Every time you open that bag of planters, three people keel over in alaphalactic(sp?) shock a block a way.
First of all, the basashi (raw horse meat) ice cream is not typical Japanese fare, and I think most Japanese people would think it pretty strange. It’s a novelty item.
I second the remarks that most Japanese people hate licorice, root beer, and (to them) overly sweet desserts. They didn’t like the cookies I made (chocolate chip and oatmeal) because they were “too sweet.” I knew a woman who complained bitterly about the overly sweet pastries in Paris. They also don’t like cinnamon candy - says it tastes like medicine.
I knew a Thai guy who thought dill pickles were the height of disgusting. He almost gagged while eating one.
A lot of foreigners are also grossed out by huge American portion sizes, and the high fat content of a lot of food.
One thing that people in China/Hong Kong seemed to freak out about Western manners was touching food with one’s hand.
Also, a colleague once decided he didn’t want his candy bar, and pitched it, unopened, onto the top of some paper, in a waste-paper basket (not a regular trash can). I went “hey, free candy bar” and retrieved it. This was absolutely disgusting to my Chinese colleagues, who called me lap sap lo (garbage man) from then on.
Hm. I actually think sugary peanut butter is pretty nasty. The peanut butter I get is pretty much nothing but mushed peanuts. No salt, no sugar, just peanuts. Always chunky, never smooth.
Yeah. I much prefer Teddy Chunky p.b. (ground peanuts & salt; that’s it) to something from Skippy or Jif, and it quite resembles the stuff I’ve had in Europe and Ireland. Across the pond, I remember p.b. consumption being pretty uncommon, and, oddly, p.b. being rather expensive; they obviously much prefer Nutella over there. I like Nutella, too, but a Nutella-and-raspberry-preserves sandwich sounds kinda nasty to me.
To quote Special Agent Dale Cooper “Nothing beats the taste sensation when maple syrup [clap!] collides with ham.”
I prefer bacon to sausage myself.
Which brings up a quote from Gordon Cole: “The word ‘linkage’ reminds me of sausage! Never cared for the links, preferred the patties, but breakfast is a real good idea!”
I suspect that if you didn’t tell me what it was, I might like chitlins. Or at least not heave.
Yeah, I knew what Gift means in German. Up in Gettysburg there is a touristy establishment called Das Gift Haus. Just the thing for those once in a lifetime presents.
The one Deustcher who was loading up on jalapenos thought they were pickle slices. Until his first bite. This was at the Ramstein airbase open house. The soldiers who were being tiraded by this angry german were purposely eating the jalapenos right out of the can in front of him as he screamed. Apparently, extra condiments are usually not free so this guy was taking advantage of the unlimited toppings. I know another german word: Schadenfreude.
Peanut based things just don’t sell over here, sweet, or salt.