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“Don’t Hate It Until You Try It”: 40 People Are Sharing Their Unpopular Takes On Food
Pickles wrapped in cheese, popcorn with beans and ice cream on meatloaf are just a few of the surprising food combinations Americans said they love, according to this survey. It’s not to say these pairings are must-try, but they definitely show just how unique our taste buds can be.
So when Twitter user Michael Realman called for “canceling each other over food takes today,” it hit a soft spot for many. Immediately, people started sharing their own “cancelable” food combos that hit all too close to home, or rather the kitchen, for the rest.
From ketchup on waffles to Nutella pasta, some of the pairings will definitely raise our brows but hey, who am I to judge when I put salt and pepper on my porridge! And if you too are no stranger to some quirky food combo, be sure to share it in our comment section!
Image credits: trichesfaucons
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Most of us have at least one eating habit, if not more, that chances are we developed way back in our childhood. The first year of life is a period of rapid physical, social and emotional growth, during which eating patterns also develop. During this first year, infants transition from consuming a single food (i.e., breast milk or formula) to consuming a variety of foods more characteristic of an adult diet.
Moreover, parents influence children's eating behavior in many ways. First off, adults actively make food choices for the whole family, serving as models for dietary choices and patterns. Children also learn about food by observing the eating behaviors modeled by others. For example, research reveals that children's intake of fruits, vegetables, and milk increased after observing adults consuming the foods.
Our food preferences, whether common or unusual, are also part of our eating habits that formed early in life. They often include unique food combinations, too. The registered nutritionist Charlotte-Stirling Reed, who’s the author of “The Baby & Child Nutritionist,” told Bored Panda that when it comes to weird food pairings, parents often have a preconceived idea of what “flavors” go together. “They find it unimaginable that their young children eat certain pairings. But little ones, especially during weaning, don’t have the idea that breakfast HAS to be sweet, for example, until we introduce that idea,” she said and added that “They might not see the problem of having a courgette porridge in the morning or avocado ice cream!”
This is a pretty common dish (specifically in the UK), so I don't see this one being cancelled.
Both of those ingredients bring my daughters IBS up big time!! Goes from a flat stomach to looking five months pregnant! Hard to cook without them but possible!!
“In fact, my children recently chomped through some fruit sorbet with a stick of cauliflower on the side (their request). Sometimes children just follow their own innate intuition of what foods and flavors they want at that moment,” Reed told us. She said that parents should be happy to see that and “let them go for it!” Moreover, the child nutritionist added that she has carrot, beetroot and courgette porridge options as regular breakfasts for her kids, “and to them that’s quite normal!” If you and your little one feel adventurous enough to try some of the Reed’s unique porridge recipes, check them out right here.
I don't see anything unusual? Not my favorite, but if there was a cookie shortage, I'd at least consider them.
Yes me too! I know why people don’t like the flavourless cookie, but the icing tastes really good!
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That aftertaste means the icing is artificially sweetened. They aren't all like that.
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YES! We've had these! They look tasty but the cookie is bland and the frosting tastes like medicine! WHYYY?! 🤢
I would have fallen into this trap. These look scrumdiddlyumptious. Thanks for the warning!
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*gasp* HOW DARE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! these are the classic kid birthday cookies! my childhood!
They LOOK good. They taste like ... sugarless, dough cookies.
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Looks like a perfectly ordinary iced sugar cookie with sprinkles. I don't see a problem here.
when you're stuck with no snacks they are quite a viable option.
I respectfully disagree I like them. Give me anything with sugar and I will eat.
Homemade, no. Commercially made, hell yeah. Homemade tastes like the ingredients.Commercially made is tasteless and leaves your mouth feeling like it’s coated with Crisco.
I mean, the biscuit might be alright if you could taste anything other than icing.
Yes, if they are bought. Homemade sugar cookies with frosting are WAY yummy!
I taste more chemical than cookie when eating these. It’s disgusting! I totally agree with this one!!
they are good and my fav WHAT IS WRONG WITH THEM OTHER THAN THEM BEING PERFECT
Are they? I don't think they can be befause they are the embodiment of 90s kids cookies
I like them tbh... the sweet icing perfectly compliments the flavorless cookie, but only when done right.
i LOVE LOVE LOVE these so if you ever get some and dont want them, GIVE ME THE COOKIES
The blue and pink frosted ones taste terrible. These are my favorite store bought cookies! I just stick to the white, yellow, or orange frosted ones
If store bought... sure... I have a friend who makes these 'type' of cookies... but has this recipe from her family - and they somehow taste like freakin' MAGIC. they LOOK like these cookies but oh my jeebus... they don't TASTE like these cookies.
Agreed. The frosting usually has an odd old taste and the cookie is overly sweet.
I don't like these either, I've thought about making a pie crust from them though, for a "refrigerator" type pie. Not tried it.
A cookie made of drywall smeared with a little mortar is disgusting? Since when? (They taste like powdered sugar mixed with flour with wet powdered sugar spread on them.)
Still too dry to eat, like you need a drink of something after eating these
OMG!! When we were a base-hopping military family, I missed and craved these cookies (Grandma's brand from a Utah bakery in particular) so bad, I called the company (this was pre-internet ordering) and paid for 4 dozen 4-ounce, individually wrapped gems to be shipped to me. Cookie Heaven!! LOL!! Did the same thing get 20 pounds (had to order bulk) of red and mixed Swedish Fish over to Hawaii when I couldn't find them readily available on the islands.
They're not 'disgusting.' They just crumble too much and have no substance to them. All they do is get your clothes and car and sofa full of crumbs! Don't even THINK about trying to dunk one of these jerk cookies in milk. Instant dissolution.
This! My daughter always wants me to buy them, but they have no flavor other than sweet. Pretty, though, I'll give them that.
Tastes like chemicals rather than flour, butter, and sugar like cookies should
they have to be made by a good baker or they only taste like sugar
Homemade ones aren't so bad. The store bought ones are hideously disgusting. Of course, if you don't like soft cookies, you won't like these anyway.
They are about a year old when you buy them. I used to work at a grocery store and we would get the whole years lot at one time.
These are the WORST totally agree. They taste like sugar sand paste with cardboard.
I call them Play-Doh cookies. And I just learned that's how it's spelled.
Yes! My husband loves these and they are just a dry, crumbly pile nastiness to me.
Butter cookies aren't my favorite (dry and tasteless), but a little fresh frosting is exactly what they need.
Okay Luther, calm down. We'll all come over for your home-baked wares then, but you only had to ask!
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Sensory scientists and flavor experts have been studying just what foods and flavors pair well with others, pleasantly surprising our taste buds. One such pretty widespread combo is pineapple and ham (but beware to never order this kind of pizza anywhere in Italy!), which seem to work perfectly together.
Paul Breslin, a sensory scientist at the Monell Chemical Senses Center and a professor of nutrition at Rutgers University, explained this combo: “Really fatty foods, like ham and other meats, tend to leave your mouth feeling fatty, which is an undesirable state. Enter the pineapple. The fruit, which is naturally acidic, cuts through that greasy mouthfeel, creating a balanced (and tasty) result,” he said.
Pears and blue cheese have a similar effect. Breslin says that dressings typically contain three components: fat, salt, and acid. In the case of this classic pairing, the blue cheese provides the fat and salt, and the pear does its part with the acid.
Meanwhile, Niki Segnit, UK-based author of The Flavour Thesaurus, argues that “there are many wonderful matches to be discovered, and you don't need a PhD in molecular gastronomy to start experimenting.” She told the press that “interesting and unusual flavor matches can be made with common store-cupboard ingredients, like cheese and marmalade, or chocolate and aubergine.”
This 2020 survey commissioned by SPAM found that 41 percent of American respondents were most likely to have discovered their favorite food combinations from family or friends. The most popular food combo Americans love is the dipping of French fries in their chocolate milkshake. Other top combinations were chocolate and popcorn or sour cream and onion chips with chocolate. Interestingly, over half said they’ll have a “freak out” if their different foods touch each other while on their plate, the same survey found.
Hear me out. Vanilla Greek yogurt, a spoonful of fig preserves, a good sprinkle of chopped toasted walnuts.
People put stuff in Starbucks coffee because Starbucks coffee is terrible.
You forgot the fact that they sit on the bottom of the ocean and eat all the fish poop that drifts down, and they are full of poop when people eat them.
OMG! Finally another human being that shared my aversion to Ranch! It's totally gross! My favorite food is bacon cheese fries. I ALWAYS get it without ranch, because ranch is just gross. I usually always get it WITH ranch because some brain surgeon in the kitchen thinks that EVERYBODY likes ranch. 😝
"There are 3 stages in life - I hate olives; I don't despise olives and OMG OLIVES"
this might kill you but, i sometimes eat raw onions as a snack when i’m done grilling burgers, like chips. *powers up defibrillator *
I can't stand BBQ pizza, and also don't much like chicken on pizza, so totally disagree.
I've tried hot sauce on vanilla ice cream. It's an odd combo, but I've done it more than once.
If taste of flavourless grass is someone's thing...not judging but actually judging.
As long as it's medium rare, then I don't care if it looks like it was hit by a 4x4 and the grill left an imprint
Note: this post originally had 117 images. It’s been shortened to the top 40 images based on user votes.
let me just say, after looking at some of these, i refused to look at the rest of them, and just came here to say that
What is the purpose of this post? Just don't eat it and stop judging what others do
"Hunger is the best sauce" ---- a proverb for a reason. When you're hungry, you'll eat anything. Been there, tried that.
There are a lot of these where i really wonder if they've ever had a good example of the thing they hate. Like nowadays, especially in Canada and the US, i can easily imagine someone who has never had good bread or a good tomato. It's sad. otoh, if they have and they just don't like them, fair enough
We have amazing breads and tomatoes in the US, lol! I grow heirloom tomatoes every summer and bake breads all throughout the year. Darn, now I'm hungry for warm, fresh bread.
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I like Hershey's chocolate and Goldfish Crackers. Probably the sweet and salty combo.
I thought I was the only one. It's one of the many weird food habits I've passed to my daughter. One of the others is pepperoni, jalapenos, onions, and pineapple on pizza.
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Skin on fries are not fancy. You're just too lazy to peel the f****n spuds!
that sounds like the best way to have rice pudding when you have no rice pudding I have ever heard
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Add another one. I've never even bought it. I tasted it once at my sister's house and thought I was going to die from a sugar overload. I don't understand the appeal.
Load More Replies... I suggest we cancel the cancellers. Why should anyone care what other people like or don't like to eat?
If we cancel the cancellers then aren't we cancellers and should be cancelled?
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With some of these horrible posts.. Do you upvote them (after all, this is a list of food combinations that should be cancelled) or do you downvote them, because they are just terrible?
I think we're upvoting the ones we don't want to cancel
Load More Replies... Cheez-its and black licorice are a snack sensation you gotta try at least once. Tastes like gourmet sausage
I don't get the love for those sickeningly sweet brown sugar and molasses concoctions some people think are BBQ sauce either, but a nice tangy or spicy sauce can compliment just about any meat.
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These folks are amateurs :) When I was 5 or early 6yo and alone at home while my parents were working and sister in school (my parents were quite trusting or that was a different time, I guess), I got hungry and started looking for something to eat. I ended up mixing bread crumbs with some sort of powder for instant vitamin drink and ate it dry. I liked it. Made it again quite a few times, especially while still a kid.
This list made me sad- half the food was things I can no longer eat, the other half food I have never heard of/tried :(
If you're referring to the peanut butter spread they try to pass off as peanut butter then you're right. It might as well be classified as icing. It's like saying miracle whip is the same as mayonnaise. I prefer natural peanut butter like Adam's. It actually tastes like peanuts. If you don't like peanuts then it really doesn't matter which one you try.
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Coffee creamer, straight outta the container. Pure chemicals, almost styrofoam, sure, nummy, yes!
Rice with anything is a crime against humanity. Absolutely revolting stuff.
For the most part, rice is just a filler carb. But, sushi wouldn't really be the same without it.
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let me just say, after looking at some of these, i refused to look at the rest of them, and just came here to say that
What is the purpose of this post? Just don't eat it and stop judging what others do
"Hunger is the best sauce" ---- a proverb for a reason. When you're hungry, you'll eat anything. Been there, tried that.
There are a lot of these where i really wonder if they've ever had a good example of the thing they hate. Like nowadays, especially in Canada and the US, i can easily imagine someone who has never had good bread or a good tomato. It's sad. otoh, if they have and they just don't like them, fair enough
We have amazing breads and tomatoes in the US, lol! I grow heirloom tomatoes every summer and bake breads all throughout the year. Darn, now I'm hungry for warm, fresh bread.
Load More Replies... I like Hershey's chocolate and Goldfish Crackers. Probably the sweet and salty combo.
I thought I was the only one. It's one of the many weird food habits I've passed to my daughter. One of the others is pepperoni, jalapenos, onions, and pineapple on pizza.
Load More Replies... Skin on fries are not fancy. You're just too lazy to peel the f****n spuds!
that sounds like the best way to have rice pudding when you have no rice pudding I have ever heard
Load More Replies... Add another one. I've never even bought it. I tasted it once at my sister's house and thought I was going to die from a sugar overload. I don't understand the appeal.
Load More Replies... I suggest we cancel the cancellers. Why should anyone care what other people like or don't like to eat?
If we cancel the cancellers then aren't we cancellers and should be cancelled?
Load More Replies... With some of these horrible posts.. Do you upvote them (after all, this is a list of food combinations that should be cancelled) or do you downvote them, because they are just terrible?
I think we're upvoting the ones we don't want to cancel
Load More Replies... Cheez-its and black licorice are a snack sensation you gotta try at least once. Tastes like gourmet sausage
I don't get the love for those sickeningly sweet brown sugar and molasses concoctions some people think are BBQ sauce either, but a nice tangy or spicy sauce can compliment just about any meat.
Load More Replies... These folks are amateurs :) When I was 5 or early 6yo and alone at home while my parents were working and sister in school (my parents were quite trusting or that was a different time, I guess), I got hungry and started looking for something to eat. I ended up mixing bread crumbs with some sort of powder for instant vitamin drink and ate it dry. I liked it. Made it again quite a few times, especially while still a kid.
This list made me sad- half the food was things I can no longer eat, the other half food I have never heard of/tried :(
If you're referring to the peanut butter spread they try to pass off as peanut butter then you're right. It might as well be classified as icing. It's like saying miracle whip is the same as mayonnaise. I prefer natural peanut butter like Adam's. It actually tastes like peanuts. If you don't like peanuts then it really doesn't matter which one you try.
Load More Replies... Coffee creamer, straight outta the container. Pure chemicals, almost styrofoam, sure, nummy, yes!
Rice with anything is a crime against humanity. Absolutely revolting stuff.
For the most part, rice is just a filler carb. But, sushi wouldn't really be the same without it.
Load More Replies...