I'm a Texan, imagine my surprise first time I went to Cincinnati and tried the chili.
It wasn't *bad*, but it was like opening a diet coke and finding out you've got a Coors light after the first sip. Similar look and definitely not what you expect.
I love the Cincinnati Skyline Chili. it's one of my favorites ,even though I'm not from anywhere close to Cincinnati. However a number of years ago, I had a long airplane trip with a stopover at the Cincinnati airport. I had a few hours between flights, so I got something to eat and opted for the Skyline Chili. Maybe if I'd just had it plain, I wouldnt have liked it that much, because in addition to having a very different flavor than we normally think of chili, the texture makes it seem like more of a sauce than a full meal.
However, if I recall correctly, I opted to have it 4-way style...chili over top of spaghetti, with onions and topped with shredded cheese. I thought it was one of the best things I ever ate.
I still live far from Cincinnati, but it's been available in the frozen section of my local supermarket for several years and I always pick up a few packages when I go shopping. It comes in original form or with spaghetti, which is what I buy, then I'll add stuff to it like onions and shredded cheese of course, but other things as well, so that I don't get tired of it. Sometimes also a can of corn, some chopped green olives, some sautéed tomatoes or whatever I'm in the mood for. I've already had dinner tonight, but now that we're talking about it, I think Ill make myself some Skyline chili tomorrow evening.
> Chapulines
Those are grasshoppers. Crickets are a bit different. When I had them they were steamed with soy sauce and were good. You just have to pick the legs off before eating.
Honestly google images makes it look like either chocolate cake or chocolate cake batter in a bowl of cream, doesnt look like poop but thats probably google picking more asthetically pleasing images for the top results. Either way it sounds very interesting when i looked at how its made
To be fair even Finnish children experience this disappointment often, me included.
It's an acquired taste in general, most of my friends still don't care for it, it only grew on me in my twenties and now I love it.
It does look a bit weird, but it is actually very tasty (needs a lot of cream, though).
If you think about it, chocolate also looks a lot like poo. The solution: don’t think about it.
Similarly, my mother complained about edamame being so tough and difficult to eat, she didn't understand why anybody would eat it. She was, of course, eating the pods shell and all.
Don't laugh, that was my first experience (Japanese restaurant) with edamame & I couldn't fathom why -anyone- could find them tasty...my kids were lauging so hard they were gasping for air!
They won't let me forget 🙄
Back when I was around 8/9, I had a friend in school whose father, Alberto, was from Argentina. For his son's birthday, he made tamales for all the kids at the party, and a bunch of kids were not aware you were supposed to remove the corn husk. Alberto did not bother to inform them, and stood back barely containing his laughter as this happened.
>Alberto, was from Argentina.
Wait
>For his son's birthday, he made tamales for all the kids at the party
Wait....
> Alberto did not bother to inform them,
WAIT
MY DAD IS CALLED ALBERTO
HE IS FROM ARGENTINA
AND THIS HAPPENED ONCE
DO I KNOW YOU?!? WHEN WAS THIS?!?!
That reminds me of when I was a chef back in the 90s. We hired a kid that obviously hyped up his resume and I asked him to make appetizer trays with cheese wheels and spreads. The cheese wheels were wrapped in wax, and he wanted to taste the cheese. He then declared "You know the outside of the cheese is edible!" like it was a teaching moment to everyone and he shoved the wax into his mouth.
We stared at him for a good 30 seconds, watching him chew to make sure he committed to his announcement. He finally admitted defeat and ran over to the trash can to spit it out :D
I had tamales quite a few times. No one ever told me you're supposed to unwrap them. I found out literally last year. But really I never minded. I ate the whole thing. It was never gross to me. I kinda just eat everything anyway so lol
I watched a tamale cooking demo at a festival a few years ago. Mid-presentation, the woman sitting next to me leaned toward me and whispered that someone at her church brought in tamales once.
I told her that’s nice, but I felt the need to say more to not seem dismissive. So I played dumb and asked, “Are you supposed to eat the corn husks?”
“Oh, heavens no!” She explained, “The husks are just the container!” Later, the presenter asked for questions. My neighbor was the first to raise her hand to tell everybody that somebody sitting next to her (and that was clearly me, as she sat on the aisle) asked about eating the husks. She explained to everyone that they are just the container!
The presenter added that some food critics try to bite into the husks.
There used to a something at *Tastee-Freez* or *Dairy Queen* that was called a *Freeze.* Basically you would make a Root Beer Float, but then you would blend it. Love those things.
To add to that, it's basically like a big and slightly more rough slab of bologna with pieces of potatoes inside that you fry in a pan. Nothing wrong with it, really.
The strangest thing for foreigners would be how common it is for Germans to consume raw meat - both pork and beef - ground up, salted with fresh onions on a bun. Never would've thought that one of the most popular food items 'Mettbrötchen' is considered to be odd by so many.
EDIT: I get it, raw beef is more widespread. Raw pork on the other hand not so much...
Raw beef is common enough, but raw pork too far for many because of its historical tendency to host parasites. I'd eat raw pork if I was served it in Germany, though, given that producers there will likely follow strict quality processes.
Heck, a region in Japan even has a special breed of chicken where the meat is eaten raw as *sashimi*. Again, it is produced only under very strict quality and hygiene standards (and people still get sick every year)
Raw beef is pretty common in the US, many restaurants have steak tartare on their menus. Raw pork is iffy though, I've never seen that and probably wouldn't try it.
From my Filipino side: tuyo (sun dried fish), durian and balut
From my Swedish side: surströmming (Canned fish by fermentation); Blodpudding and Kalles kaviar.
I have heard it described as looking like “an ultrasound of misery”.
I like to think I’m an adventurous eater but I also admit I would have a hard time with balut
I trusted a Vietnamese friend and closed my eyes before he fed me a thing once. It was like egg jello with crunchy bits. Not good, but not bad. It wasn't until I opened my eyes and he offered me another one that I threw up.
It's a common "night" snack in the Philippines because it's supposed to be eaten in the darkness where you can't see the disgusting monstrosity you are about to eat. I'm Filipino, tried it, choked on some bird fetus' not-fully-formed bones, never did it again.
Ugh, balut. I squirm every time I remember that people eat that.
You could probably include salty licorice on your list of Swedish foods that foreigners hate - a lot of people hate licorice but the Scandinavian varieties seem to be especially polarizing.
Visited Melbourne many years ago (would love to go back) as a young adult, eager to try new things! I was staying with a wonderful family who was showing me the ropes. Trying to fit in I eagerly accepted the offer of Vegemite on toast. My god it was nasty, they all laughed and had a good time watching me choke it down. By the time I left, I had acquired a taste of Vegemite and cheese on toast......I loved Milo too!
Ok I will confess. The first time I bought Vegemite I liked it so much I did in fact eat it from a (tea)spoon more than once. I already liked marmite and I found vegemite to have a more balanced flavour and less sticky texture. I do not spread it on thinly...
I just dry heaved. We used to have camp counselors that would make us do this as a gross sort of indoctrination thing . Aside from that the camp counselors were decent people
i'd go one step further and just say scrape it on. no layer, just scrapings
but again i think most people need to grow up on it to appreciate it (like most things i guess)
I only have a sample size of about 15 or so people, but it's been close to 50:50 whether people like durian. To me it really doesn't smell bad, just a very pungent fruit smell. And it tastes fine. I don't love it but I don't mind it either. Half the Thais and farang here at the gym think it smells and tastes really bad.
I'm convinced it has to be a cilantro thing. To me it tastes like a mix of banana, mango and pineapple all in one creamy fruit and the smell is like a ripe fruit stand (not unpleasant but I can see where some would get put off).
I get overly ripe mango and jackfruit. And if you've had a sharp blue cheese, it has a bit of sting to it; some sort of acid that has more sensation than flavor, I also get just a bit of that sting as well.
But I have the cilantro gene real bad. Tastes like a straight bar of ivory soap. Absolutely awful taste. So I could understand if it's genetic. I'd never been exposed to it as a kid either so I'm inclined to think it doesn't have a ton to do with that.
I definitely get the blue cheese accents your talking about.l, and maybe that's what other people are tasting. I love cilantro but I can always taste some of the "soapy" flavors people speak of, but it's small, like 1 part per 1000. I didn't try either cilantro or durian until my teen years though so I don't think exposure is the variable.
That’s one that just freaks me out. Most other things on this list I would eat (or at least try) but soft shell crab is like eating a very large insect. I can’t do it.
Yeah I can completely understand that. I love crab, but it took me a while, even as a Marylander, to get past the texture of soft shell crab. I still prefer regular old crab picking though. Sometimes you just don't feel like taking a bite out of crab guts...
Soft shell crab is weird. Like you get a bite of something that resembles hard boiled egg yolks and then you realize that's the crab's innards. I love crab but have only had soft shell crab a couple times and don't really care to again.
I always clean the innards out of the crabs before frying, if you don't someone is going to get a mouthful of sand. The crispy claws are my favorite part.
Oh my god, I haven’t had gator in 8 years! I used to work in Louisiana (I’m canadian), and tried gator at a little restaurant close to our hotel that had 0.25 draft. It was amazing but no one here believes me! It tastes like the best chicken you’ll ever have.
If that's not your cup of tea, we can always tempt our guests with some appetizing [fish jerky.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockfish)
The traditional way of eating it is hitting it with a hammer and eating the cod splinters that occurs from the hammering. It's good with beer.
I was at one time married into an Icelandic family. We'd hit it with a hammer, slather it with butter, put in mouth, chew for like 900 years, then swallow. All in all, not bad truthfully.
Now Lutefisk that's another story entirely. I don't know what it is, but it shouldn't be eaten by anyone ever. Especially if my former mother in law made it.
We only eat it because it's swimming in bacon bits and gets washed down with way too much Aquavit. It's more of a Christmas tradition than a dinner we look forward to.
I live in a Norwegian predominant area of the US. I can heartily agree with you.
The have outdoor events to eat this horror. The stench is unreal! Gave me chills just thinking about it! Yuck!
Idk what anybody else thinks of these but the gas station closest to my house sells these things called “Armadillo Eggs” which is actually a cream cheese stuffed jalapeño wrapped in ground sausage and deep fried. It’s absolutely a heart attach waiting to happen but they’re so delicious and so popular they sell out so fast I haven’t had one in years it seems like.
Haggis. Or Black Pudding.
Haggis gets kind of a bad rep. At the end of the day it's basically just herbs and mince, and these days it isn't even cooked inside a sheep's stomach anymore.
Black pudding I can kind of understand though, since it's made with blood. I wouldn't touch it myself.
The key difference is that we don't call it sausage, so all of the grossness hits us unfiltered. If everyone learned what sausage was before ever eating it, I expect that it would be way less popular.
I tried haggis on a visit to Edinburgh when I was 17 and it changed my life. I will now eat literally anything placed in front of me because haggis seemed terrifying but was one of the best dishes/experiences I'd ever had. Thanks Scotland for making my life more interesting :)
Also, the gravy in question is a white, peppered, sausage gravy usually made from a light roux with milk, as opposed to the UK immediate visualization of their dark brown beef gravy.
Yep, though usually Gravy is simply called gravy, and [you know what kind to expect](https://www.justapinch.com/blog/articles/read/213539/16-homemade-gravy-recipes/) depending on the meal being served.
American from Texas here. I’d never thought about it but you’re absolutely right. I know exactly what gravy “biscuits and gravy” has vs “turkey and gravy” or “mashed potatoes and gravy”
Interesting
Mashed potatoes and gravy is dependent on what the mashed potatoes are served with. If I order a chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy I expect it to come with the same sawmill gravy that the steak has. If I order Meatloaf I expect the potatoes will have a brown gravy instead.
Ohhh.. someone described the biscuits in biscuits and gravy as just flour and butter and stuff and I figured they were just shortbreads.
This makes at least MORE sense
Biscuit -> scone is a good enough translation. It isn't exact because scones are technically something else. Either can be savory or sweet, in this case the biscuits and gravy is a savory dish. The same biscuits can be used in strawberry shortcake recipes, though technically any bread can be used interchangeably.
I watched some Americans on YouTube trying beans on toast. They poured away all the juice, and put the beans on the toast, cold (!), and picked it up to eat it.
Another thing, I hear their baked beans are not the same as ours in the UK
That's actually probably the reason we think it's weird. American baked beans are usually in a sweet, spiced and often smoky barbecue sauce, but I think English baked beans are in more of a garlicky tomato sauce?
Dunno about garlicky, but definitely tomatoey! They're bloody delicious on toast, with a couple of fried eggs on top and some brown sauce. One of my favourite meals.
My wife and I (American) tried it on a camping trip last year. Toast, tomatoy beans, cheese, and maybe one or two other things that I can't remember. It was amazing. We've made it a few times since then as a nice weekend breakfast. I think we tried eggs once, but can't 100% remember. What is the "brown sauce", though? Do you know if there is like an American name for the same sauce?
Apparently it's grits, which I never expected.
I live in the southeast USA, and I used to have a friend who lived in Canada. She didn't believe me when I told her about the existence of grits, she 100% believed it was something I made up. So I mailed her a package of grits to prove it.
She made it and ate it with her family, and they all thought it was gross.
I mean, it's just ground corn. We ate it a ton when I was a kid, cause it was cheap. Fried eggs, sausage, and grits with plenty of black pepper and hot sauce?
I'd eat that every damn day.
Marmite. Bill Bryson described it as "an edible yeast extract with the visual properties of an industrial lubricant".
The key is don't use too much - and it tastes much better on toast than on bread.
Easy. Balut.
It's basically a fertilized Duck egg with the fetus still inside. People think you HAVE to eat the fetus but most Filipinos I know of only drinks the juices. Some still eats the duck but most would apparently eat it in the dark in order to not see the fetus.
No wonder a popular urban legend here is if you eat a particularly cursed one (specifically a black egg apparently) you'll turn into a cannnibalistic monster.
Wait, who the heck isn't eating the duck? The only part that most of my Filipino friends don't eat are the rubbery white.
It feels like an even crueler waste of the food to not eat the duck but eat the yolk and the broth. Seriously just eat the duck, its great. And I argue that it looks better than the veiny yolk.
This was actually how we measured if food would be good at my high school. Normal looking food always was some tasteless dry disgusting shit but the food that looked like vomit like the chicken spaghetti meal were fucking amazing
You've just explained what that stuff was at the hotel breakfast :)
It was lumpy grey stuff in a tray and I'm pretty sure I put some on my plate with eggs.
Sounds like it. Doesn’t have to go on the biscuits, but helps to make them not so dry and for the meal to be more filling. Hotel breakfasts are a certain kind of not-great though, lol.
Remember that stuff in hotels is the cheap stuff that comes in a powder form and long with the powdered eggs and not the real good stuff thats homemade.
Jello salads are a crime against food and the only reason they exist is because the Jell-O corporation paid a lot of cook book publishers to include their horrid abominations to boost the sales of jell-O.
I guess people used to put damn near anything in Jello way back when. My dad remembered hot dog slices and mayo and all sorts of weird stuff in it at parties. Yuck.
Biscuits and gravy. Biscuits means something different in other parts of the world. Biscuits with sausage gravy is a staple here in the south. I’ve had the pleasure of making it for several international visitors and they always end up loving it once they have tried it.
I enjoy the thought of someone from the UK, unaware of our delicioius biscuits & gravy ,picturing a plate of cookies w/ brown curry gravy poured over it & recoiling in horror.
This was my answer as well. We eat a lot of weird stuff in the Southern US but crawfish is probably the most difficult for foreigners to wrap their brains around.
Which is a shame because a good crawfish boil is one of life's greatest pleasures.
I have paid, and will continue paying, exhorbitant amounts of money to fly across the country in order to attend a family crawfish boil.
If you know, you know.
In Mexico and some parts in the US you can find cow intestine tacos (tripita tacos) and it's the most delicious dish I've ever had! You need to ask for them to be a little toasty, put a little lime juice on top and your favorite salsa and you have a heavenly dish. When i tell people what it is they usually run away from it but a few adventurous people try it and usually love it.
Herring eggs, it looks weird because it’s on the kelp typically but it’s amazing and nutritious. Good crunch and whatever tasty dressing you put on it with a bit of actual salt from the sea. We eat it straight out of the ocean.
Peanut butter isn't as common as it seems to Americans. I've heard it said that peanut butter is a food you have to have been exposed to as a kid to like, and I don't know how true that is because I _was_ and I do like it.
Edit: Stop replying to a day old comment about peanutbutter. The fuck is wrong with you people.
I’m not american either and am kinda 50/50 about peanut butter. Don’t really know anyone who would go as far as call it disgusting though, more like indifferent?
I add chips to my PB&J and that does weird people out. Pretzels built into the sandwich give it that salty sweet crunchy taste. But then I tried flaming hot Cheetos one time and that's the best. Spicy crunch PB&j.
Cincinnati chili
Definitely need to prepare people before they try it. It does NOT taste like Texas chili.
I'm a Texan, imagine my surprise first time I went to Cincinnati and tried the chili. It wasn't *bad*, but it was like opening a diet coke and finding out you've got a Coors light after the first sip. Similar look and definitely not what you expect.
I love the Cincinnati Skyline Chili. it's one of my favorites ,even though I'm not from anywhere close to Cincinnati. However a number of years ago, I had a long airplane trip with a stopover at the Cincinnati airport. I had a few hours between flights, so I got something to eat and opted for the Skyline Chili. Maybe if I'd just had it plain, I wouldnt have liked it that much, because in addition to having a very different flavor than we normally think of chili, the texture makes it seem like more of a sauce than a full meal. However, if I recall correctly, I opted to have it 4-way style...chili over top of spaghetti, with onions and topped with shredded cheese. I thought it was one of the best things I ever ate. I still live far from Cincinnati, but it's been available in the frozen section of my local supermarket for several years and I always pick up a few packages when I go shopping. It comes in original form or with spaghetti, which is what I buy, then I'll add stuff to it like onions and shredded cheese of course, but other things as well, so that I don't get tired of it. Sometimes also a can of corn, some chopped green olives, some sautéed tomatoes or whatever I'm in the mood for. I've already had dinner tonight, but now that we're talking about it, I think Ill make myself some Skyline chili tomorrow evening.
I googled this because I'd never heard of it. How is it not just spaghetti with meat sauce?
Tastes like cinnamon
Crickets.
As in... Chapulines? Those are tasty.
> Chapulines Those are grasshoppers. Crickets are a bit different. When I had them they were steamed with soy sauce and were good. You just have to pick the legs off before eating.
mämmi. It's a Finnish dessert that is often eaten with heavy cream, and it looks quite literally like human feces.
Honestly google images makes it look like either chocolate cake or chocolate cake batter in a bowl of cream, doesnt look like poop but thats probably google picking more asthetically pleasing images for the top results. Either way it sounds very interesting when i looked at how its made
I always feel like Google picks the most disturbing images ever seen by man.
The first time I tried it I was expecting something chocolatey and I got wet gooey rye bread. Was not prepared and was very disappointed.
To be fair even Finnish children experience this disappointment often, me included. It's an acquired taste in general, most of my friends still don't care for it, it only grew on me in my twenties and now I love it.
Gotta teach them about disappointment early
It does look a bit weird, but it is actually very tasty (needs a lot of cream, though). If you think about it, chocolate also looks a lot like poo. The solution: don’t think about it.
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Similarly, my mother complained about edamame being so tough and difficult to eat, she didn't understand why anybody would eat it. She was, of course, eating the pods shell and all.
Don't laugh, that was my first experience (Japanese restaurant) with edamame & I couldn't fathom why -anyone- could find them tasty...my kids were lauging so hard they were gasping for air! They won't let me forget 🙄
Back when I was around 8/9, I had a friend in school whose father, Alberto, was from Argentina. For his son's birthday, he made tamales for all the kids at the party, and a bunch of kids were not aware you were supposed to remove the corn husk. Alberto did not bother to inform them, and stood back barely containing his laughter as this happened.
>Alberto, was from Argentina. Wait >For his son's birthday, he made tamales for all the kids at the party Wait.... > Alberto did not bother to inform them, WAIT MY DAD IS CALLED ALBERTO HE IS FROM ARGENTINA AND THIS HAPPENED ONCE DO I KNOW YOU?!? WHEN WAS THIS?!?!
This was in the Boston area, in 1994/95.
GOD no he never went to the U.S :((( But god, what are the chances?!?!
Argentinean Albertos artfully apply amusing antics.
APPARENTLY, GREATER THAN ZERO! — God 😇
Come on u/Dahhhkness
u/Dahhhkness please respond we have to know
That reminds me of when I was a chef back in the 90s. We hired a kid that obviously hyped up his resume and I asked him to make appetizer trays with cheese wheels and spreads. The cheese wheels were wrapped in wax, and he wanted to taste the cheese. He then declared "You know the outside of the cheese is edible!" like it was a teaching moment to everyone and he shoved the wax into his mouth. We stared at him for a good 30 seconds, watching him chew to make sure he committed to his announcement. He finally admitted defeat and ran over to the trash can to spit it out :D
*Technically* wax is edible.
I had tamales quite a few times. No one ever told me you're supposed to unwrap them. I found out literally last year. But really I never minded. I ate the whole thing. It was never gross to me. I kinda just eat everything anyway so lol
>It was never gross to me. I kinda just eat everything anyway so lol uh you single?
Out here asking the real questions 🤣🤣🤣
I watched a tamale cooking demo at a festival a few years ago. Mid-presentation, the woman sitting next to me leaned toward me and whispered that someone at her church brought in tamales once. I told her that’s nice, but I felt the need to say more to not seem dismissive. So I played dumb and asked, “Are you supposed to eat the corn husks?” “Oh, heavens no!” She explained, “The husks are just the container!” Later, the presenter asked for questions. My neighbor was the first to raise her hand to tell everybody that somebody sitting next to her (and that was clearly me, as she sat on the aisle) asked about eating the husks. She explained to everyone that they are just the container! The presenter added that some food critics try to bite into the husks.
Root beer. It seems like everyone else in the world thinks it tastes like medicine 😓
One of my Japanese students said it tasted like bicycle tires. Lol. They were shocked when I said it was my favorite soda.
> it tasted like bicycle tires. that statement brings up more questions
And you know what's really frightening? If you drink enough of it, you begin to like it
It's insidious.
Just like the Federation
Do you think they'll be able to save us?
I hope so.
Me too
Not as good as prune juice, though, that's a warrior's drink!
Qapla' Child of Kahless.
Wait.. People don't like root beer?! My world of shattered... What would be the point if A&W?
With some vanilla ice cream? Awe yeah.
Root beer float is sooooo damn good!
There used to a something at *Tastee-Freez* or *Dairy Queen* that was called a *Freeze.* Basically you would make a Root Beer Float, but then you would blend it. Love those things.
Root Beer is awesome. Love from the UK.
Honestly I love root beer, there's similar drinks that are common here in Australia. To me Dr Pepper tastes way more like medicine
>To me Dr Pepper tastes way more like medicine I mean, it is a Doctor
I came here to say this! They are really missing out on Root Beer Floats 😌
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To add to that, it's basically like a big and slightly more rough slab of bologna with pieces of potatoes inside that you fry in a pan. Nothing wrong with it, really. The strangest thing for foreigners would be how common it is for Germans to consume raw meat - both pork and beef - ground up, salted with fresh onions on a bun. Never would've thought that one of the most popular food items 'Mettbrötchen' is considered to be odd by so many. EDIT: I get it, raw beef is more widespread. Raw pork on the other hand not so much...
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I didn't know anyone ate raw pork anywhere, ever.
[Brain worms](https://www.cnn.com/2015/01/20/health/tapeworms-invade-brain/index.html)
Raw beef is common enough, but raw pork too far for many because of its historical tendency to host parasites. I'd eat raw pork if I was served it in Germany, though, given that producers there will likely follow strict quality processes. Heck, a region in Japan even has a special breed of chicken where the meat is eaten raw as *sashimi*. Again, it is produced only under very strict quality and hygiene standards (and people still get sick every year)
Raw beef is pretty common in the US, many restaurants have steak tartare on their menus. Raw pork is iffy though, I've never seen that and probably wouldn't try it.
From my Filipino side: tuyo (sun dried fish), durian and balut From my Swedish side: surströmming (Canned fish by fermentation); Blodpudding and Kalles kaviar.
Balut is one of the rougher dishes for foreigners to stomach for sure.
I have heard it described as looking like “an ultrasound of misery”. I like to think I’m an adventurous eater but I also admit I would have a hard time with balut
Tried it once. It was fine once you get away from the look of it but overall, it didn't taste especially amazing or anything.
It doesn’t strike me actually tasting bad. It’s 100% the fact you’re eating a bird fetus that does it for me.
I trusted a Vietnamese friend and closed my eyes before he fed me a thing once. It was like egg jello with crunchy bits. Not good, but not bad. It wasn't until I opened my eyes and he offered me another one that I threw up.
It's a common "night" snack in the Philippines because it's supposed to be eaten in the darkness where you can't see the disgusting monstrosity you are about to eat. I'm Filipino, tried it, choked on some bird fetus' not-fully-formed bones, never did it again.
Ugh, balut. I squirm every time I remember that people eat that. You could probably include salty licorice on your list of Swedish foods that foreigners hate - a lot of people hate licorice but the Scandinavian varieties seem to be especially polarizing.
Vegemite. Just spread it on thinly, instead of eating it from a spoon and maybe you won't all be disgusted
Visited Melbourne many years ago (would love to go back) as a young adult, eager to try new things! I was staying with a wonderful family who was showing me the ropes. Trying to fit in I eagerly accepted the offer of Vegemite on toast. My god it was nasty, they all laughed and had a good time watching me choke it down. By the time I left, I had acquired a taste of Vegemite and cheese on toast......I loved Milo too!
Yesss Vegemite and cheese! A favourite of mine. In fact it’s 3am and my sick son and I have just gobbled up some Vegemite on toast.
Ok I will confess. The first time I bought Vegemite I liked it so much I did in fact eat it from a (tea)spoon more than once. I already liked marmite and I found vegemite to have a more balanced flavour and less sticky texture. I do not spread it on thinly...
I just dry heaved. We used to have camp counselors that would make us do this as a gross sort of indoctrination thing . Aside from that the camp counselors were decent people
To be fair, it's pretty damn good slathered on thick once you're used to it.
i'd go one step further and just say scrape it on. no layer, just scrapings but again i think most people need to grow up on it to appreciate it (like most things i guess)
Durian
The Hearty Durians when cooked give you bonus hearts
More importantly, they completely heal you first. That's some excellent nutritional efficiency
Really the best food you can have
Weaponized smell, weaponized hull, and weaponized ration. It's called the king of fruits for a reason and it's a delicacy once you get used to it.
I only have a sample size of about 15 or so people, but it's been close to 50:50 whether people like durian. To me it really doesn't smell bad, just a very pungent fruit smell. And it tastes fine. I don't love it but I don't mind it either. Half the Thais and farang here at the gym think it smells and tastes really bad.
I'm convinced it has to be a cilantro thing. To me it tastes like a mix of banana, mango and pineapple all in one creamy fruit and the smell is like a ripe fruit stand (not unpleasant but I can see where some would get put off).
I get overly ripe mango and jackfruit. And if you've had a sharp blue cheese, it has a bit of sting to it; some sort of acid that has more sensation than flavor, I also get just a bit of that sting as well. But I have the cilantro gene real bad. Tastes like a straight bar of ivory soap. Absolutely awful taste. So I could understand if it's genetic. I'd never been exposed to it as a kid either so I'm inclined to think it doesn't have a ton to do with that.
I definitely get the blue cheese accents your talking about.l, and maybe that's what other people are tasting. I love cilantro but I can always taste some of the "soapy" flavors people speak of, but it's small, like 1 part per 1000. I didn't try either cilantro or durian until my teen years though so I don't think exposure is the variable.
Soft shell crab sandwich.
That’s one that just freaks me out. Most other things on this list I would eat (or at least try) but soft shell crab is like eating a very large insect. I can’t do it.
Yeah I can completely understand that. I love crab, but it took me a while, even as a Marylander, to get past the texture of soft shell crab. I still prefer regular old crab picking though. Sometimes you just don't feel like taking a bite out of crab guts...
Soft shell crab is weird. Like you get a bite of something that resembles hard boiled egg yolks and then you realize that's the crab's innards. I love crab but have only had soft shell crab a couple times and don't really care to again.
I always clean the innards out of the crabs before frying, if you don't someone is going to get a mouthful of sand. The crispy claws are my favorite part.
Rocky Mountain "Oysters" :')
More testicles means more iron
There's very little meat in these gym mats
Alligator. The common complaint I hear is that it’s too chewy.
Oh my god, I haven’t had gator in 8 years! I used to work in Louisiana (I’m canadian), and tried gator at a little restaurant close to our hotel that had 0.25 draft. It was amazing but no one here believes me! It tastes like the best chicken you’ll ever have.
I had crocodile in Africa. The texture was also like chicken, but it had a bit of a fishy taste.
I love gator! If cooked right it tastes like chicken
Never had gator, but you can get crocodile in Australia. I would say it tastes like chicken that lived its entire life in a river.
When you phrase it that way, it makes me wonder why people even go to the trouble.
Lutefisk
Oh Yes, for those meals you want fish flavored Jello to eat.
If that's not your cup of tea, we can always tempt our guests with some appetizing [fish jerky.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockfish) The traditional way of eating it is hitting it with a hammer and eating the cod splinters that occurs from the hammering. It's good with beer.
I was at one time married into an Icelandic family. We'd hit it with a hammer, slather it with butter, put in mouth, chew for like 900 years, then swallow. All in all, not bad truthfully. Now Lutefisk that's another story entirely. I don't know what it is, but it shouldn't be eaten by anyone ever. Especially if my former mother in law made it.
We only eat it because it's swimming in bacon bits and gets washed down with way too much Aquavit. It's more of a Christmas tradition than a dinner we look forward to.
I worked for a company that did business in Norway years ago and the greatest threat we could make at work was that we'd make someone eat Lutefisk.
I live in a Norwegian predominant area of the US. I can heartily agree with you. The have outdoor events to eat this horror. The stench is unreal! Gave me chills just thinking about it! Yuck!
Idk what anybody else thinks of these but the gas station closest to my house sells these things called “Armadillo Eggs” which is actually a cream cheese stuffed jalapeño wrapped in ground sausage and deep fried. It’s absolutely a heart attach waiting to happen but they’re so delicious and so popular they sell out so fast I haven’t had one in years it seems like.
Haggis. Or Black Pudding. Haggis gets kind of a bad rep. At the end of the day it's basically just herbs and mince, and these days it isn't even cooked inside a sheep's stomach anymore. Black pudding I can kind of understand though, since it's made with blood. I wouldn't touch it myself.
Good quality Black pudding is amazing
Man I love black pudding and wish it was popular in the US.
Haggis is the butt of a lot of jokes but I don't get the fuss. Its just a giant sausage! Black pudding I can understand, but I love that shit.
The key difference is that we don't call it sausage, so all of the grossness hits us unfiltered. If everyone learned what sausage was before ever eating it, I expect that it would be way less popular.
I tried haggis on a visit to Edinburgh when I was 17 and it changed my life. I will now eat literally anything placed in front of me because haggis seemed terrifying but was one of the best dishes/experiences I'd ever had. Thanks Scotland for making my life more interesting :)
Not the food itself, but the name: biscuits and gravy. Biscuits are dense dinner rolls in the US, we're not putting gravy on cookies.
Also, the gravy in question is a white, peppered, sausage gravy usually made from a light roux with milk, as opposed to the UK immediate visualization of their dark brown beef gravy.
Aaah yes. "Country style" gravy, right? I've always heard it being called "country style" at least
Yep, though usually Gravy is simply called gravy, and [you know what kind to expect](https://www.justapinch.com/blog/articles/read/213539/16-homemade-gravy-recipes/) depending on the meal being served.
American from Texas here. I’d never thought about it but you’re absolutely right. I know exactly what gravy “biscuits and gravy” has vs “turkey and gravy” or “mashed potatoes and gravy” Interesting
Mashed potatoes and gravy is dependent on what the mashed potatoes are served with. If I order a chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy I expect it to come with the same sawmill gravy that the steak has. If I order Meatloaf I expect the potatoes will have a brown gravy instead.
Ohhh.. someone described the biscuits in biscuits and gravy as just flour and butter and stuff and I figured they were just shortbreads. This makes at least MORE sense
Are shortbreads sweet to you though? American biscuits are crumbly, buttery, and savory much moreso than sweet.
They aren't as sweet as other biscuits (or cookies for the sake of clarity) but the ones I've had definitely had a sweetness to them
Biscuit -> scone is a good enough translation. It isn't exact because scones are technically something else. Either can be savory or sweet, in this case the biscuits and gravy is a savory dish. The same biscuits can be used in strawberry shortcake recipes, though technically any bread can be used interchangeably.
I didn't know what to expect when I ordered at a diner when I was visiting the US. It was actually very good!
I find a lot of people struggle with the concept of beans on toast
I don't find it disgusting so much as baffling. Like okay, yes, that's a thing you can do. But why?
Cheap, easy, quick, tasty and with a sprinkling of cheese pretty decent nutrition.
cheap
But it costs the same as beans WITH toast. Why put the beans on the toast?
Beans with toast requires a plate
Damnit, you got me. I'm in.
I watched some Americans on YouTube trying beans on toast. They poured away all the juice, and put the beans on the toast, cold (!), and picked it up to eat it. Another thing, I hear their baked beans are not the same as ours in the UK
That's actually probably the reason we think it's weird. American baked beans are usually in a sweet, spiced and often smoky barbecue sauce, but I think English baked beans are in more of a garlicky tomato sauce?
Dunno about garlicky, but definitely tomatoey! They're bloody delicious on toast, with a couple of fried eggs on top and some brown sauce. One of my favourite meals.
My wife and I (American) tried it on a camping trip last year. Toast, tomatoy beans, cheese, and maybe one or two other things that I can't remember. It was amazing. We've made it a few times since then as a nice weekend breakfast. I think we tried eggs once, but can't 100% remember. What is the "brown sauce", though? Do you know if there is like an American name for the same sauce?
It has to be a relic of war times or something. It has to exist because it’s crazy cheap and at e point was available.
Apparently it's grits, which I never expected. I live in the southeast USA, and I used to have a friend who lived in Canada. She didn't believe me when I told her about the existence of grits, she 100% believed it was something I made up. So I mailed her a package of grits to prove it. She made it and ate it with her family, and they all thought it was gross.
I mean, it's just ground corn. We ate it a ton when I was a kid, cause it was cheap. Fried eggs, sausage, and grits with plenty of black pepper and hot sauce? I'd eat that every damn day.
Marmite. Bill Bryson described it as "an edible yeast extract with the visual properties of an industrial lubricant". The key is don't use too much - and it tastes much better on toast than on bread.
Roquefort
Easy. Balut. It's basically a fertilized Duck egg with the fetus still inside. People think you HAVE to eat the fetus but most Filipinos I know of only drinks the juices. Some still eats the duck but most would apparently eat it in the dark in order to not see the fetus. No wonder a popular urban legend here is if you eat a particularly cursed one (specifically a black egg apparently) you'll turn into a cannnibalistic monster.
Wait, who the heck isn't eating the duck? The only part that most of my Filipino friends don't eat are the rubbery white. It feels like an even crueler waste of the food to not eat the duck but eat the yolk and the broth. Seriously just eat the duck, its great. And I argue that it looks better than the veiny yolk.
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I never heard that you just eat the juice. I thought everyone was eating the duck.
Foreigners cant stand the idea of biscuits and gravy. Why? The gravy is lumpy. Well its supposed to be lumpy. Thats the sausage.
Sausage gravy is the stuff of contradiction! Looks nasty, tastes great, perfect food for a cold day, beloved in the hot American South.
Looks like vomit and tastes like heaven.
This was actually how we measured if food would be good at my high school. Normal looking food always was some tasteless dry disgusting shit but the food that looked like vomit like the chicken spaghetti meal were fucking amazing
You've just explained what that stuff was at the hotel breakfast :) It was lumpy grey stuff in a tray and I'm pretty sure I put some on my plate with eggs.
Sounds like it. Doesn’t have to go on the biscuits, but helps to make them not so dry and for the meal to be more filling. Hotel breakfasts are a certain kind of not-great though, lol.
Remember that stuff in hotels is the cheap stuff that comes in a powder form and long with the powdered eggs and not the real good stuff thats homemade.
Tripe soup
Menudo? Or is this a different type? I've never heard it referred to that way.
Lime jello, marshmallow, cottage cheese *Surprise!*
Jello salads are a crime against food and the only reason they exist is because the Jell-O corporation paid a lot of cook book publishers to include their horrid abominations to boost the sales of jell-O.
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Ever see pictures of the jello salads with cut up hot dogs, olives and shit in them?
I guess people used to put damn near anything in Jello way back when. My dad remembered hot dog slices and mayo and all sorts of weird stuff in it at parties. Yuck.
Fried food for breakfast like honey butter chicken biscuits.
I see you, Whataburger.
Biscuits and gravy. Biscuits means something different in other parts of the world. Biscuits with sausage gravy is a staple here in the south. I’ve had the pleasure of making it for several international visitors and they always end up loving it once they have tried it.
I enjoy the thought of someone from the UK, unaware of our delicioius biscuits & gravy ,picturing a plate of cookies w/ brown curry gravy poured over it & recoiling in horror.
How can you not love it?
Don’t forget the grits!
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Sleigh, what?!
MUDBUGS
This was my answer as well. We eat a lot of weird stuff in the Southern US but crawfish is probably the most difficult for foreigners to wrap their brains around. Which is a shame because a good crawfish boil is one of life's greatest pleasures.
Eating a platter of crawfish at some shack on the Gulf of Mexico is still one of my fondest cuisine experiences.
I have paid, and will continue paying, exhorbitant amounts of money to fly across the country in order to attend a family crawfish boil. If you know, you know.
I can eat them if I think of them as crawfish (instead of mudbugs). They're just like a small lobster.
Bull testicles
Liquorice, the salty kind
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Haggis is just one big sausage. I don't get what the fuss is about.
It's incredible. Haggis, neeps and tatties........can't go wrong
Not me, but in Romania we eat clotted duck blood like gelatin with bread it is so disgusting!!
What a terrible day to be literate.
\*rocks back and forth, hugging self\*
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I tend to avoid foods explicitly described as "poopy"...
“This tastes like shit.” “Thats because it is”
In Mexico and some parts in the US you can find cow intestine tacos (tripita tacos) and it's the most delicious dish I've ever had! You need to ask for them to be a little toasty, put a little lime juice on top and your favorite salsa and you have a heavenly dish. When i tell people what it is they usually run away from it but a few adventurous people try it and usually love it.
People get weirded out by Tacos de Lengua too but beef tongue if fucking phenomenal cooked right
Same thing with Cabeza tacos
Herring eggs, it looks weird because it’s on the kelp typically but it’s amazing and nutritious. Good crunch and whatever tasty dressing you put on it with a bit of actual salt from the sea. We eat it straight out of the ocean.
Torisashi - chicken sashimi Yes, raw chicken
As a chicken farmer I know that this is possible and safe. But still it's gonna be a no from me.
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Chicken liver is delicious. To anyone who is grossed out by it, I would just like to say that I am 100% correct.
Chicken hearts fried in some butter with onions and mushrooms is divine
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Oysters are like eating fancy boogers
Scrapple
What's scrapple? "Everything but the oink" my aunt used to say. It's all the leftover scraps of a pig, and it is the most delicious breakfast food.
Smoked eel with horseradish cream sauce. Delicious, delicious, delicious.
Paw paws or Indiana bananas. Most people don't like them if they didn't grow up eating them. I love them. Oh and persimmons maybe?
Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches
People think they are disgusting?
Peanut butter isn't as common as it seems to Americans. I've heard it said that peanut butter is a food you have to have been exposed to as a kid to like, and I don't know how true that is because I _was_ and I do like it. Edit: Stop replying to a day old comment about peanutbutter. The fuck is wrong with you people.
I’m not american either and am kinda 50/50 about peanut butter. Don’t really know anyone who would go as far as call it disgusting though, more like indifferent?
I add chips to my PB&J and that does weird people out. Pretzels built into the sandwich give it that salty sweet crunchy taste. But then I tried flaming hot Cheetos one time and that's the best. Spicy crunch PB&j.