Things I'm Embarrassed I Eat

My culinary upbringing was, admittedly, an odd one. I believe I owe this largely to my parents, though it seems unkind to make them take credit for any of my (many) oddities. My mother is German you see, like her mother, my smokin-hot Grandma Marion. Germans are made of hearty stock and are not to be daunted by the odd vein or bit of cartilage when approaching a chicken wing. Indeed, having sat down to a few meals with my relatives from Cuxhaven, I witnessed a gleam in their eye not unlike what one might expect to encounter in the eye of Kveldulf the berserker (and also alleged werewolf) as he sat cagily waiting on the field of battle.

Coming from my father's side then, a love for odd and seemingly nonsensical food combinations that prove to be intensely satisfying. Peanut butter, jelly, and cheese sandwiches for example. In a particularly entertaining home video, my eight year old self (be-sweatered in a hot pink best embroidered with pandas, and no Mom, I still haven't forgiven you for that outfit. ; ) demonstrates how to make tuna fish by my father's recipe. The ingredient list is as follows: tuna, mayonnaise, dijon mustard (which I refer to proudly as "Grandpa mustard" as my dad's dad loved it so well), an onion soup mix packet, and crushed up Fritos. It seemed normal enough when I was a kid, but I'll be darned if I've ever seen such a concoction repeated in any of the many encounters with tuna I've had as an adult. A year ago in a bout of nostalgia I whipped up a batch of onion-soup-mix-Frito-tuna and by-passed the bread, opting instead to trowel it down my gob on a handful of Doritos. It was every bit as excellent as I remembered.

Fueled by love of food and an addiction to PBS cooking shows at an alarmingly early age, I did my level best to pass on my self-proclaimed sophisticated tastes to my younger siblings. One of my favorite summer games for us to play was "restaurant." I would draw up menus for their breakfast and lunch featuring exotic items given what I thought to be catchy and alluring names. The only one that stands out in my mind is the oft-ordered "Americana" - a piece of bread with melted cheese topped by Bacos (Bacos are essentially bacon-flavored corn flakes if you've never had the pleasure to experience them). Look out Jacques Pepin.

Oddly the menu never featured chocolate mousse as I had hoped; I being unable to reproduce what I'd seen on TV by relieving an entire carton of eggs of their whites, adding a goodly measure of chocolate Quik powder, and frantically assaulting it with a fork. Giving up on pillowy clouds of delicate chocolate mousse, I attempted to salvage the dish by doing the only other thing I knew how to do with eggs. Scrambling them. Needless to say, the unseasoned palates of my younger brothers were not as adventurous as I'd hoped, and my chocolate egg white scrambler was rejected outright. Strangely I also failed to be seduced by their chocolatey-eggy goodness as I attempted to demonstrate to my young wards just how fabulous a dish they were missing.

And so continued my pattern of tinkering around in the kitchen, slapping together odd conglomerations of foodstuffs while standing in the cool air in front of the fridge, squirreling away my prize to the den of my room/couch/wherever. In the comfort of my family home, all of this seemed very normal and reasonable, as do most things we do in isolation. It's not until we introduce an outside person not in possession of our treasured quirks that we perceive we have done something terribly, irrevocably odd.

The first challenge to my cultivated tastes came in the form of my dear friend Crystal as we sat at the breakfast bar in her kitchen eating chicken, she with a surgeon's precision, neatly extracting the bits of vein odd colored peices from hers, I chewing the delicious pocket of fat happily found at the end of the my drumstick joint. Her pert nose wrinkled as I moved onto the crunchy gristle. "What?" I queried. "I don't know how you eat that stuff. Nastiness," quoth she. I smiled sheepishly. Being a good friend, she still spoke to me in spite of my habit of eating like a member of the Mongol hordes.

The next encounter took place during my sojourn at Ricks college, and came in the form of my friend Heather's perfectly plucked brow raising in a suspicious arc as I loaded up a Dorito with a goodly knob of scooped out avocado flesh. "It's really good" I assured her, offering her a bite. Wonder of wonders, she liked it, and we ate it frequently at our pig-out gatherings thereafter. Vindication at long last.

Which brings me to the next bit: the not-so-fascinating list of things I'm embarrassed I eat. All these things I find to be utterly delicious, but without fail, if consumed in front of witnesses garner at the least a raised brow or more severely, full-on goggle-eyed querulousness.

Spicy Hunan egg rolls and chocolate milk - The oddness of this one lies not only in the combination of foods, but in the fussy and ritualistic way I insist on eating them. A bite of eggroll, a small sip of milk. Repeat, repeat, repeat. The spicy meatiness of the eggroll when contrasted with the cool creamy chocolate milk is exquisite. Warm/cool, warm/cool - delicious.
French fries dipped in a Wendy's frosty - This combination is a quadruple juggernaut of taste contrasts. Sweet and salty, hot and cold. Mmmm.
Cheddar cheese dipped in ranch dip or dressing - Ranch takes on a subtle sweetness when contrasted with the sharpness of a good aged cheddar, and finishes with a certain pleasant herbiness that cuts through the richness of the cheese. Plus it's fat on fat action so the flavors meld beautifully. But boy howdy. I ate this combination off a relish tray amongst in-laws on one occasion, and judging from their reaction, you'd think I'd just fished a fresh cat-biscuit from the litter box and popped it in my mouth.
Fat - I love the taste of fat. Go ahead and shudder your revulsion. I'll wait. Now then. Fat has a delightfully mellow flavor and melt in your mouth texture I adore. It's like a meat truffle.
Chicken skin - I've been known to pick boiled skin from the pot while I'm making stock, salt it, and bolt it down.
Burnt things - I'm blaming this one on my father, as he introduced me to the wonders of burnt toast. I apparently took it to levels he hadn't ever approached as I set marshmallows aflame whenever making s'mores and regularly filled our house with smoke as I incinerated my breakfast of English muffins. He accused me of being carbon deficient. At work I was outlawed from making popcorn as I would purposely add thirty seconds to the timer to produce those delectable brown-black pieces that dissolve into charcoal-y buttery loveliness on your tongue.

So there they are in all their shame and glory - my pet gastro-anomalous goodies. Mock if you must.

-Cyndi