Fussy Vegetarian Problems: A Lifelong Issue

I've been a vegetarian all of my days; a fact that some people find it difficult to believe.

'Oh but you must have eaten meat'

Only under duress, let me assure you.

Mince (bleurgh!) Source: www.123rf.com

I have very fond memories of outlasting my mum, nan and various other caregivers who implied that I might not leave the table until I had finished my mince.

Clearly I won that one. More than a few times.

(hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!)

I have no idea why or how I have managed to reject meat at such a young age.  I guess it's something to do with texture more than anything else, plus I have this weird really sensitive palate where I can guess what is in something.

Me, the wee vegetarian baby! My 'I will not eat mince' face.

Good for cocktail hour, not so good when I can taste individual ingredients of something I don't like so much.  For instance, I hate pineapple and find it really difficult to eat or drink anything that has a large amount of pineapple juice in it.

Pineapple is in a lot of nice cocktails :(

I am a self-confessed fussy-ass vegetarian.

• I do not like mushrooms. Nope. No no no. A bit squeaky and a bit earthy and they look like flayed skin. Grim.
• I hate cheese sauce.  It smells awful.  I love cheese.  I love lots of cheese.  Cheese sauce is a bastardization of cheesy goodness. I will not tolerate it. It's fatty and greasy and just odd.
• Aubergine is not a nice texture to have in your mouth. Just no.
• I forced myself to eat a banana recently. It was the worst half hour of my life so far.
• Quorn is the devil's food.  The primary reason I don't eat meat is because I hate the taste of meat. This is soy pretending to be meat.
• Oh, also, Soy.
• It's taken me years to tolerate tomato and I can now...but only very thinly sliced and with the guts removed.
• I vaguely remember being at a friend's house for tea and refusing to eat the middle bit of the cucumber.
• I used to actively avoid going to other people's homes for tea in case I didn't like what was being served.  It actually used to make me sweat.  Now I have mastered my gag reflex to the EXTREME and can actually basically gag down anything (within reason).  Even cheese sauce.  But it's a struggle!

Just coat it all in cheese!

Admittedly, I have gotten a lot better over the years.  I can now eat melted cheese (which is the gateway to hell by the way.  My waistline did not really need chips and cheese, pizza or nachos...but I suppose it increases the variety of a restaurant menu for me) and I am now better at eating strawberries (grainy texture).

I even verge on enjoying blueberries (strange skin), raspberries (bitty) and caught myself having some cereal with milk in it the other day (I had to eat it very very quickly in case the cereal went soggy.  There must have been about 2ml of milk on it, but that counts...)

Life as a fussy vegetarian is tough.

I face massive dilemmas in the supermarket sandwich aisle at lunchtimes (I hate mayonnaise.  You don't realise how much mayo is on EVERYTHING until you are actively trying to avoid it).

I actually more often than not end up ordering sides in restaurants because I honestly can't see anything I actually want to eat on the menu (if I'm out with people who know me well, this is okay, but if this is like, a formal thing or with someone I don't really know I have to use the mastered gag reflex thing to choke down the least offensive meal).

When staying in hospital after my c-sections I virtually ate nothing basically because hospital food is gross and most usually because it was cheese mayo, cheese sauce or something equally horrific.  Oh, or soggy cornflakes.  Very soggy cornflakes.  I subsisted on the goodwill of my visitors, whom I begged for food. Not the best when your body has had a baby and is also recovering from major surgery. 

I suppose there are positives.

My meal choices are usually plain and simple and easy to make; a quick salad, a sandwich, some chips.  I'm easy.  I miss cooking, but in this lull of time where I have a baby plus two other kids to cook for, I'm easy to please.

Hell, I'm just happy to actually get the chance to eat!

What I do eat is relatively healthy.  To a point.  As long as I'm not mainlining chips and cheese or pizza constantly, I'm actually a fairly healthy eater.  One of the quirks of my palate is that I prefer 'clean' tastes, like cucumber, pepper and lettuce, and I'm more than happy (oddly) snacking on spring onions (weird but true).

And hey, I'm discovering new things all the time.

You guys might scoff at my immature tastes, but heck, I have all this to come, suckers!

I might even enjoy mushrooms one day.

Maybe.