branching out

i've always been called picky. i don't like a lot of things. i've had to learn to temper my gag reflex on my international travels as i've been asked to ingest rancid goat milk and millet, fish with literally thousands of bones, parts of chickens I never knew were considered food, turkey heart, marmite, and ox tail. surely, all these things are considered edible, if not delicacies where they are natively served, but to me, they were just weird. however, in an effort not to offend my hosts, i have tasted. it hasn't always been good; i haven't always been able to swallow/not gag; i have tasted almost everything put in front of me (i drew the line at the chinese soup that included every part of the chicken, and i couldn't be sure which partswere in my bowl).

but here in america, i've been a little more stubborn about the foods i don't like. these are usually foods that i wished i liked, because life would be easier if i did (I wouldn't have to make special orders or wonder about the fare at a dinner party). because i'm not allergic to any foods, i think it would be rude of me to say to someone, "oh, please don't serve that dish, i really hate tomatoes." i mean, come on... my friends and family know i don't like certain things, and aren't offended when i pick something out, at least, they've never told me it bothers them (sorry if it does...). i don't make a fuss about it, i just don't like certain foods. these, for example:i've never liked tomatoes, mushrooms are a fungus for goodness sake, watermelon is weird and doesn't really taste like much more than water, and avocados are exotic and buttery-ish. these have been my excuses. until this year, that is. i decided i would grow up this year. it's been a slow process, i know. i'm 24 and i'm finally getting there.

anyway, it started in China when there was pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving, and i was going the miss out on dessert because i don't like pumpkin pie. it's a texture thing. i love pumpkin bread, and pumpkin butter when the season is right. but, i have an extreme sweet n' salty tooth, which basically means i crave everything, sadly. so i decided that dessert is not something you just pass up, took and big honkin' (okay, half a slice) of pumpkin pie, and proceede

d cautiously. and, it was delicious! amazing! i can't believe i never liked it before i was 22 years old. oh, what those 22 years were missing!

so i came home and slowly started to try foods i'd never liked before. my mom's squash casserole. avocados, and by extension, guacamole (i had a horrific reason for never liking guacamole), salsa, spinach dip, hummus. all of these endeavors proved at least moderately successful: i no longer didn't like any of these things, and would eat them if served, although, they wouldn't necessarily be craved by me.

the past few months, i've been trying to keep the trend going. i tried watermelon in may. it was alright, but still, it was mostly water. i'd really rather drink my water and not worry about spitting out the seeds. but i could eat it.

the big step, however, came tonight. i was served a sandwich for dinner. a sandwich with a big, gargantuan, thick slice of tomato on it. it was so juicy that pulling it off would have still left the taste behind, not to mention would have been rude, i think. so i held my breath and took a bite. it was a little rough at first. the taste was hard to get past. but i didn't gag. i filled my mouth with delicious garden salsa sun chips (amazing that i love things with a tomato flavor, but not actual tomatoes...) once my palette was mollified, i took another bite. it was better than the first. then, i kept taking bites until the whole sandwich was gone. and you know what, not only did i not gag, but i think i actually liked it. a little. maybe.

so i'm going to keep branching out. i'm not going to order things without tomatoes for a while, and who knows, but this time next year, i could be chowing down on this:

okay, that may be a little crazy, but you never know...