On my intellectual plate. . .

So, as I brieftly mentioned in my last post, I was a picky kid. How I define this pickiness may be different from how my parents describe it... as they were the one trying to cook for me. But here is what I recall: I ate off plate with seperated sections until I was about ten, and I remember eating a lot of: fishsticks, corndogs, hot dogs, and peanut butter sandwiches. Here is an unbiased example: the only sandwich I ate until probably about the age of 10-12 was peanut butter OR peanut butter and honey. That is two to three ingredients and when you really think about it... peanut butter and honey is just slightly sweetened peanut butter... There were slight changes throughout my life to make me a little less picky... going through growth spurts and playing sports made me so hungry I suddenly liked more things. Living in the dorms gave me the same appreciation. And then... I worked in a kitchen. And suddenly I was expected to taste and comment on all sorts of things that I had been so sure I didn't like.... But I still don't like a lot of things that most people would enjoy just thinking about: beans, avocados, squash and pumpkin pie are the few that come easily to mind.

My younger brother was also a picky kid. And I admit I spent much of my time living with my parents pointing out which ways he was pickier than I. He didn't like pasta. He didn't like cheese unless it was mozzarella melted on a pizza. And anything green and healthy looking? You can forget about either of us being tricked into that. The list of vegetables consumed in our house was short: corn, carrots, and broccoli.

I never understood what made me and my younger brother so picky and my older brother and so many other kids in the world so food accepting. This was one of the things that led me to study nutrition in college (I didn't finish that study, I failed some science classes and switched my major). While I have now accepted more and more foods onto my plate, I am still regularly reminded of how picky I am by my husband who will pretty much eat anything. Meanwhile, his younger brother: a picky kid.

To me it is fascinating what makes kids like my husband or older brother look at something (no matter what the name or smell or appearance) and say, "Yeah I'll try it" and like it versus me or my younger brother or brother in law look at the same thing and say, "I don't like it." My brother in law, who is youngest of the 5 combined siblings has been practically made famous by the fact that he looked at something, was told to try it and said he didn't like it. When he was asked repeatedly to try it because how could he know that he didn't like it without trying it, he replied: "I just know by thinking. I thought about it, and I don't like it." I've recently defended this long told "family legend" by mentioning that, even though I am not nearly as picky as I was as a kid, sometimes I make a dish (usually things with lots of veggies or a new sauce... things that have lots of ingredients such as a stir fry or a salad) and I finish it... and despite knowing that I like every individual ingredient that I have included or even knowing that I have made this recipe before.... something in my brain just acknowledges the dish in front of me (appearance, smell, ingredients) and fires back with: "You are not going to like that."

So anyway, I know some picky people... lets move on to my point. WHAT CAUSES THIS? How come my husband can look at anything indiscriminately and think, "This could be delicious!" and meanwhile I have the same foods and I scoot everything around the plate with my fork and think, "I am going to be hungry at the end of this meal because I am NOT going to enjoy this."

I am currently reading "How We Eat" by Leon Rappoport. He is primarily a psychologist interested in.... well, how we eat. In his book, he examines the things we eat and why we, as a species come to establish a food as good or bad. Additionally, he has researched extensively on how we develop our food habits. It looked like an interesting library book which it has turned out to be... but it also has brought me back to some of my initial feelings on what was so interesting about studying human nutrition.

I'm not far along and he hasn't had much to say about being picky but he does mention this in chapter two, "Its not necessary to study psychoanalytic behavior to recognize the obsessive-compulsive tendencies shown by people who insist on arranging their food in a certain pattern; having their bread toasted lightly, darkly, or in-between; or having their coffee not too hot and not too cold with just the right amount of sugar and cream. All forms of obsessive behavior... can be understood as defenses against anxiety. People who show obsessive food behaviors are evidently trying to cope with anxieties..."

I definitely see a relation to the mental aspect of not liking a lot of foods. I've long held the belief that kids avoid foods which their bodies have reactions to. Perhaps not always a correct correlation (many people avoid a specific food after having a long night of gastro-intestinal issues, but they didn't necessarily have food poisoning from that item) I mention this because I admitted earlier that I don't like pumpkin pie. A notable thanksgiving of my childhood, we had all the aunts and uncles and cousins at my house. Two came with the stomach flu. I was asked to try the pumpkin pie, didn't enjoy it and then had the stomach flu all night. To this day a traditional pumpkin pie makes me a gag a little... even though I enjoy pumpkin in all sorts of other things (including pumpkin cheescake, yum). And perhaps a food being avoided does not neccessarily a strong reaction that others around can observe such as a "typical" allergic reaction of anaphylactic shock or vomiting... But something in the brain seems to connect that the food is not going to be enjoyable in some way. So I mention that part first, but lets get back to Rappaport's thoughts on the subject.

The quote above ends like this, "People who show obsessive food behaviors are evidently trying to cope with anxieties that probably can be traced to harsh or tramatic childhood experiences with eating." Some people just have parents that react to "I don't like it" with force or anger or frustration. Having been the daughter of a picky kid, I did not suffer from that. To me it sounds excessive to make picky eating about having a tramatic childhood. But I guess there are kids out there that are forced to clean their plates even when they don't feel good, that have to eat their vegetables to get up from the table, and that age old threat... "You can sit there til breakfast, I don't care, but you will not get up from that table until you finish." Perhaps I would not have been willing to try things over and over again until I liked them (such as with many of the vegetables I eat now) had I endured this treatment. Perhaps I would still be as picky. But... perhaps not.

I will say, to credit my parents patience with us: my younger brother, the fellow picky kid is not picky anymore. He works in a popular health food store as a cook and eats all sorts of vegetables, beans, squash, grains... Every time I talk to him, he mentions something else he enjoys that I never imagined he would. Our last conversation was on avocados. I think I will ask him next time if there is anything he can think of that he still would not eat no matter what. I bet there's something... but its probably something simple and "kid-friendly" like Kraft macaroni and cheese.

Now a brief disclosure: I am not a parent. So maybe we should just ponder and revisit this when I have kids that look at me like I'm trying to poison them and say, "But mom, I know by thinking and I don't like that!" But maybe and one can only hope: they eat like my husband.