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Let me try to explain. I have certain food items that I really dislike. I am not allergic to them, but their taste I just can not bear at all. They include some foods that people tend to have in too many meals, and the best example is onions (in any way, green onions, leek, cooked onions, etc.). Overall I am not a very picky eater, but even a tiny bit of onion will spoil any dish for me. I know I am not alone in this, I have several friends also totally disliking onions, but in general people like them, obviously.

So whenever I am at a restaurant and I have to mention food should be cooked without onions, they sometimes forget it, then I remind them I asked, and the waiter either says something like: "But it compliments the dish!" or "But there's not much of it!", or they pick the most obvious pieces out, but it remains there.

Whenever I am with friends or I meet new people in a friendly gathering and someone cooks for everyone, every time I am being mocked - in a friendly way, but - about it. I have, unfortunately, zero sense of humor, even though I try to cultivate it and am a good-natured person, so I can never think of a witty or a proper answer.

Whenever I am visiting my granny, she loves to cook for me (as grannies are) and at every single meal there will be a talk how I should try onions and how food is not eatable without them and so on and so forth.

I know this is my own problem, but I get really frustrated from all these comments and situations. I know I can not change everyone around me. I can definitely not change granny or any new people I meet, and I can not force my friends not to joke about it since it's their way of expressing friendliness towards me, light jokes. But it seriously angers me and makes me feel like an idiot. I can not control my food dislike, that's a given.

Any advice of how I can behave in such situations? Maybe how to answer properly to stop the conversations at the very start, not being too rude, but effective? I hope I have made it clear enough.

JAD
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A random lady
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    I agree with @AnneDaunted. An Interpersonal Skills question on this topic might look more like "How do I present my likes and dislikes in a way that don't bother people" or "how do I discourage my granny from commenting on my food dislikes" or something. – PolyPixiePaladin Jan 10 '18 at 18:26
  • Other alternative: "How can I respond to people who hassle me for my food preferences?" But please pick what best represents what you're looking for. – Jess K. Jan 10 '18 at 21:57
  • Thank you. I am new to this site, and do apologize if my post looks like an off-topic. I did not find a better part of StackExchange to post this to, and I was trying to formulate my problem in the best way. I have edited the last paragraph of my post, does it fit now? – A random lady Jan 11 '18 at 10:39
  • A statement for people who say "oh, you just haven't tried the right recipe/variety/etc." is "I've been to an excellent/expensive restaurant and they prepared this wonderful dish that everyone else raved about. I tried it and I still couldn't stand (ingredient). I use this for avocados. Blergh. – mkennedy Jan 11 '18 at 19:15
  • @mkennedy Oh, that definitely doesn't work, unfortunately=) People are never satisfied with any other dish, they want me to try this particular one=) – A random lady Jan 11 '18 at 22:28
  • @Arandomlady - I think your edit resolves the reason the question was closed. If the question doesn't get reopened within a few days, I suggest you post a request for reopening at Meta. // Would you mind pinging me if the question gets reopened? – aparente001 Jan 26 '18 at 19:12
  • @aparente001 Thank you. I am new to this site and am not always sure how things work in here. I will see what happens in a couplpe of days, yes. – A random lady Jan 28 '18 at 16:42

2 Answers2

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When it comes to strangers, or servers at restaurants (people you are never going to meet again), I would stick to telling them it's an allergy (or better, express that you'll have a 'bad reaction' to consuming them) if they ask. There's no reason for them to care whether it's a preference or an allergy, they should take your food preparation request seriously regardless. This way when the food preparation does go amiss (onions in your food), you can tell them that you can't eat it (which is true, because for you the dish tastes awful and is ruined), without being grilled for your preferences.

Example encounter:

You order your food with no onion

You receive your food WITH onion

You: "Excuse me, I can't eat this, could I please get a new dish without onion?"

Waiter: "Why not? There's not that many, you can pick them out."

At this point, the waiter is putting you on the spot and being argumentative of your own personal preferences.

You: "I'm unable to digest onion/I have an allergic reaction to eating onion/I'm intolerant to onion."

If the waiter presses any further, tell them it's not their business (this is a polite thing to do at this point, honestly)

The above is something a friend of mine with gastroparesis (which eliminates a wide variety of foods from a diet) frequently did at restaurants. She found that it ended up being more tiresome to explain why she was making a request to someone than to just tell them she was allergic. Your experience at a venue is your business alone, and telling a white lie to ensure you continue to enjoy your experience without arguing with a server is acceptable.

However, the people in your life who know that you simply don't like onions are a harder subject to address. It might be best to find a short sentence you can respond with whenever it comes up. I was giving my friend who dislikes eggs a hard time once, to which he replied:

Never going to eat them - they taste like feet.

I certainly don't agree that eggs taste like feet, but I could agree that if something reminded me of feet while I was eating it, I'd stop eating it too!

Just find a short, somewhat comical (tastes like feet/butts/etc.), statement that you can say quickly and passively to move the conversation along. I'd aim for something universally unappetizing, so that the interest to continue talking about food is lessened.

This also has the effect to make people think "WOW, I am not going to bring up onions around Alice anymore because every time I do, she talks about feet!"

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Jess K.
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  • I love the "Never going to eat them - they taste like feet." suggestion. That's a perfect response. I would suggest never lying. Even small lies have a way of sowing distrust. And trust is the foundation of any healthy relationship. Why not just use the "taste like feet response" on the waiter? – Dan Anderson Jan 10 '18 at 17:04
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    never lie about an allergy. people use that far too often and it cheapens the concept for those with REAL allergies. if you tell your Dr. that you have a latex allergy they need to do a HUGE procedure to ensure you aren't exposed to a potentially fatal situation. with food "allergies", you are pegged as a liar if you say you're allergic and then wind up eating what you're "allergic" to. if your food has onions, be firm, send it back, and involve the manager if the response isn't serious. – baldPrussian Jan 10 '18 at 17:36
  • Thank you, the suggestion about allergy for the restaurant cases looks better to me now because of the way you out it. I would normally never lie, but this definitely makes life easier and never disturbs anyone because waiters are not my friends and don't care. – A random lady Jan 10 '18 at 17:36
  • About the second suggestion - to be honest, I am 99% sure the first answer will be "How do you know, ever tried feet/whatever else?" =))) And 90% sure that won't work, many of my friends would gladly make gross remarks themselves=))). Also, that, unfortunately, definitely won't work for granny. But I will try this out and see if it will bring anything=). – A random lady Jan 10 '18 at 17:37
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    @baldPrussian I would obviously never lie to a doctor, but why would it matter to a waiter apart from making his life a bit harder that he needs to cook a clean dish for me? I am at a restaurant and I want that clean dish, and why would it matter what the reasons are. – A random lady Jan 10 '18 at 17:38
  • @baldPrussian As someone who worked as a server; I'm not sure if I understand your concern. If the allergy is serious enough to cause a serious risk with minimal exposure; OP would probably be best off avoiding restaurants that have onions at all. Alerting your server of a food allergy is not the same as telling a Dr. about allergies before a surgery. In a restaurant; there is a certain level of personal responsibility for what you eat. If you aren't preparing it yourself; you shouldn't rely on kitchen staff or a server to make sure you survive. People make mistakes. – JMac Jan 10 '18 at 17:51
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    @Arandomlady I'm inclined to agree with baldPrussian. Just be honest. I have celiac and because gluten-free is a fad diet now, it dilutes the seriousness of the issue. I get questioned "is that just a preference?" which is annoying because now I have to justify and explain yet again, but worst is when they think it's fine to just pick out the croutons from the salad / prep my food on the same surface as bread / etc because all their other "gluten free" customers didn't complain about it. – Em C Jan 10 '18 at 18:00
  • @EmC to be fair; gluten free is pretty unique when it comes to that problem; so it's not a great analogy here. Gluten free diets were a fad diet. You don't see that for most allergies. It's quite a different situation just due to the cultural dynamic. – JMac Jan 10 '18 at 18:25
  • Two examples, 1) you say you have an allergy, then accidentally you eat an onion, nothing happens they point it out and now you are in an embarrassing situation and you have damaged this persons trust in you. 2) You lie to a stranger, later you meet this stranger again and for whatever reason start a longer term relationship with them. They find out you aren't actually allergic and now they see you as some one who exaggerates and don't trust you quite as much.

    In any single situation these following situations are unlikely but over the course of a lifetime they become very probably.

     – Dan Anderson Jan 10 '18 at 18:34
  • To address everyone's concerns, OP obviously has a sensitivity to onions and won't "accidentally" eat a bite without being able to react and acknowledge that they can't continue eating the dish. Additionally, there's no reason why telling someone who you aren't trying to have a relationship or conversation with that you have an allergy would diminish the seriousness of real allergies or damage any sort of relationship. – Jess K. Jan 10 '18 at 18:49
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    Instead of "allergy" you might try "I am very sensitive to them and have a very bad reaction to them. I just cannot eat them." That is not technically a lie, the bad reaction is "disgust" and perhaps "nausea" and "I hate them". True, your server may think you are talking about some physical reaction (like a rash or seizure) instead of an emotional reaction, but let your server interpret it as they will, you didn't lie. – Amadeus Jan 10 '18 at 18:49
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    @Amadeus I've updated to include note of this, because the point isn't to blatantly lie to your server - the point is to say something that isn't debatable. Make them think you CANT eat this thing that they seem to want to force you to accept. It's not their place to be doing so, so give them reason not to question you (i.e. I cannot consume this or else) – Jess K. Jan 10 '18 at 18:52
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    @JMac: you are correct that a person with a food allergy, which is potentially life-threatening, should exercise caution and be careful where they eat. I spent better than a decade in the food business; we saw a lot of people who said "I have a gluten allergy" and then proceeded to devour bread like there was no tomorrow. That only makes it harder for people with real, dangerous allergies. For someone with a seafood allergy, we would ensure that we scrubbed the grill to cook safely. Yes, people make mistakes. I just prefer that those don't threaten someone's life/health. – baldPrussian Jan 10 '18 at 19:51
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    @baldPrussian Gluten allergies are a tricky subset of this; because along with a legitimate allergy, it also became a fad diet. I don't see the real harm in telling a restaurant you are allergic to onions when you aren't; because either way, OP wants to be treated as if they are. As far as the restaurant is concerned, it shouldn't change anything. – JMac Jan 10 '18 at 19:56
  • @baldPrussian In union with what Jmac just said, as cruddy as it is (I've worked in food service, I get it), our jobs are never to play detective and figure out why the customer is asking for their service a certain way and which requests we should respect. The point is that we do it, regardless. That's your job. A customer doesn't owe their server anything. – Jess K. Jan 10 '18 at 20:05
  • I know a restaurant chef. When a guest says they are allergic to something, that's a very huge hassle for them, because it means they are legally obligated to clean every single kitchen tool and work surface which might have come in contact with the substance the guest claims to be allergic to. This is a huge time-waster for them, the guest and everyone in the restaurant who is waiting for their food to be prepared. – Philipp Jan 11 '18 at 11:44
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I have certain food items that I really dislike.

Same for me when it comes to carrots or mint-flavoured chocolates.

Tasted them once, and threw up.

Ew.

When people ask me (or mock me), I simply state it:

Tasted them once, and threw up. Aaaaaaand I'm not enthusiast about throwing up here in front of you. I suppose you too are not enthusiast about that, are you? [smile, maybe wink also]

It literally grosses them away, and makes them change subject on the spot.

What I told you so far applies to friends or anyway close people.

When it comes to service people (e.g. waiters), you can put it in a "less gross" way:

I have stomach disturbs with [food you hate], so please please please, really make sure no trace of it is in the dish. Thank you [smile]

If they want you to come back eating at them... all the more reason to comply with you.

Markino
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  • Thank you! That is really not my style of communication and not really true, but I will think about how I can alter this suggestion to fit me. – A random lady Jan 10 '18 at 17:39