Thanks, Canadians! I feel better educated now.

Black ants tend to have a bitter flavor, while yellowish ants have a more lemony taste and make a great hiking snack. Roll over a log and grab some grub (literally). Fire ants, of course, will make you ill.

Generally when going to politically sensitive areas, we listen more than we talk. I have my own, very strong, opinions about the drug industry and the US's involvement. Would I state these opinions to a Colombian? No, because it would be presumptuous to act like I know more about a country than a native does. Likewise, when we move to Sarajevo, I'm keeping my piehole shut.

And devajd, tell me if you see any rude Americans!

I'm pretty non-picky about food, and I've got the figure to prove it. I think the only things that most people like that I don't are eggs, broccoli blossoms (the stems I love, but the bumply parts at the top gross me out), and passionfruit. My mother accuses me of lying about disliking eggs to this day. She was dumbfounded when I announced at age 3 that I hated eggs and thought some little bad-influence friend from nursery school influenced me to tell her that. I still hate eggs, in any form, and she still thinks I'm making it up just to be oppositional.
And word to the posters upthread who mentioned people making rude comments about the food you choose to eat. I go out for lunch on a regular basis with some folks from work, and a few of them always feel the need to tell me how disgusting they find my menu choices. I like meat rare, and if I order a steak, burger, etc., I'm going to order it rare. And they always have to make "jokes" about my food getting up and running away, or mooing, or just how generally disgusting they find it. They also love to comment on how I must have no taste buds left since I like spicy food. Now, I think it's a crime to cook the life out of a fine piece of meat and turn it into a nasty hunk of charred shoe leather, but I would never say that to them when they order their meat well done.

So would a pig.

Sorcha, I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who has my own blankets. Our bed is made up with two sheets, two blankets and two comforters. Mr Rabrab is the one who rolls up, though, so it started as me just trying to figure out how to not wake up in the middle of the night completely uncovered. Now I'm so used to it, I don't know whether I could go back to sharing blankets.

dmno you'd fit right in at our house; cream soda is my preferred soft drink, then sharp citrus (I really like 50-50 and Fresca better than 7-up), then ginger ale. Cola's at the bottom of the list.

Am I the only one here who puts jelly in her cottage cheese?

ETA: Auntlada, a friend of mine had a similar thing happen, she finally sat her man down and said "Look, I married you for better or worse; I didn't marry you for lunch everyday."

On unexpected children:



It's been my experience that that's how number 3 children often are. At a recent party, we discussed this with friends. Everyone who was a first or second child was planned. Everyone who was third or beyond was an accident. Then we discussed the various methods of birth control that don't always work. I think I scared some of them by telling them that my mom was on the pill when she got pregnant with me.

On only children:



This is how I got to be auntlada. Both parents were only children. I actually have biological nieces, but was always closer to Little Bear. I even gave him a nickname, after all. I'm doing good to remember which nieces go with which brothers, usually. That's what they get for giving them all J names.

On condiment misuse:

The local university has a fairly good hotel and restaurant administration school. Twice a year, they have visiting chefs come in and teach the students and then supervise the students preparing and serving a fancy dinner to people who pay $75 a plate as a fund-raiser. The paper used to get free tickets, so I'd get to go. One time they had a couple of chefs from New Orleans. One course had filet mignon, andouille sausage and shrimp. It was fantastic. Some people near us brought their teen-age and younger kids (at $75 a plate!) and had to ask for ketchup because the kids wouldn't eat it otherwise. It killed me.

On being alone:

When we first married, my husband worked at Pizza Hut, usually on the night shift since he was still in school. (We were going to wait until he graduated, but it became apparent that might be quite a while. And it was.) He was assistant manager, and when the company moved in a new manager, the new guy brought his own assistant manager. Hubby had the choice of quitting or being a cook. He quit. And was home all the time. Drove me nuts. After 10 years, he has mostly gotten used to my need to be alone and that it doesn't mean I hate him. I blame my mother. She's the same way. Fortunately, my father fishes.

I don't know about Canada, but according to one of mr pseudo's Japanese colleagues, eating while you're walking is one of those things that is considered uncouth and rude in Japan. Now that he's mentioned it, I do remember seeing all of these vending machines everywhere (they sold everything in them, I swear; I could have gotten a bowl of noodles out of one), and people would be stuffing their faces next to them, but no one walked and ate.

Hate both Miracle Whip and Mayo. Meh on ketchup. Love Mustard.

I like watermelon, but hate the other kinds - the green and orange ones. I can't even be bothered to find out what they're called. Talk about boring.

For some reason, I never even tried coffee till I was in my late 20's, but ever since I did, I've loved it. I drink a pot of it nearly every day, but if I have just one cup of tea my stomach will kill me.

Another vegetarian here, so I'm not about to go out and eat just anything without knowing what's in it, and my ability to be 'adventurous' is more limited.


That really surprises me. I would have assumed their food is spicy like Mexican food. Well, when you assume...


I had a friend who got dumped a month before her wedding. Within a couple of months she was dating a new guy, in under a year they got married. I should feel happy for her - she's much happier now, and he is a good guy. But part of me feels bad for her. She never got to enjoy being single again, and enjoy being on her own. She's just jumped from one long term relationship to another.

Heh. What exactly counts as "large food"? Because if I saw someone here in Toronto walking down the street eating a pumpkin or a whole turkey, it wouldn't be rude, it would just be hilarious.

Great. Now everyone in my office knows I'm crazy, on account of the random laughter and such.

Awesome. I meant like a sandwich or a burrito or other meal-sized food, rather than nibbling on a piece of candy or a bag of chips.

Re: spicy Latin food. Mexicans don't even eat their food that spicy - most Americans eat Tex-Mex, which is spicier and fattier than what Mexicans eat. Colombians eat beans, chicken, plantains, empanadas, and, for whatever reason, you'll often find a fried egg on top. It's very hearty, simple, peasant fuel. I wanted to try roast guinea pig in Ecuador, but we couldn't find a nice restaurant that served it. It's a delicacy in some parts of South America, and they serve it feet and all. Apparently the meat is quite tender.

So, who wants to have dinner at my house?

That's what they want you to think.

Word McWord. I also hate coffee unless it is well disguised as a Starbucks Caramel Frappuccino. And my mom almost always suggests french toast for breakfast when cooking for my brother, at almost 27 he's never eaten it. Of course she does the same thing to me with salmon.

I'm not married yet but my OH's mother has been telling me for years (since I was 17) that I have to have daughters as she is the mother of four boys. Not only does she know what they look like and want input on names, she already picked out what they will call her...Grammy. In spite of all that, I love her to death.

The OH and I have the perfect living situation. We have a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment. When we want to be together, we can be. When we want to be apart we can be. When he's been eating Taco Bell...his bathroom is several hundred feet away from mine. Oh, and the bedrooms are almost the same size but mine has a huge closet that is all mine. The only things we share are the kitchen, the laundry room and the living room.

And for the record I've never heard of any of these local foods (Dixie Cups, Duke's Mayo, etc.) I guess I'm just a name-brand child.

I know that Mayo is eggs and oil, but what is Miracle Whip?

Not to derail the conversation, but we got a hilarious e-mail at work today. Now I just started here and it's a nice investment/bond trading firm in New York



Now, I don't think our bathrooms are that bad, and the toilets are automatic flush, so I don't know what they want us to do, but the whole trading floor hasn't stopped talking about this.

I normally don't post here (I just lurk), but WedsAddams inspired me to comment.

My mother and all of my mother's side are Ecuadorian. I was traumatized - traumatized!!! - at the age of 8, when at my aunt's house in Guayaquil, they started roasting guinea pigs. This little American born Ecuadrian almost died when she saw little pet guinea pigs skewered on a stick and roasting slowly. And then (!!!) watching her beloved grandmother chow down.

I hear it is delicious, and most of my family members have chowed down at some point on the little furry friends, but I have never managed to work up an appetite.

Let me know if you ever do though!

My grandmother has been saving baby clothes for me for years. Apparently, I am way past my prime baby-making age in her mind. I'm 28.

It's funny when I run into classmates from high school and see that their children are pretty grown up. As a matter of fact, a friend who was a year behind me has a 10 year old son. At least one person from my class has a child that...come to think of it, probably started high school himself yesterday. The last time I checked the alumni web site, she had 3 kids. Since she had 3 when we graduated, that means she had all of her children between 14 and 18.

So, when I'm not dealing with my family giving me grief, it's the comments of my tactless peers that I have to address. They take pride in the fact that their children will be out of the house before they're 40. That's fine for them, but why bash me in the process?

I forgot to mention the incredibly jacked up pseudo bomb threat we had here late last week. Well, imagine how warm and fuzzy it was to go down to the store on the lobby level and see these.

Dixie Cups, coincidentally, were what we used to freeze Kool Aid in so that we could sell them for a quarter in my grandmother's yard when I was little. What were those called? Chilly Willy's? I know there's another name, but I can't think of it.


THANK YOU!! *exhale*


Ah, so you are a "cold peanut butter" person? I'm a "RTPB/CK" (Room Temp PB/Cold Ketchup). Bf thinks I'm odd for the CK part.

• I also don't eat watermelon, which gets me mocked incessantly at family reunions and all other outdoor events that involve eating. I don't like the texture. And it taints all the other fruit in fruit salad, which really sucks for me and my fellow haters.
  
  
  
  
• I don't drink coffee, but I am a Frappacino Ho. Go figure.
  
  
  
  
• I grew up on Miracle Whip at home and Helman's at the aforementioned grandmother's house. It was all called mayonaise and it was years before I realized why Grandma's sanwhiches tasted so different. I thought it was some kind of granmajic.

Funny!


I almost spit out my sandwhich on that one. Hee!


Chitterlings? Or Chit'lins? Hate them. But, again, this gets me mocked incessantly at family reunions and all other indoor events that involve eating.


I've liven up blah mac'n'cheese with a tiny bit of barbeque sauce. Lots of seasoning in there.

Weds, if you're serving "beans, chicken, plantains, empanadas", I'm so there. I could live off of that. Though lately I don't like chicken parts...only bonless skinless chicken breasts. Not that I won't eat parts, but I often get asked why I haven't finished because I've only taken a few outside bites.

I think I sprained my brain trying to figure out how to do this.


Yipes, SW! That is scary. Was there an actual bomb?

Food discussion....YAY! I actually wrote an essay once on my food quirks. Personally, I am indifferent with respect to watermelon and ketchup. Both are ok but I can't recall the last time I bought either voluntarily. I hate pepperoni because; ok this sounds gross, but the sides curl up and essentially make a little grease pocket on the top of the pizza which squicks me out. *shudder* Of course, I also tend to blot the excess grease off my pizza with a paper towel so it's quite possible that I am a freak. I hate tomatoes. Ick! Salsa, tomato sauce, etc are all fine but actually sliced tomato will not pass my lips. I grew up on Miracle Whip so I like it because its familiar but I also like real mayo. I make my own on occasion but since I live alone it goes bad before I can eat it all. Mustard only goes on hot dogs and very minimally at that. However, I am a chocoholic and VERY adamant about chocolate use. The only acceptable additions to chocolate in my book are caramel, nuts or another kind of chocolate. DO NOT put fruit in my chocolate (dipped strawberries are the exception) and for the love of Phil, DO NOT put mint in or with chocolate.....that is simply a waste of good chocolate. *shudder*

I had to train my poor fiance to taste food before covering it in salt. Apparently his family did not season things when he was growing up. A couple of years ago, several of my single friends all had a sleepover after going out for New Years. I was making brunch the next morning, including this yummy green chile frittata and a couple people were pulling out the ketchup before they ever tasted it. However, I triumped because once they had a taste, the vile ketchup on my yummy home-cooked dish was not necessary.

Hee! Zron, I hear ya on the miracle of fishes and loaves; my dad was/is a far better cook than my mom. However, I have lived alone for the last 10 years or so and I am constantly met with astonishment that I cook for just myself. I get reactions along the lines of "wow, you actually cook dinner for just you?" Um, yeah...I'm hungry and I don't like most processed/prepackaged food. Its not like I'm whipping up 4 course meals with complex sauces. I throw some salmon or chicken or steak on the grill and make a salad or some veggies. I doubt that I spend more than 20 minutes preparing my average meal and yet people are simply astonished. Cooking dinner actually calms me after a long day at the office and apparently this makes me a giant freak amongst my peer group.

I would never ever complain about what was being served or ask for something else. Just imagining doing something like that brings the image of my tiny little grandma giving me the smackdown for being rude (or my parents for that matter). No, thank you is definitely an under-used term these days. Although I do have a doozy of a story related to this. A year or so ago, a friend and I decided to have an informal cookout for our group of friends. I sent the e-mail out and one guy in the group e-mailed back that he would love to come but he just started dating someone and could he bring her along. I told him that of course she was welcome. My friend was a psuedo-vegetarian in that he didn't eat red meat or poultry but did eat seafood, eggs and dairy. So I had veggie burgers on hand for him along with a nice fruit salad and I think grilled veggies. Well he shows up with the beeyotch and she starts complaining that we don't have the right brand of veggie burgers and she only drinks natural soda and juice, blah, blah, blah. I matter of factly tell her the location of the nearest Whole Foods.

It was a box in the mail room that was ticking for some strange reason. That didn't bother nearly as much as seeing how the situation was handled.

That reminds me, I should leave. No point staying longer than I have to with stuff like that going on.

I put salsa in my mac and cheese. It's so essential now that I'd sooner skip the cheese than the salsa.


Two theories, both gross:

1.) They used the wallpaper as a tissue without pulling the wallpaper off. Unlikely, maybe impossible.

2.) Snot rocket.

I was with you until the mint. I love mint with chocolates. The Girl Scout Thin Mints are some of my favorite cookies. They just don't last long enough. (I can eat a box in one sitting, no problem.) My mother-in-law, to whom I've never explained my aversion to fruit in chocolate, knows I love chocolate so for my birthday, she usually gets a chocolate cake. Only it often has apricot in it. I eat it, but I don't like it.

I eat several things I don't really like there, though. I always forget until after the first bite that she puts green olives in her egg salad. She also likes to serve avocado halves with some salady thing. I hate avocadoes (os?), but I eat it because she's my mother-in-law. Also, they lived in West Africa as missionaries for almost 20 years. Generally, missionaries (like diplomats, apparently) are taught to eat whatever is served.

I hate coffee, but I love the way it smells, particular if it's flavored with vanilla or nuts. My husband likes coffee, but prefers hot tea. (In Oklahoma, you have to say hot tea. If you just say tea, it comes with ice.) We have a coffee pot, though, for when my parents visit since Dad drinks coffee (or used to -- he stopped recently because it upset his stomach). Of course, it hardly ever gets used since they rarely visit us to stay the night. They save those trips for the kids who gave them grandkids.

auntlada, I found a recipe for Thin Mints online that is very close to the real thing. I had a whole thin mint operation set up in my kitchen the other day, and now my freezer is full of chocolately minty goodness. It's cheaper than the GS thin mints, and you can have them all year!

I love ketchup. Of course you keep it in the fridge -- where else would you keep it, Suga? Duh. One of my very favorite comfort foods, left over from when I was a kid, is still a grilled cheese (made to very exact specifications) with ketchup. And I've been known to use the last french fry to mop up all the extra ketchup on my plate. No sense it going to waste!

When I worked in foodservice we used to eat french fries with honey-mustard sauce and smoked cheddar cheese. It was probably the best thing we ever cooked there! I figure I could easily give up meat as long as I could afford smoked cheese.

My parents were big on exposing my brother and I to 'odd' foods when we were kids. I remember one time during grade school, our whole family had been invited over to eat dinner with a couple who what been friends with my parents in college. The wife oh-so-hesitantly asked my mom if she thought my brother and I could handle sausage and sauerkraut for supper, or at least not throw a fit if we saw other people eating it. My brother and I thought she was nuts -- we were the kind of kids who got in fights over who'd get seconds on sauerkraut.

Heh, Suzikins.

I think that chick was at my last cookout too. That is exactly the kind of guest I was complaining about.

It isn't that you haven't prepared vegetarian or diet friendly alternatives. It is that they would prefer something else. I'm having a house party, not opening a restaurant.

Hee! I used to call these the fuzzy heads, and I didn't eat them either, until I was in college I think. I am picky about fruits and veggies. My hubby calls me the vegetarian who doesn't like vegetables.

NO fruit and chocolate together, ever! Including strawberries. Raisins are the only acceptable kind-of-fruit that can get in the vicinity of chocolate and still be edible. And I'm with auntlada on mint and chocolate, especially GS cookies. Yummmmmmmmm.

Any other root beer lovers? I substitute Pepsi for coffee for that morning caffeine pick-me-up since I don't do coffee. But my favorite fizzy drinks are root beer and cream soda. Root beer floats are heaven!

And, per above discussions, adding to my list: HATE olives of any kind. Loooooooooooooooove avocadoes. Used to hate tomatoes but now don't always pick them out of everything.

ETA: Peanut butter in the fridge is only for Mr. jpgr's skeeviness. He thinks there's less chance of him getting a whiff if it's cold. If left to my own devices, it would be room temp.

And europa - recipe please!!!!!

And re: living alone - I've never ever lived by myself, and that is one big regret.

Regarding sodas, I always loved root beer and Dr. Pepper. The sodas that are impossible to find in Colombia? You guessed it - root beer and Dr. Pepper.

How great is a thread that talks about ant flavors? And I didn't even KNOW ants came in flavors! I grew up with parents who did not tolerate picky eaters, so I'll try anything, I suppose, although some fried sweet-shrimp heads at a sushi place once stared me down. And won.

Horse? Isn't shabu-shabu traditionally horse meat? I think I've tried that. Not big on beaks and feet, though, or entrails of any sort, including chit'lins. You have to know who washed those buggers.



And you can set the thermostat wherever you want.

And you can get them fried, boiled, raw, live...it's like Burger King, you can have ants your way!

ETA: off to search the grocery stores for canned green beans. Unfortunately, this could take a while, which is one of the drawbacks of being an expat. Once you leave the US, the grocery stores get a lot less reliable.

bungle3358 - YES! Salsa mixed into mac & cheese is awesome! Didn't Velveeta used to have a version of their shells and cheese with salsa in it? I admired them for the attempt, but it just wasn't the same.

It does need to be good salsa. I'm not a huge salsa snob or anything, but I absotively posilutely can't eat any salsa made by Tostitos or Pace. Ugh.

Coincidentally, there's a gross restaurant in Toronto called "Shabu Shabu" where they bring you the raw food and you cook it yourself. (A concept which just outrages me. My brother loves that place and I always tell him: "You pay money to cook the food yourself? Why don't you give them an extra $25.00? Maybe they'll let you do the dishes too!") Anyway, he managed to drag me there once and I'll never forget, the first thing they brought out was a plate full of raw shrimp with the heads and eyes still on them. Uh...no.

My general rule is: Never eat anything that's looking at you.

Of course. Their from another planet. Just ask Ariel (Amish in the City. Yes, I watch it.).


Popsicles? Freezer Pops? We called them both. Chille Willy's in my neck of the woods were those long plastic tubes of colored sugar-water that you would freeze. Popsicles were anything with a tongue-depressor in it.

And I'm with you on the "RTPB/CK". I didn't know you were allowed to eat ketchup at room temperature (except in portion control packets, and those just stink all around).

Susikins, if blotting your pizza denotes freakitude, then I am a freak as well. And who knew it was my pizza habits that would do it to me? Without consciously trying, I've got MrKate to the point where he will blot the whole pizza when he takes it out of the oven. He claims it's all for me, but I think he likes the taste of pizza better than the grease, too. And with Pepperoni? I share the "cupping" hate, but love the spicy taste. Have you tried dicing it into little cubes? Still greasy if you don't blot, but easier than draining little grease cups.

And with that? I'm out for the day, gone to catch some delicious dinner, a lovely Bible study, and a cap off a fabulous evening with TAR with my hubby. Have a wonderful night, y'all!

JenEx, I am a Michigander that thinks Vernor's is evil and not of the Lord, with the notable exception of a Boston Cooler. (I also am not a native Michigander.)



I need to go to Meijer's tonight, and I'll do a price check.



I do something even more disgusting. Instead of Mash Potatoes & Gravy? Cottage Cheese & Gravy. It's actually pretty good.

I can eat just about anything, but for some reason I cannot stand sweet potatoes (aka yams). It's not that I dislike them, like I do spinach or cauliflower, it's that my gag reflex goes into overdrive when I try to swallow them.

I made the mistake of telling one of my friends this while I was having dinner at his place. He insisted that I try his sweet potatoes and I finally gave in. I somehow managed not to projectile vomit on everything in sight and attempted to tell my friend that I liked his cooking, but I don't think he bought it.

Get yer haggis! Oatmeal and onions, boiled in a sheep's stomach! Tastes as good as it sounds! [/Groundskeeper Willie]. Talk of entrails, etc., always makes me think of haggis, which I have fortunately never been served. I've always imagined it's the whiskey that makes it taste good and since I don't like alcohol ...

Rachel RSL, this is much the same reasoning I follow when I refuse to use the self check-out line at the grocery store or Wal-Mart. At Wal-Mart, I'm already carrying all my own bags to the car. I expect some service.

The never-eat-anything-that's-looking-at-you rule is also why I couldn't eat the crawfish at a Mardi Gras party. Sure the eyes were only little black dots, but they were eyes. Also, it tasted nasty. I'm willing to eat the meat mixed up in an etouffee, but not by itself.

Meijers, I so miss you. I didn't realize how amazing Meijers is until I moved to a place without it. Now I have to go to Safeway AND Target, instead of the convenient one-stop shopping I grew up with.

I've had haggis. Voluntarily. It tasted like bland, very dry sausage. And of course it was deep-fried, like just about everything else I ran across in Scotland.

ETA: Meijers, huh? Around here we have a store called Fred Meyer (owned by Kroger), which is pretty much a cross between Safeway and Target. Odd. And indispensible. When my shoelaces broke while I was on vacation, I had absolutely no idea where to go to get a new pair -- it wouldn't occur to me to get odd stuff like that anywhere except Fred Meyer.

I am a big root beer fan, and am thrilled when I can find it in diet (I follow South Beach). The grocery stores in Tanzania were not reliable. Once they had root beer, at $1.50 per can. I bought four, and they never stocked it again. Occasionally they would have cranberry juice, and I would buy a case. Once I was so excited that they had it (I had run out, and they hadn't had any for awhile) and a Japanese lady watched me freak out and buy a case, she looked at it funny, but bought one. I wonder if she liked it.

ETA, I like Haggis. Irn Bru - a scottish soda - on the other, tastes like you are drinking bubble gum. Yuck.

Speaking of willing to try anything, I ate haggis at a Robbie Burns Day party last year. And I liked it, I really liked it. I know, I couldn't believe it either!

Did you try the deep fried Mars (aka Milky Way) Bars? I thought they would be nasty, especially since the place where I bought one used the same oil for their fish & chips. But they turned out to be pretty good.

As far as the haggis, I didn't get to try that but I did eat a lot of Indian food. The neighborhood in Glasgow where I stayed must have had a dozen Indian restaurants in a 5 block radius.

Another vote for keeping a kosher attitude about chocolate and fruit -- never together at the same time. I like fruit, I like chocolate -- but they're totally different tastes and they spoil each other when ingested at the same time. (And that includes strawberries, raisins, everything.) I spoze I have to cop to being somewhat picky about fruit in fact -- though I enjoy almost any fruit raw, I don't really take to any form of cooked fruit. I can take apple pie if it's served, though I can also leave it; don't go for jelly or jam (I take my peanut butter all by itself on bread or preferably toast, thanks), and all those fruit stuffings and relishes with meat just puzzle me (again, incompatible sensations to my palate). I mean, I'll choke the thing down if I'm a guest, but it's no pleasure for me.


A third one, even grosser: that wasn't a glob of snot that was hanging from the men's room wall.

Is there such a thing as a good haggis? In the sense that if I'm in Scotland and want to try haggis, there would be some restaurants known for their tasty or authentic or whatever haggis, while others would just have blah haggis or have it on the menu just because? Because I do plan to try haggis when I go to Scotland next spring.

(And thus endeth one of my least productive workdays in my employment history...)

How was the Indian food in Scotland? I love Indian food, but have always had a hard time reconciling Indian food and English (or in this case, Scottish -- yes, I know the difference) tastes. Of course, I'm basing this on what I know of English food, which isn't a lot, except that it's fairly bland.

It was very good, and what was interesting about some of the restaurants was that they specialized in regional cuisines instead of doing a catch-all menu of the entire country.

Indian cooking is so widespread in the UK there's a running joke that it's the new British cuisine.

Actually, it should be pretty easy to cook for friends on the South Beach diet...pretty much any vegetarian dish would be fine unless it was white rice/pasta. But brown rice, whole wheat pasta, etc...are all acceptable in phase 2 (phase 1 only lasts 2 weeks). You might ask your friends if they have the SB Cookbook, there is a very good Vegetarian section in the cookbook. I've been doing the South Beach diet since the end of May and I've lost 30 lbs. It hasn't been hard for me to follow, just smarter choices than I was previously making. And I love food (obviously, or I wouldn't have had 70lbs to lose....almost halfway there!) so there was no way that I was going to go on some cracked out meat only diet. I generally have a large salad for lunch with tomatoes, broccoli, cheese. Some days I put either lean turkey breast or lean turkey ham diced up in the salad as well.

This being said, my husband is a chef and when I make something to share at a potluck or when people come over for dinner, some always assume that he must have made the food so they go up and thank him for cooking such a wonderful dish. They just can't seem to understand that I can also cook....even all fancy like, even though I don't work in a restaurant! That and the tired old line "it must be wonderful being married to a chef" Yeah, not really....he's always at the restaurant during mealtimes and only cooks Sunday breakfast and dinner at home.

Yeah, bf drives the bus so I have to beg and beg to get him to drive on weekends. I incorrectly assumed that he liked driving. I guess that's like him asking me to work on weekends, huh? Aint happening.

Rinaldo, I just cracked up at your last statement. I'm home alone now so there's no one to judge. Wheeee!


I have a yooge thing of really good mango salsa that I got from Costco, but my problem is that I don't have a clue what to do with it. I've eaten it with salmon before and I liked that, but what else?

Ok, I'm off to go and try to work off the bag of Reece's Pieces I had today.

Of course it was the family sized bag. Did you even have to wonder?

Nope. But I did have fried mashed potatoes and fried oatmeal. The first? Not so odd. The second? Odd.

ETA: auntlada -- like a potato pancake, pan-fried, not deep-fried. (Same way as the oatmeal, actually, which was cold leftover oatmeal sliced and pan-fried.)

How do you fry mashed potatoes? That actually sounds really good -- as long as I can get someone else to do it for me. I don't really enjoy cooking. I can do it, but I don't like it much.

ETA: I was just discussing the Olympics and Greece with the blowhard old guy in the sports department. We're talking about why Greece didn't have the sites landscaped, etc., and I said I thought it was largely because they fired the woman who worked to get them the Olympics in the first place, then sat on their butts for 2-3 years before rehiring her. Almost all the work was done after she was rehired. Then he tells me that they're so poor over there at the eastern end of the Mediterranean because that was the way the Communists left it. Does anyone else remember when Greece was Communist? That was when I left because I was pretty sure he wasn't making any sense. Not that he usually does.

I like mango salsa as a dressing for roast chicken or pork.
I forgot to include, upthread, in the things I hate category: marshmallow in any form. Marshmallows, marshmallow cream, Peeps, S'mores, etc. Ewwwwwwww.
Mayonnaise: my parents always used Best Foods. I wasn't aware that Miracle Whip even existed until I went to a friend's house and was served a sandwich made with it. I thought that the mayo had surely spoiled, but I was raised to politely eat anything served to me at another home, so I did, convinced I would go home and die from food poisoning. I told my mother after (just in case she had to rush me to the hospital) and she managed to figure it out and explain it to me. I had a very similar experience with my first time eating margarine after knowing nothing but butter.
I live in the South now, so I'm definitely going to be looking for Duke's mayonnaise on my next trip to the grocery store.

Apparently cooking is going the way of sewing; a domestic skill that everyone used to have, but that now is more of a hobby or a craft. Some people are predicting that, just as we all buy our clothes ready-made from the store, in a generation or two everyone will buy all their meals ready-made.

I tell myself this can't be true. Then I go to the grocery store and see the packages of pre-sliced vegetables.

Apologies to all those who are kitchen impaired but... it's a carrot, people. It's not that hard to chop!

Let me reiterate what princesslola said about South Beach. Processed grains and grain products are out, anything unprocessed is fine, and almost all veggies (and most fruits) are fine. Sugar is out, too. I was going to do South Beach when my butt got too big, but just cutting out sugar and white flour was sufficient. Still, I did read the book and I still use some of the recipes. Vegetarians and South Beachers should be able to have the same meal with few problems, if there are any at all.