What's the ugliest food you've ever seen?

[Philosophy Explorer]

Did you eat it?

This post continues another thread. I think the ugliest food I've ever eaten are octopi, but they are tasty, yum yum.

PhilX

[thedoc]

S.O.S. and if you don't know what that is, shame on you. But it tastes good.

[Philosophy Explorer]

Chipped beef. Were you in the army?

PhilX

[Walker]

The Gallery of Regrettable Food
James Lileks

http://www.lileks.com/institute/gallery/

[thedoc]

Chipped beef. Were you in the army?

PhilX

Creamed Chipped beef on Toast, I was not in any service but my father was in the Navy. My mother used to make it with Hamburger instead of chipped beef.

[uwot]

Oysters aren't pretty, but tripe looks like carpet underlay; which frankly is the best use for it.

[Skip]

Whichever miracle cure the arthritis ad next to the online games is pushing this week.
They go out of their way to make everything look horrible.

In the real world, not mad keep on tripe.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Oysters aren't pretty, but tripe looks like carpet underlay; which frankly is the best use for it.

'Carpet underlay' lol. I was just going to write 'oysters' as the ugliest. They look like those disgusting globs that filthy males who've never been taught any better hurl onto the footpath via one nostril after a noisy gutteral performance.

[Skip]

Liver is not all that pretty, either.

But there are no ugly vegetables or fruits (not even the one that's called uglyfruit) and even root crops have a certain charm.
My main reason for becoming vegetarian was aesthetic.

[Greta]

I was just going to write 'oysters' as the ugliest. They look like those disgusting globs that filthy males who've never been taught any better hurl onto the footpath via one nostril after a noisy gutteral performance.

Consider how it is for the poor oysters and their loves lives http://scribol.com/environment/animals- ... ove-lives/.

Yes, I agree with offal. Liver, brains etc. Beauty is only skin deep etc.

Would you say beef tongue is ugly as such, or just offputting? Maybe not ugly enough? Dad used to eat tongue slices on sandwiches. He also used to have one of those northern European preserved fish bits in a jar that looked diabolical to me as a child.

I made some pretty vomit-looking concoctions not long after leaving home that some people wouldn't eat, even though they were quite tasty (IMO).

[vegetariantaxidermy]

I was just going to write 'oysters' as the ugliest. They look like those disgusting globs that filthy males who've never been taught any better hurl onto the footpath via one nostril after a noisy gutteral performance.

Consider how it is for the poor oysters and their loves lives http://scribol.com/environment/animals- ... ove-lives/.

Yes, I agree with offal. Liver, brains etc. Beauty is only skin deep etc.

Would you say beef tongue is ugly as such, or just offputting? Maybe not ugly enough? Dad used to eat tongue slices on sandwiches. He also used to have one of those northern European preserved fish bits in a jar that looked diabolical to me as a child.

I made some pretty vomit-looking concoctions not long after leaving home that some people wouldn't eat, even though they were quite tasty (IMO).

A friend of mine got home to find his flatmate cooking dinner. 'Mmm, sausages' he said. 'No. Sheep's anuses'. How would anyone even think of cooking and eating that? Some people enjoy eyes too.
When you think about it Skip is right. There are no disgusting vegetables or fruit.

[Skip]

Liver looks bad but tastes good - if you cook it right. Brain and pancreas are quite pretty: intact, washed clean of blood, they have a light pink, undulating surface, like a smoother, slicker, more sophisticated cauliflower, but they taste like tofu (i.e. whatever the seasoning is)
Once you get the skin off, tongue is just another muscle: very lean and finely striated, easy to slice neatly, which is why it was popular for cold-cuts. Good with horseradish or piccalilli.

The negative association with organs is not their actual appearance, but that they show us our own components: that we, too, are potentially edible... the same as our prey. Something we don't like to dwell on. Evolution and kinship are easier to deny when the stuff on our plate is some anonymous ground meat covered in sauce....
... or is that earthworms?

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Liver looks bad but tastes good - if you cook it right. Brain and pancreas are quite pretty: intact, washed clean of blood, they have a light pink, undulating surface, like a smoother, slicker, more sophisticated cauliflower, but they taste like tofu (i.e. whatever the seasoning is)
Once you get the skin off, tongue is just another muscle: very lean and finely striated, easy to slice neatly, which is why it was popular for cold-cuts. Good with horseradish or piccalilli.

The negative association with organs is not their actual appearance, but that they show us our own components: that we, too, are potentially edible... the same as our prey. Something we don't like to dwell on. Evolution and kinship are easier to deny when the stuff on our plate is some anonymous ground meat covered in sauce....
... or is that earthworms?

Didn't you just say you are vegetarian?

[Greta]

Sheep bums, VT? Are you sure he wasn't taking the piss? You may have seemed too keen on his snags for his liking.

One vegetable I find disgusting is okra, not visually but texturally due to the mucilage (the "muc-" prefix saying it all) http://foodblogga.blogspot.com.au/2009/ ... -stew.html. As for fruit, I have a childhood memory of having to pick up rotting peaches fallen from our trees (that always dropped small fruit unripe). They'd be infested with fruit fly grubs and were withered, brown, gooey and they reeked.

Skip, you're right about tongues but such logic is unlikely to overcome, "Dad's eating a tongue on bread - euwww!". The jiggliness of brain also turns me off. Funny, jelly is fine but I don't want meaty things to jiggle. Maybe that kind of texture is associated with muscle meat going off?

Yes, seeing innards is a reminder. Even today I still sometimes marvel at the grotesque bag of goop that we all are. The fluid dynamics needed to facilitate life's complexity are more practical than aesthetic.

[Skip]

Didn't you just say you are vegetarian?

For the last 35 years. Before that, I was a passable cook in two meat-heavy cultures.
And worked in a histology lab for many years, several of them in forensics.
Boiling skulls to clean them for identification was one factor in my conversion.

Greta --
One vegetable I find disgusting is okra, not visually but texturally due to the mucilage

That's what makes it a good thickening agent. You don't have to look at it in stew.
I have done young okra breaded and deep fried, which isn't bad - but on the whole, I find it not worth cultivating and picking.

As for fruit, I have a childhood memory of having to pick up rotting peaches fallen from our trees (that always dropped small fruit unripe). They'd be infested with fruit fly grubs and were withered, brown, gooey and they reeked.

Onions smell worse. Decomposition is never an attractive process. You'd appreciate those peaches more if you ever had to unpack human remains gathered up from the forest floor (the average adult dismembered corpse fills three green bags) infested with maggots. Did you know some of them can jump 2-3 feet?

The jiggliness of brain also turns me off. Funny, jelly is fine but I don't want meaty things to jiggle. Maybe that kind of texture is associated with muscle meat going off?

I'm not sure what it is. Some people are very sensitive to anything slimy (I could never eat an oyster unless it was smoked - and then it's just a salty eraser); some dislike a soft, yielding texture. Mostly, i suspect, it's our imagination making connections.

The fluid dynamics needed to facilitate life's complexity are more practical than aesthetic.

Preserve your skin! That shallow veneer is all the beauty we have.