Boring eater

OK but again the examples you are providing are of people with specific medical conditions which makes food challenging for them.

We seem to be going around in circles with this and I feel like I have explained this several times and you are either not understanding or deliberately ignoring what I am saying but this is not what I am talking about.

Once again, I am not talking about people who have medical conditions. I am talking about people who just can’t be arsed to try things.

Food is a very personal thing and a lot of our preferences are rooted in our early experiences.

if you go to an Indian restaurant and he eats egg and chips - so be it. As long as you get your curry and enjoy so be it?

I used to be really unadventurous with food when I was younger and first married and my husband was so patient and just encouraged me without any pressure to try things.

He really helped me to do it incrementally (such as try a korma 1st not a vinderloo) and never pressured me to eat beyond my comfort zone.

I’m pretty good now and will eat a range of foods across many cuisines and sm more prepared to try things.

I probably couldn’t vocalise it then but I was pretty scared of anything different as I grew up in a very simple meat and 2 veg (always the same 2 veg) household where variety was most definitely not the spice of life.

we’re complex beings and we’re all different.

My DH is an unusual one because he has whatever the palette equivalent of being tone deaf is but he declares everything the be delicious. I cook food really carefully to make it as nice as possible but he'd say the same thing about a jacket spud. Which is nice in a way but also means his own cooking is woeful as he'll forget to add salt, or add ingredients in a weird order because to him it all tastes great 😂

Oh dear I'm like him 😂 I have stomach issues so very limited in what I eat.

You're missing the point I'm making. ARFID is just one example of why someone might have a limited diet. You just don't know - my friend is on WLI and hasn't told many people but it has significantly changed her food preferences. My MiL had covid and now can't stand anything with tomato in it. All three of us could be labelled as 'fussy' by someone who sees us eat in restaurant.

The point is, there could be a million reasons why someone doesn't eat a wide variety of food and sometimes that will be that they just don't want to try new things but for others it could be a reason the they are choosing not to share.

This issue I had with your posts is the assumptions you make about a persons character and intelligence based on whether they eat certain foods. You have no way of knowing the reasons and you don't have a right to that information. And it really shouldn't matter.

Yes, unfortunately for the OP the thread has been high jacked and taken off topic.

The ex-H was like this and he had the palate of a two year old. It really spoiled dining out and holidays for me, trekking about to find something he would eat. No phobias or disorders, just bland and unimaginative.

But a person with a phobia of specific foods is obviously a special and limited case!

You can hardly expect us to think that most people would interpret the OP’s post to be about someone with ARFID. Most people don’t even know what it is.

I’ll be honest, there wouldn’t have been a second date. I eat a very varied diet, cook adventurously and couldn’t cope with a general fusspot. I can deal with gluten free, nut free, vegan etc just not the don’t eat anything brigade, had enough of that with dd, took 10 years to get her eating a normal diet

People are saying they wouldn’t want their partner to be a fussy eater if bonding over food is one of their joys in life. There’s nothing wrong with that. You can have whatever you want on your list of likes or dislikes in a potential partner. Again, we aren’t discussing it in the context of ARFID.

And some people are acting like they're superior because they like a wider variety of food. It's just food. If you like something then eat it but it doesn't make you a better or more rounded person.

Unless he tries to make you eat the same as him. or sneers at your food choices, I think that someone's choices are a very personal matter, and that you should not demand that he should like the same food as you (he shouldn' do that to you either).

You know as well as I do that people very quickly started talking more generally about people who have limited diets and not the individual in the OP. Including you.

People are getting very defensive about their valid eating issues but we are not talking about that. We’re discussing adults who refuse to expand their palates beyond the basics because they assume the food will be ‘yucky’.

Well no. But if people want chips they can make them or order them - it's hardly a crime.

If I’m the one cooking I’m not doing chips with everything.

I could never be with someone who was fussy with food. An ex boyfriend was fussy and the only veg he would eat was peas. I love just about all vegetables. We would never have worked together.

Both me and DH love food. We love cooking together, trying new recipes all the time and eating out.

I freely admit I am pretty obsessed with food. I watch lots of cooking programmes, look for new recipes online all the time, love looking through cookery books (I often get 2 or 3 cookery books from the library and read them in bed!

Having to cater for a fussy eater and cook different meals for me and him would drive me mad no matter how nice or lovely he was in other ways

But again we are not talking about people making judgments about people they have met on the internet. We are talking about the OP’s significant other.

Don’t you think if he had ARFID she might have mentioned that!

Of course it would be judgmental to make assumptions about someone based on their eating habits at one meeting.

Or over the internet....

But we’re talking about the OP’s partner! Not some random she’s just met.

Of course it would be judgmental to make assumptions about someone based on their eating habits at one meeting.

You seem determined to make this all about ARFID. Its not about ARFID. Its about people without diagnoses of a mental health disorder who are just dull and set in their ways.

My husband was like this when we first met. He would eat Chinese and Indian (albeit a limited selection of food from there). Absolutely no cheese, no nuts and a very limited palate.
Initially, I was accommodating, but then it got on my nerves, especially when I was cooking. One day, I really fancied a chicken kiev. I knew he wouldn’t eat it, despite liking chicken and liking garlic. I decided to buy it anyway and plonked it in front of him at dinner time. I explained it was like a giant chicken nugget with garlic, and he liked both those things! He begrudgingly ate it and enjoyed it. I then started introducing more foods such as stir fries, curries, carbonara with a small amount of cheese in it. He used to cover it completely with ketchup (!!!) but then stopped doing that. He’s now much more adventurous and eats Thai food and other cuisines he’d never have eaten before. I decided to treat him like a toddler and put the food in front of him to try. Otherwise, he never would.
He still won’t really eat cheese (albeit he now eats cheesecake and pasta dishes with Parmesan stirred through). I did feed him cheddar mash once, when I bought it by accident instead of regular mash. I just hid the packaging and he loved it!
I also bought him a Nutella milkshake from the airport on our way home from our honeymoon as they didn’t have regular chocolate. He drank it all, plus half of mine. I never have told him it was Nutella (as he won’t eat nuts)….
In short, I refused to pander to him and he did become more adventurous. His mum (begrudgingly) comments from time to time “you’d never have eaten that if I’d cooked it for you” etc etc

God forbid people eat food they like

Insisting on chips with everything would also be a turn off.

Me too! I guess for some, bonding could be over football or music, and others it’s food. I introduced someone to Japanese food and the fact they loved it as much as I do made it a really good experience in that restaurant. I have friends who won’t go near raw fish though and that’s ok but it’s not all raw fish. My kids also love Japanese food, I introduced them to it at a young age. I’m not Japanese but I’m very happy my family love the cuisine. I could live with it if they didn’t but if a partner said yuck I’m not trying raw fish, for no other reason than he thinks it’s going to be a slab of uncooked supermarket cod, then I would find that annoying that he’s not at least educating himself.