to think that being a fussy eater in someone else's home is actually quite rude?

[wrathomum]

And never even to TRY new things? Or appreciate the efforts of the host (who has multiple food sensitivites) to cater for everyone and try to provide healthy fare? And to not even feel a little bit bad about being fussy?

My mother was genuinely surprised to find I still don't like porridge as an adult. She said 'oh I just thought you were being awkward'.

Ah, I see!

at being forced to eat a sprout at 38. I'm amazed you haven't thrown one at her already.

i honestly think it all depends on what your mother ate when she was pregnant with you.....if she was all sickly and just nibbled on toast, then you will be a fussy eater. If she wolfed down a good variety of healthy food, then so will you.....

I always ask people if they have anything they can't eat. I always leave the food in the middle of the table for people to serve themselves. If I'm cooking curry, I specifically check beforehand that people can eat it. I try to make sure that we have at least two vegetables so if people don't like one, they can have another. If, when I've tried to come up with something appropriate, they just made rude comments or put on a face like a slapped arse, I would be annoyed.

Manners are the real issue here. A few years ago I went to dinner at a friend's house. She served rice as a side dish, but had done some potatoes for another person who didn't like rice. The non-rice eater sat at the table and said 'Rice is disgusting. Exactly like slugs. I don't know how you can eat it.' That is just bloody rude, as well as totally unnecessary. Why couldn't she just thank her hosts for a lovely meal? Nobody was even asking her to eat the effing rice!

DH and DD are coeliac and I throw up at the smell of fish and seafood (no idea if this is an allergy, never got close enough to one to find out); we always tell people when accepting an invitation for a meal. I feel quite apologetic that we're awkward to cater for, but people are always charming about it. And for some of the really dedicated types, they adore rising to the challenge.

On the four occasions in my adult life where fish has been served to me, I've been absolutely mortified and very apologetic on three of them. Not able to eat it and really sorry it hadn't been mentioned before (they all happened a long time ago, I've learnt my lesson now). On the fourth occasion, it was my SIL and she already knew but served up a sauce full of prawns anyway.

To go back to the OP, I think you're confusing two issues here. It is not acceptable to be rude about food you're being offered in someone else's house when you've accepted an invitation, so YANBU there. On the other hand, I think you're really struggling because you're offering them something you used to love eating and no longer can . And if they don't want it, that makes you angry with the whole situation. I really sympathise (my DD has only just been diagnosed and now has to say no to lots of things she likes) but I think YABU.

DD hates sprouts, I make her eat one at Christmas dinner every year.
TBF though, it's a bit of a joke now, I jokingly insist, she jokingly eats it whilst making gagging noises.
She could eat them to be polite at someone else's house, but I don't make her at home.
The Christmas dinner thing is a standing joke now.

Manners are the real issue here. 100 per cent agree, dashingredhead, it's just rude and egocentric to make your food issues central to a friendly meal, that thing with the rice...pfff....

There's a massive gulf in people's ideas of fussiness isn't there?

Not liking mushrooms or onions isn't fussiness, you just don't like onions or mushrooms.

Eating cheese at one meal and not at another is downright picky and rude.

Having a range of foods you don't like is fussy.

Physically being unable to eat certain foods due to allergy or textures due to senstivity or a range of foods because you were tube fed, suctioned and vented for a good proportion of your weaning years deserves a little sympathy I think.

The problem is that the latter group, who perhaps trying to be polite just don't eat very much rather than complain or cause a fuss, get lumped in with the former groups as attention seeking, tedious, boring and irritating.

^Not liking mushrooms or onions isn't fussiness, you just don't like onions or mushrooms.

Having a range of foods you don't like is fussy.^

I don't understand this. If not liking 2 foods isn't fussy, why not liking 20 foods fussy? it's exactly the same thing just the 20 food person has it worse than the 2 food person.

I do think "not liking onions" in an adult is fussy, they are in so many things and really don't have any taste is most of them, so why not just eat it and get over it?

I had multiple food allergies as child, most of which I was very lucky to grow out of. I was left though with an undeveloped and fussy palate, as I had no experience of basic flavours like pepper, ginger, chilli...all kinds of things. But being a grown up and not wanting to be limited and annoying in daily life, I trained myself to like lots of things that I didn't initially. There are things that I wouldn't pick for myself, but almost nothing that I wouldn't try if you served them up to me.
Fussiness and not liking things can be overcome, if you want, for most people. And if you don't, well why the hell not?

I agree, Penis, especially on 'There are things that I wouldn't pick for myself, but almost nothing that I wouldn't try if you served them up to me.'

Do people have to love every single thing they eat? I don't know how many times I've been to eat at people's houses and eaten stuff I would certainly not choose for myself. I wouldn't dream of announcing that I didn't like it much, or in any other way causing a fuss. You just eat what you can, praise what you like the most (or dislike the least ), say thank you and offer to wash up. Not difficult if you're a grown-up although I've known several people who seem to find it impossible

Penis it's not the taste of the onions that's the problem, it's the slime. I can eat them if they're chopped, but if there are big lumps of onion in a casserole I will gag. So I eat round them. I don't pick out tiny pieces.

I don't understand this. If not liking 2 foods isn't fussy, why not liking 20 foods fussy? it's exactly the same thing just the 20 food person has it worse than the 2 food person.

Which proves precisely the point I was making; that people's idea of fussiness differs hugely. To me not liking two things isn't fussy (whether they are in lots of things or not). To you it is. I don't like seafood, cold soup or noodles, Chinese food in general. I don't rate myself as fussy. dd however is at the other end of the scale and would probably have the OP throwing plates.

Endo you'd love my onion gravy then. Finely chopped onion in that.

DS will try anything, but if he definitely doesn't like it, he won't eat it again. He definitely has a far wider range of tastes than any of his friends and some adults I know.

I understand the onion thing. It's about the type of onion too. For example sometimes in Chinese takeaways you tend to get big square lumps of onion and I have to sit them to the side, I will eat smaller pieces, and anything with onion in, even onion soup, but the texture of those big chunks if the onion is the wrong type of onion isn't nice.

Having said that, it's merely a food I don't like, I have no phobia or allergy so if I was at someone's house and thought I would offend, I would certai ly make myself eat them.

I still don't understand why it's offensive or rude to pick out an ingredient and leave it.

If someone did that with a meal I had cooked, I wouldn't think "oh they don't like my cooking". I would think "oh they don't like onions/olives/aubergines". Nothing offensive about that.

I think this is different from not eating an entire meal/plateful of food. That is potentially offensive/rude as could easily be interpreted as "they don't like my cooking".

minipie, it just is nasty table manners, it really is. The point of good manners and etiquette is to make the other person feel comfortable, isn't it?
picking through your food like the mother of a spoilt toddler isn't really going to achieve that....

Fussiness in and of itself isn't a problem. If people don't eat certain things, fine. Very few people can claim to like all foods equally. It only potentially becomes rude when you're being fussy around other people, and it starts to affect them. For me, fussiness becomes bad manners and thus irritating when:

-someone is pulling faces and chewing really slowly and poking things around with their forks and wincing during a meal

• someone keeps commenting on a food they don't like or "can't eat" while others are eating said food and enjoying it (or trying to)

• someone makes no effort to mitigate the effect of their fussiness on others, e.g. they don't even touch their plate of food, they sulk throughout the meal, they don't even try a little bit of what is on offer etc.

If someone doesn't like one element of a dish and just leaves that bit while cheerfully eating other bits, it's absolutely fine. If someone is apologetic that they are fussy about the food that someone has cooked, and says they really can't eat any of it but they recognise that it's their problem and will just have some toast...well I might feel a flash of irritation, but I would get over it and it would be fine.

It's all about attitude, really. Personally I tend to think that all this "I can't eat that, I'd literally throw up" is psychosomatic (allergies apart) and people could swallow most foods without averse reactions if they just relaxed about the whole thing, and if there weren't other socio-cultural factors at play too. That's just my own take on it, though.

Trying to be positive about this, we have a relative who has some real difficulties around eating, but who lives abroad, so needs to come to stay for several days if she's coming to visit at all.

Last time she came to stay, we (think we) had real success by putting a small variety of foods on the table, letting everyone serve themselves and then doing our best to not look at any point at what she had got on her plate, not to mention food at all, and so on. It seemed to work better than the more obvious techniques of asking her about food and trying to cook something appropriate.

An old friend put it in context for me by saying that you have to balance people's mental health with their physical health, and though it may not seem all that healthy for someone to eat nothing but mince pies and cheddar for a month, if that was best for their mental health, then you should accept it as a healthy eating plan for them at that particular stage of their life.

I am an adult fussy eater and you'd HATE to have me over for tea. I'm not quite bad enough to be on a tv show (I eat vegetables for one thing!) but I'm not ready for society at large just yet.

To be fair, I would never pull a face, and I would always say thank you and appreciate your kitchen efforts. But generally, I always warn people what an awful eater I am, and only really go to eat at very close friends and family's houses - who all know what to expect anyway.

I've been making a real effort in the past few years to expand my range of foods, and it is now a lot, lot better. But I still cannot stomach most sauces, certain foods touching certain other foods (I know, I'm ridiculous) and probably more individual foods than most. I'm really trying, but I can't just grin and bear it and make myself eat something that physically repulses me. Well I could, but I think wretching at the dinner table is the height of bad manners!

And before anyone says how my mother must have pandered to me as a child, she didn't. She made me sit staring at cold food for an hour before I went to bed with no dinner. I don't blame her at all - my siblings all eat normally.

The point of good manners and etiquette is to make the other person feel comfortable, isn't it? picking through your food like the mother of a spoilt toddler isn't really going to achieve that....

Yes but good manners apply to both guest and host. As a host it's good manners not to expect your guests to eat foods they don't like - and I never would.

I am having a dinner party tomorrow - does anyone want to come?

Menu is Naice Ham and Pom Bears

Then Greggs Sausage Rolls in Fruit Shoot sauce

No idea about dessert. Maybe bananas as they are fucking rank.

Naughty, naughty GetDownNesbitt!

I'll come

I am a self confessed fussy eater and can't eat something I don't like - I will vomit! I wish I was able as many of my friends are to be able to eat anything whether they like it or not but I can't

That said, I would certainly not say anything bad about the cooking or make revolting noises through the meal. If I really couldn't eat it I would applogise and explain that I can't eat it. However this rarely happens as most of my friends know what I am like and cater accordingly !!!