AliceLidl I'm with your dad. I can't imagine not putting vinegar and oil on lettuce and other salad stuff.
I grew up with a lovely mum who was a really good cook, but very plain.
She had very strict rules on what was acceptable with her food and what wasn't.
She thought any kind of condiment was an insult to her cooking and would sulk a bit if you transgressed.
She allowed salt but banned pepper and any fruit with meat - so no apple sauce with pork or cranberry on turkey.
We were later allowed apple sauce because I learned to make it school and my teacher raved about it at a parents' evening - especially my experiments with cloves and cinnamon.
That was okay with my mum because it had been endorsed by an educational expert.
She allowed mint sauce from an ancient jar because my dad insisted on it. I can't face mint sauce because she used to just top the jar up with vinegar. It looked like tea leaves with vinegar.
I'm willing to believe that mint sauce with lamb is lovely. But not vinegar with roast lamb, so I can't get over it.
Mustard was WRONG as was red sauce because it was made from tomatoes which are WRONG.
Brown sauce was okay. Mainly because my brother ignored her and ate it with everything.
Salt and vinegar was just about okay on your own fish and chips from the shop but you could tell by the look in her eyes that it wasn't really. As was anything other than cod.
I always tried to get her to try a McDonald's Filet-O-Fish. It had all the things she liked: sweetish yet bland bun, breaded fish and a slice of bland, processed cheese.
Yes, there was some tartare sauce, which was obviously WRONG but we could have asked for a sachet on the side and she could have experimented.
She was implacable. I really think she died without experiencing a taste sensation. But you can take a horse to water...
I have never eaten bread sauce. It was also on my mum's long list of WRONG THINGS.