To have zero patience with fussy/picky/faddy eaters?

[JudgeyHotPants]

I'm not talking about people with genuine medical conditions that prevent them eating certain foods such as celiacs, but those with a list as long as their arm of various foods that they "don't like" and who try and dictate where you should eat when you go out with them in a group, won't budge and insist on everyone else making allowances to suit their fussiness and then sulk when you don't. Pushing their food around their places passive aggressively with faces like slapped arses.

You might wonder why it bothers me so much but I have several family members like is and eating out with them is a nightmare. We're talking the kind of people who will only eat plain meat and two veg type of stuff and won't touch anything "fancy" or spicey or seasoned with herbs or god forbid anything "foreign". So when you go anywhere with them your restricted to cheap and chearful pub chains or fast food places. When they go abroad they even seak out those hideous places that do full English breakfasts and egg and chips! I find it rude and childish.

I have zero tolerance for this kind of behaviour and am often made out go be the bad guy when I push to go somewhere decent for a meal. But they way I see it your not ill, you don't have an intolerance, your just being a twat. Just shut up and eat it!

AIBU?

YABU in that people can decide for themselves what they do and don't like. to eat. I wouldn't force myself to eat something I know I am not keen on.

I choose not to eat meat - I wouldn't go to a restaurant that didn't offer a non meat option.

There are other things I am not keen on but work roung I am not keen on nuts in my food - I like nuts on their own but not in warm food particularly - no would never choose a nut roast for example - so hopefully that isn't their only veggie option.

And I don't like spicy food very much - but there are often ways round tht. Going for an Indian meal would never be my preferred option for eating. but I will go if everyone else wants to - and choose accordingly.

So YANBU to think that you should be able to have a say in where you choose to eat, in the same way the others do.
But YABU for expecting people to want to eat exactly the same foods as you like.

I am sure there must be the odd food choices you don't enjoy.

Picky/fussy/faddy annoys the shit out of me, limited eating does not.
I can and do eat pretty much anything, and will happily enjoy a McDonald's or chippy or whatever.
So long as you don't moan or whine about the food I don't care at all and would be happy to invite you over and do fishfingers and chips.

My MIL won't eat at restaurants that use garlic.

I use garlic in lots of dishes that MIL has eaten and enjoyed very much at our house. The difference is, I don't write it on a menu and let her read it first!

Apparently CarpetCrawler, coriander tastes very different to a section of the population. It must be how the enzymes react with their saliva (I made that bit up, but it sounds plausible...) or something. You must be one of that section!

I also think you are mixing up "spicy" and "hot" - a korma does have distinctive spices used, they are just not hot spices.

As it is I do eat korma. But avoid some of the other dishes which use other spices which I am not keen on.

But then o the other hand I will eat all manner of fish and seafood and there is little shell fish I won't eat - although I find the taste of octopus unpleasant in general.

Intolerant about intolerance. Gotta love Mumsnet.

I'm severely intolerant to lactose. So much so, that, in the past, I've been sent to the NHS dietician and have NHS prescribed calcium tablets to make up what I can't get through my diet. Do you really think I'd get a hospital referral and a lifelong prescription if I was just faddy?

I'm lucky, it's not an allergy so I won't suffer anaphylactic shock if I eat it by mistake. I won't die, I just feel very unwell. I just get a severe pain in my stomach, a very uncomfortable and bloated belly, trapped wind, and dramatic, body shattering liquid diarrhoea, all within about half an hour of eating it. This diarrhoea can last for up to a day. I feel unwell for a couple of days afterwards.

I'm also unable to eat any very spicy foods, or strong chillies. My stomach just can't handle it any longer. There's an instant pain in my stomach if I overdo it by mistake, or feel obliged to eat something to be polite. It's not that I'm narrow minded or picky - it hurts.

Why should I be forced to eat food that makes me ill or hurts me? It's bizarre to even consider it.

I check all my labels, and explain carefully whenever I eat out. Unfortunately some restaurants are ignorant about the reality of genuine intolerance as many of the posters above and seem surprised when I refuse to eat the food that's covered in butter.

I'm sorry you find it a drag eating with people who have to take care. Imagine how much more of a drag it is to be the person who can't just what they want. It's a pain in the tit in itself. People's attitudes make it far worse.

Stopthefog the OP made it very clear she wasn't talking about people with intolerances and allergies.

Stopthefog that isn't picky or faddy eating. The op clearly stated she wasn't talking about intolerances or allergies.

Thing is OP - you don't have 'zero tolerance' to the fussiness, or else you'd not go along with eating where they want every time. Reassess your reaction, you are actually very accomodating, even if it annoys you like mad.

My solution would be to stop eating out with them, be honest, "I don't like eating out at the same places as you do, let's not go for lunch or dinner, but meet for a coffee and cake." going for 'afternoon tea' with people like this often works, however sadly in my experience, people who won't try anything other than the foods they ate as a child tend to view food as just fuel and that afternoon tea would be a waste of money on an extra meal they didn't 'need'.

And don't go on holiday with them again - or else agree in advance you won't eat as a group as you like different foods and you don't want to eat 'English pub food' when away.

You can stop being quite so tolerant to fussiness. People like this don't get it's a big deal because people have always pandered to them.

As someone with several people in my life with genuine allergies and intolerances to certain foods, I find the "I can't have... " people harder to accomodate. IME - people with alergies try very hard not to let their food problems effect others, whereas people who are fussy are hte ones who are more inclined to think everyone should eat their way or is wrong .

I think that if you have food issues (whether you have a medical problem such as an allergy or intolerance or whether you are an attention-seeking whinyarse) you should try to socialise in ways that don't involve meals. Go to the cinema, or the park, or the beach; meet your friends/family for a shopping trip or a drink or something. Now and again, fine - other people can put up with a dull or proletarian 'plain' meal, or having to cringe in a restaurant as you interrogate the waiters/make faces/spit stuff out/bore on about the state of your bowels occasionally if they want to spend time with you, but it becomes very tiresome if it's a regular thing.

Yes, Solid, it's not the limited diet at all that bothers me, it's the lack of manners surrounding it.

I think I've hit a raw nerve with some posters Behind, it's glaringly obvious now some of them have basically admitted to being picky themslevs.

All Indian food tastes of Corriander ? Really, seriously? Does it fuck!

Stopthefrog - she's not talking about people like you, people who can't eat a range of foods for health reasons, but people who just won't try anything other than a small range of foods and believes their preferences should be the diet of a group and don't see that they are being selfish to always put their preferences first. they tend not to see that because you can eat both X and Y although you prefer Y, if they don't like Y their instance on only eating X with you is rude, because you will eat X, even if you don't like it.

StopThefrog did you even bother to read the OP properly before posting?

Penniechews so everyone else is fussy and your not is what you're trying to say then? I've see all sorts of justifications for fussiness but that one probably takes the biscuit.

Fussy eaters piss me off too. I hate it when a certain friend comes over as I know she'll never like what I offer her as a snack or whatever (unless it's crisps!). I asked if she wanted a Toblerone cookie once and was looked at like this

I'll eat/try anything except liver and olives.

Yes Solid - although sadly, in my experience, fussy eaters don't realise they are being difficult, because usually fussy eaters who've got that way as adults have been pandered to for years. They just don't get that other people would hate to eat their limited way so that's not fun for them to eat out with them.

Also set against that, most genuine allergy suffers are very aware they are being 'difficult' about what they can and can't eat, most likely to suggest non-food based socialising or try to find something on a menu they can eat in a restaurant the rest of the group/family want to go to.

give me a "allergic to chilli, dairy and eggs" person above "why would you want to eat foreign muck?" person any day!

YANBU!

This drives me mad. We have a family member (so sometimes have to go for dinner with them) who will not eat anything fried or cooked with oil/ butter. She won't eat red meat and only free range, organic chicken. She won't eat anything 'spicy' or any kind of dessert. This limits where we can go, it always has to be a place of her choice and she sits there making comments about the food the rest of us eat.

Personally I think it is very attention seeking. People obviously have likes and dislikes but not like this!

Penniechews - not a problem, as long as you'll go to pretty much anywhere for dinner then just ask for yours without the sauce or whatever so everyone else can eat food with moisture sauces!

You are so not being unreasonable. There is nothing worse than pandered to, pampered adults exclaiming 'oh but I can only eat THESE foods'. Actually unless you have a medical reason not to, food is fuel and you CAN eat it. My toddler eats a more varied diet than some adults I've come across.

My only dislikes are cucumber and whipped cream on things.

Attention seeking and silly beyond childhood to have a huge list of dislikes.

I'm a fussy eater, but I do my best not to make a fuss about being a fussy eater. I like what I like and am not going to change because it might annoy others.

I will go to any restaurant and don't insist on specific ones I like if others choose somewhere they like. I just choose something from the menu that I know I will eat.

It only gets slightly difficult if we go for a curry (hate the stuff) and there is nothing else I can eat. My friends are very nice though and generally make sure there is at least a salad I can have. No one makes a fuss, we all just get on with it.

Fussy eaters don't annoy me per se, arguably I am one to a minor extent. Never been to a restaurant and not been able to find at least one thing I like which is on the actual menu.

Fussy eaters who go on and on and on and limit other people's choices as a result do get on my nerves, massively.

YANBU. Fussy eating in an adult is childish and tedious.

I find food bores equally irritating, TBH –you know, 'I'd like this better if they'd cooked it with x spice instead of y spice' or 'It's just a little overcooked for me'. Trying to show off how knowledgeable and sophisticated they are about food. It's just dull.

I remember 'Spicy as Fuck' too. I want to open an MN restaurant called that one day.

YANBU - any dinner with my husband's family is usually tricky - no seafood, no game, no meat which is not well and truly done, nothing vegetarian, no onions, no fruit with meat, no cheeses other than gouda, nothing foreign (including rice),... We always end up having roast pork, boiled potatoes, beans and carrots. Chocolate pudding for dessert.

Oh I remember "spicy as fuck" as well! One thing that struck me as that thread progressed to the "spicy fans revolt", was that the plain food couple still tried to control their friends' night out - after declining the dinner once it became apparent the rest wouldn't back down on eating non-bland food, they arranged post dinner drinks very early so to rush the spicy eaters and limit their enjoyment of the meal.

It did seem on that thread at least, the fussiness was part of someone just used to dictating to the group.

I'm quite happy to go to any restaurant and have the simplest thing on the menu, even if it's just bread, I never complain, I'm content to be there.

It's other people that have a problem with this, because they want me to have the things they enjoy. WEIRD.

I love most puddings, but don't expect others to, I respect the fact that lots of people don't enjoy sweet things.

OP, you obviously feel that people like me are inferior in some way. I'm not.