Picky guest. Rude and ill-mannered or within his rights?

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Gah. I am throwing a themed dinner party for friends from a particular interest. (A bit like a medieval feast for people from a 12th Century interest group.) The menu is complicated and of the 'Take one plucked flamingo' school of recipes. It's a massive deal and will require military-like organisation to pull off but I'm looking forward to it.

It's at my house but I have a co-host. The partner of the co-host will not eat anything on the menu. There are four options for starter, five for main course, four for pudding. My co-host tells me he eat won't eat any of them.

He's not vegetarian or allergic, he just doesn't like vegetables or anything 'complicated'. I've been asked to serve a plain chicken breast. The menu includes a roast chicken salad (offensive because of watercress) and a plain couscous.

I think it's rude. AIBU?

"the actual evidence," not "actually evidence."

TheNewStatesman regardless of whether that's true, you don't give "therapy" to someone without their consent

There's also a difference between controlled exposure and just throwing someone into a situation they find terrifying while shouting I'M BEING HELPFUL

Email / text back
"I was just laughing over your text again last night - when it suddenly occurred to me that you might not be joking ...sudden moment of horror ! but its a dinner party - not a restaurant - so if you could just let your partner know that the only "Off menu" choice - I'm providing is "sitting in the car with a sandwich from the garage, and thats only providing you buy your own sandwich" anyway must go ...just off to boil some peacocks"

"TheNewStatesman regardless of whether that's true, you don't give "therapy" to someone without their consent

There's also a difference between controlled exposure and just throwing someone into a situation they find terrifying while shouting I'M BEING HELPFUL"

?????

Erm, what do you imagine the OP would be doing--tying him down and force-feeding him spicy lentils?

He has a choice, either eat some of the food she provides or eat nothing and buy some chips on the way home. His decision.

Do you have any actual evidence that this man considers non-plain-chicken-breast food to be "terrifying"?

Now I'm hungry.

Completely pointless post, I know, but honestly looking at that menu - I really am hungry!

Kintsugi

"Just out of curiosity, if you did happen to be a 12th century peasant whose only food was pottage 3 times a day then what the hell did you do if you had sensory issues around lumpy food say, would you starve or do the issues disappear if you're starving, in the true sense of the word?"

I honestly dont think that was an issue. I think the real choice was between eating or not, it was not between selecting whatever you thought you might be able to ear. I do believe this fussyness is a modern day first world affliction.

eat, not ear.

TheNewStatesman, no, I was just pointing out how your point that exposure helps fears is kind of irrelevant here.

Can people stop saying fussiness is a modern thing? Myself and others have provided links that explain the conditions that can cause these symptoms. Don't invalidate them.

Think you'd be better banging your head against a brick wall lashes. You're just fussy - grow up .

Alternatively you have a recognised diagnosed condition which meets the definition of a disability. There's lots of things we recognise and understand which we didn't in the 12th century-all forms of medicine have advanced hugely. You wouldn't say that, say, epilepsy wasn't real but it wasn't recognised properly until relatively recently. It's like the people who insist nut allergies aren't real because they never existed in the past...we just didn't understand them. Ditto huge swathes Of Mental Health Or neurological or developmental conditions.

And before a hoard of people post saying this dude's just a fussy fucker-maybe he is and maybe he isn't. You don't know. And most of the ruder posts about fussiness show no interest in differentiating anyway.

I dont go mountain-biking with dh and his mates. I dont have the skills.

Neither do I join dh on the highest peaks when he climbs mountains.

I suffer from hayfever, so this also restricts what I can do.

So, why again must this person who has decided he cant take part fully in the event, have to join in?

Statistically I think that is the best post of the thread

So, why again must this person who has decided he cant take part fully in the event, have to join in?

Exactly this.

Posted too soon!

Exactly this. Why the actual fuck would someone want to come to something and then sit there with a face on because they didn't like what was being done/eaten/discussed/whatever?

This particular person I've said was unreasonable to ask in this situation I've got no problem with those comments. The ones that I have a definite issue with are the "no food issues in Africa /12th century/first world issue/modern affliction/fussy folk are just overgrown toddlers " type crap which are being spouted with no attempt to differentiate or worse with the clear intention of trying to invalidate recognised diagnosed conditions.

statistic - how much do you know about food intolerances being rife in the 12th century, where there were no additives, no chemically enhanced food, no vitamin tablets, no diet drinks, aspartame, sweets, crisps, chocolate in abundance, artificial sweeteners and flavouring, paracetamol, ibuprofen, over and not so much over the counter medicines in use, along with antibiotics and all sorts of pollution?

Because I really think it IS a modern day issue, created by a way of life which we cant turn away from, and that is causing havoc with our bodies.

Quint you forgot to add vaccines cause autism to your list

I think SGB has a good point, this isn't someone with SEN issues, this is someone who doesn't like food - I've met them (my mum has this tendancy too) and they genuinely tend to think other people are the odd ones. (this is very different to people with allergies, I've yet to meet an allergy sufferer who didn't think catering to avoid their allergy was big deal, they get it. I've met lots of fussy adults who really can't see that catering for their limited palate is difficult/limiting).

People who don't really like food or flavours do tend to think they are the normal ones, and tend to make a fuss about other people eating things they don't like. Even if they don't say anything, pulling faces and sneering is very common with food haters.

That said, as I said earlier, I don't think if you go back to say 12th century, you wouldn't find any fussy eaters amongst the poor, but they wouldn't be adults, they'd have died in infanthood. It was only the ones who could cope with the limited diet that would thrive. In the same way, no, you don't find many people with serious gag reflex issues in refugee camps, it's not that such people only exisit amongst Westerners, it's that they don't live long.

I'd tell him to bring a cheese sarnie.

I just think food was CLEANER and more pure "in the old days", much less to react to! You ate your meat/fish that was cooked over the fire or on the stove, you had your steamed veg and potatoes on the side. Fresh, local, organic, and without additives.

Could environmental causes be contributing to make these things more of an issue in the 21st century? Sure. Is that what your original comment said or implied? Not even remotely. "I think the real choice was between eating and not. It was not between selecting what you thought you might be able to eat. I do believe this fussyness is a modern day first world affliction "
that's not saying the additives in the modern lifestyle could have made issues more common now. That's saying that if we were living in a world with little choice of food we'd eat whatever was there. Implying it's not a real problem just fussyness.

A pedant writes: only peasants in South America had potatoes in the 12th century. Also, very few others would have been eating steamed veg. Most people would have eaten a lot of pottage, ie vegetable stew made with lots of vegetables like cabbage and onions harvested in autumn and stored for the winter, eked out with beans, lentils and so on, with tiny fragments of meat for flavour, all served with heavy, very chewy wholewheat bread.

My own view, like DinosaursRoar, is that anyone with such severe sensory issues that they couldn't eat the food on offer would have died early in childhood.

You can take from it what you want. I dont believe that people back then deliberated much about what they ate, they ate the food that was available, and for some it was a scarce resource. They did not even have to consider food intolerances, I dont think.

But there will always be somebody who takes exception to something being said on a thread because it offends THEIR OWN circumstances, even when something else is discussed entirely.

I have catered for friends with severe IBS, food allergies and intolerances, GF free and dairy free diets, and friends whose religions dictate their diet, and this is not a problem. The problem, which is discussed here, is a rude person who wants to take part in a food event, where there is nothing he wants to eat.

Those of you on the thread who do have issues around food - would you go to an event like this in the first place? Bearing in mind that it is all about complicated, unfamiliar food which will contain tastes and textures that distress you, and also that it is being held by and for your partner's hobby group, pertaining to an interest you don't share?

Because the polite, considerate, sensible thing to do in these circumstances is to wish your partner a lovely evening and stay at home.

I do get that it can be upsetting to feel excluded from things, and if your friends always want to socialise in ways that will impact on whatever issues you have then maybe it's time for new friends, but there does seem to be a growing tendency for people with issues to insist on barging their way in everywhere and having everything rearranged for their benefit, when there are times you have to accept that you can't join in, the event is not about you, and fucking suck it up.

Epic read. Nothing to say that hasn't already been said on the main topic. Wanted to add:

drool