To ask if anyone else finds food mostly uninteresting?

[JustGettingStarted]

I have a few friends and family who think and talk about food a lot. They watch cookery programs, read restaurant reviews, just generally talk about food with great enthusiasm.

I only think about food when I'm hungry. I often find myself very hungry at awkward times because I forgot to eat when it would have been convenient. When I am hungry, I definitely like my food to be tasty. It's not like I dislike food, I just don't care about it when it's not filling an immediate need.

Once I am full, I will stop eating. I leave most restaurant meals unfinished. But not always - depends on my hunger and the portion size.

One friend of mine talks about what she is planning to eat all the time. We text throughout the day and she always says things like "I need to pick up my dry cleaning on the way home and then I'm going to make a fish pie! :)" Literally every day she tells me what she's thinking of making for dinner. When we eat out together she literally scrapes her plate and then finishes my food. I don't really care because I don't want it, but it just looks odd, somehow. I can tell she's compelled to do it - she said that she simply cannot abide letting food go to waste.

My husband loves cookery programs, especially ones about American diners that specialise in something huge and ridiculous. He reads reviews of top restaurants and fantasizes about winning the lottery and where he'd eat. He talks about food in general and can become emotionally distressed if he doesn't enjoy his food.

On the subject of restaurant critics and cookery books - I'm glad there are people in the world who are passionate about food, because that means there are tasty things to eat when I'm hungry. But it does seem weird to me that there are people so into food and dining that they can make a living from it. Some cookbooks rhapsodise to the point of making my eyes roll. I just want to know how to make the roast - a paragraph about the author's visit to Tuscany and the meal they had at their friend's villa is annoying.

Am I the only person who feels this way?

@BeanTownNancy yeah mainly tomatoes. Totally agree with you though. I'm overweight despite not liking food. It is much easier to have a cheese sandwich or something and chips than it is to make something healthy. I can't even risk cross contamination with the salads at work in case someone has used the same tongs to pick up tomatoes and then put them in the lettuce etc. People are really sloppy serving foods and tend to drop tomato sauces in the cream/cheese sauces so I tend to just eat plain pasta or plain jacket potatoes. Life is very boring!!

Yes! For me it’s more that I enjoy eating and I do have certain foods I really like, but I despise the preparation - food shopping, cooking, choosing ingredients, all that stuff. I’d happily live off packets of astronaut mulch just to avoid ever having to deal with food - being in the supermarket and trying to work out what I need literally gives me anxiety. Sometimes I just stay hungry because I can’t face the thought of preparing food. I’d have a live-in chef if I could afford one

You and I are polar opposites.
Unfortunately my obsession with food, meals and my weight (overweight) has dominated my life.
It is quite fascinating to read your thread OP as I have never encountered anyone like you (not implying you are odd!) and everyone I mix with - family and friends - are food/meal obsessed.
How do you cope with this festive time of the year?

Food is tasteless if you aren't hungry. I don't understand how complicated people make food; restaurant food is too salty.

Oh wow I thought I was the only one! This is literally me, I find every type of food uninteresting and when I am hungry and I have to eat I will be very picky, I’m losing so much weight because of his and don’t wanna be like this

I don't particularly like consuming food and I don't like cooking. (I particularly dislike messy food.) On the plus side, it probably helps keep me slim. We're all different. x

Leila I can’t speak for the OP but for me to something like this:

• I like eating - if someone else has prepared it or I’ve bought it from the takeaway.
• I’d rather stay hungry than have to cook my own food, the consequence of this is I live on ready meals and takeaways and the occasional pre-prepared pot of fruit or salad. When I’ve tried to change my habits and buy fresh ingredients to cook, they end up being thrown away as I don’t know what to do with them, and that’s half of a £50 food shop in the bin.
• I don’t ‘do’ Christmas so have no hosting or cooking to do. If I was in a situation where people were visiting me they’d get birds eye frozen Christmas dinners. I’m not even joking

My stomach is so delicate I don't enjoy food anymore. I can't have gluten, onions, garlic or so many vegetables i can't be arsed.

Same! I have IBD and it's taken all the pleasure out of eating as the foods I enjoy make me ill.
I eat because I have to. But down to only one meal a day. Yet still not shifting any weight!

OMG ME TOO. I was beginning to think I was the only one!

First-world problem, I realise. I also realise I'm fortunate to have enough food to the point where I'm actually complaining there's too much. I do my bit for charity. But with those disclaimers out of the way... I just find it so boring, both cooking myself and eating out. It really irritates me how no one nowadays seems capable of celebrating anything without going for a meal, and the general obsession with food drives me mad. It's actually put some of my friendships under strain because they're food-obsessed and I'd much rather go for a drink and just focus on chatting every so often than go for a meal Every Single Bloody Time we meet up.

Admittedly I have some anxiety issues that turn eating in front of others into a trial, and that doesn't help. But it's not just that. It's the sheer ubiquity of food, food outlets, food programmes, agh make it stop! It's just so boring to me.

TBH I often wish food was something people could choose whether or not they wanted to consume for pleasure, a bit like alcohol or sweets/chocolate/cakes etc, rather than it being a daily necessity. Think how much time we'd all have free to do the things we really enjoyed if we didn't have to spend so much time thinking about, preparing and eating food every single day!

So no, YANBU, OP.

It's acceptable to be fascinated about food going in, but if you're fascinated by the bodily functions of food going out, you're a weirdo. hmm

I love this!

Are the people who are saying its just fuel and will eat what's in front of them actually just lazy and uninspirstional at cooking? Do you know how to cook?

What a tedious assumption. I can cook and I'm good at it. It just bores the crap out of me.

@sanityisamyth

And tomato seeds are absolutely the worst. They stick to everything! If someone has chopped a tomato, the seeds could be stuck to their hands/gloves, knives, and especially the little grooves in the chopping boards. Then they do the lettuce and the seeds all go in that!

IMO tomato is the worst allergy to have nowadays. It's not one of the ones people are aware of or have to make adjustments for, and tomatoes are in everything. Some days I spend ages scouring allergy menus in restaurants just to find something to eat. 🤦🏻‍♀️

Are the people who are saying its just fuel and will eat what's in front of them actually just lazy and uninspirstional at cooking? Do you know how to cook?

I admit that this probably is me. It isn’t a priority.

Luckily dh is the opposite.

Just saying..... depression and low mood can lead to either over or under eating.

I have zero appetite at the moment. Survive on yoghurt and porridge and milk. My mum died a fortnight ago, so I am sure that has something to do with it.

Not looking forward to all the food that will be about at this time. I am just about surviving on little, and couldn't care less.

I agree with the80sweregreat too - ideally it could be like a Charlie and the Chocolate factory pill that tastes of food, but tbh would be more than happy to just have a tasteless pill than provides you with your nutritional needs, 5 seconds and that's that!

It's just the constant faff of planning, shopping, cooking, and then cleaning up - hours spent on every meal that takes a few minutes to eat. Such a waste of time, money and effort!

I'm the same OP, I can't imagine watching a cooking channel, which some of my friends will do all evening.

I find this time of year particularly weird with the particular things that people feel they must have etc etc. Don't really get it.

I do have a sweet tooth, trying to get rid of it. I used to enjoy cooking but now just find it really tedious.

Yes me, I’m really not interested in it. DH and his parents love their food and despair that I don’t. When we go out for dinner it has to be were they serve ‘pub grub’ rather than anywhere ‘fancy’.

DH is doing Christmas dinner with all these extras, I’d rather have pizza!

Me! A bit, anyway. Interestingly I used to be completely unbothered about food but once I had to limit it a bit (saw a PT and counted my calories) I thought about it a lot more.

In general though I find the whole thing a massive hassle. Would happily just take a pill. I freely admit I am a shit cook though. Even if someone else cooks for me through unless they do all the planning and all the washing up then I would still find it a hassle.

Combine that with starting an exercise regime needing more protein and I am bored out of my mind with the whole thing.

I am almost the opposite to you OP although I dont really enjoy cooking, probably because my kids dont appreciate nice food. As one other poster said, my interest in food has probably increased due to jumping on the whole dieting bandwagon in my teens. I love food, but am happy with takeaways, simple things. If I couldn't eat a lot of my favourite things for medical reasons, for example, if I suddenly turned diabetic, I'm sure I would lose some interest, especially if that made food harder in terms of me having to cook more. It would certainly stop the whole comfort eating, seeing food as a treat element. I think as a society we have become more obsessed with food and unfortunately, most humans are naturally greedy, maybe its the whole survival of the fittest thing. I always imagine that if I didn't like food much, I would be a perfect size 8 but I guess it doesn't always work like that.

I can cook but I hate it (the obligation of providing food every evening). Not bothered about eating either.

I do enjoy breakfast possibly because there is no cooking involved!

I am like this to an extent. I am not interested in cooking although I can cook perfectly well. I am permanently starving and live on cereal and toast. Having said that, I like really good restaurant food (not pub all you can eat style) but I only eat out like that once or twice a year so I appreciate nice food but can’t be arsed shopping, preparing it and cooking.

I know two people who never eat meals, just snack/graze all day long so when we have a works do they don’t eat the meal, they just watch everyone else.

I'm like you OP. Food is when i'm hungry and don't think about it before that. Obviously as a mum i have to plan meals for the dc but find that thought process very difficult and get annoyed when people ask, "what are we eating at X?", find it really irritating.

Its quite intriguing listening to people who really enjoy food as a topic, analysing it, dissecting every detail.

I had a friend like this; she said she’d honestly prefer to just take a tablet and not have to bother about eating a meal.

I’m not obsessive over the detail of food, and will quite happily throw together a quick easy meal most nights, but I think I’d really feel I was missing out if i just had a pill 3 times a day instead of a meal

I'm a fussy eater. However, I enjoy cookery books with pictures, recipes, YouTube, internet sites. I'm not obsessive, but I like to dip in and out. I've recently started eating cous cous. I like to talk to people about food, it's a good conversation point.

I also know a few chefs, so I like to share my meal photos and stories from my travels too

I would cheerfully swop cooking and eating for a pill or two a day. It's tedious and repetitive (that goes for food shopping too) and now I'm retired there are far more interesting things to do!