Tricked! When foodie tendencies betray you

[canucklehead]

As a counter point to the thread of tricking your non-foodie friends, I wanted to ask - when have your foodie tendencies got you tricked.

As an example - my desire for tasty treats started very young.

My parents had flown down with me to Disneyland when I was about 8 years old - and for some reason, all of the rides scared the crap out of me. Here were my poor parents who had planned this big trip - but were stuck with a ungrateful sacrdy-cat.

Finally - to trick me onto something - they got me into the lineup for the Haunted Mansion by telling me it was the line up to a delicous buffet... mmmm I thought... thinking of fried chicken and mashed potatoes and ice cream.... I did not clue into the fact that it was NOT a restaurant until we were in the scary elevator. Tricked by my own greedy stomach!

My parents did know best though - the ride broke the ice and I wanted to ride everything after that. 2 years of therapy have allowed me to forgive my parents.

[Mooshmouse]

Nothing to add to this thread, but I'm glad that you posted this absolutely hilarious story... you had us all in stitches at lunch today!

[Ling]

Oh man, I'll have to think of a story later to post, but I just wanted to add that I was probably the only kid who hated the food at buffets (like Uncle Willy's). It tasted horrible to me. I usually just stuck with bowl after bowl of soft-serve ice-cream. At least that was slightly better than that dry fried chicken slowly fossilizing under those heat lamps.

My mom did used to ply me with "weird" treats--like bird's nest soup. I got bird's nest soup with cream when I got good grades! And whenever it was my turn to choose what kind of soup we would have for dinner, I always asked for fish maw (but not the cheap kind. My mom tried to trick me by buying the cheap kind once and I got grumpy b/c I had been looking forward to good fish maw all day. Not that I knew it was cheap...I just whined, "This doesn't taste like the fish maw we had LAST TIME!!!" I was the biggest curmudgeon. Well, I still am, actually. )

Edited October 20, 2005 by Ling (log)

[Kevin72]

I got sucked into the "We're Going to McDonalds!" ploy a few times as a kid when a doctor's visit was due. Sure enough, we would go to McDs, but only after a booster shot on the way.

[petite tête de chou]

When I was about 4 years old my Dad "tricked" me into eating my spinach by flexing his muscles and telling me that if I ate my greens I would get muscles like him AND Popeye (my favorite cartoon character at the time). Who knows why this promise of bulging muscles worked on this girl-child but it did.

[daniellewiley]

It wasn't really my gourmet tendency that led to this trickery, but it is food-related, so I'll share...

My older cousin Dan used to trick me and my brother into drinking milk. He'd hold up his arm as if to make a muscle, but he wouldn't flex his bicep right away. He'd use his other hand to hold a glass of milk, and as he drank the milk, he'd flex his muscle, making it look like the milk was causing the muscle to grow dramatically, and immediately in size!

David and I BOTH fell for this trickery!!

[Smithy]

When I was about 4 years old my Dad "tricked" me into eating my spinach by flexing his muscles and telling me that if I ate my greens I would get muscles like him AND Popeye (my favorite cartoon character at the time). Who knows why this promise of bulging muscles worked on this girl-child but it did. 

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You're not the only one! Popeye was also my inspiration for eating spinach, for the same reasons. Mom thought it a bit odd, but she wasn't about to wreck a good thing by questioning it.

I still like canned spinach...it's one of my guilty secrets around the house, for an easy dinner, when nobody's looking.

[petite tête de chou]

When I was about 4 years old my Dad "tricked" me into eating my spinach by flexing his muscles and telling me that if I ate my greens I would get muscles like him AND Popeye (my favorite cartoon character at the time). Who knows why this promise of bulging muscles worked on this girl-child but it did. 

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You're not the only one! Popeye was also my inspiration for eating spinach, for the same reasons. Mom thought it a bit odd, but she wasn't about to wreck a good thing by questioning it.

I still like canned spinach...it's one of my guilty secrets around the house, for an easy dinner, when nobody's looking.

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I love canned spinach too! Popeye certainly wasn't pulling out a bag of pre-washed spinach and a hot skillet.

[Kim Shook]

When I was 4 years old (1963), my uncle showed me that the can of peas said "English" on them and told me that they were the kind the Beatles ate - I choked them down for a couple of years before I wised up. Still don't eat the nasty little boogers.

Edited October 21, 2005 by Kim Shook (log)

[canucklehead]

I just wanted to share another quick story about a co-worker and how foodie tendencies can lead one astray.

He went on a singles' cruise to make new friends and hopefully meet someone special. When he came back - we asked for pictures from the trip and all he had were copies of the menus. He thought the food so great and all he did was eat and eat and eat... in fact he gained so much weight - he went up two shoe widths!

Ah - the tyranny of the stomach.

[lesfen]

Not really trickery, but definitely mean.

My parents didn't really have much money when I was growing up so we didn't get many "bought" treats. When we would travel anywhere in the car and pass a McDonalds or a custard stand we would always ask, "Mmooommm... can we get some (McDonalds/ice cream/candy)? Plllleeeeaaaaase???" Her reply... "No, but wave as we go by." What the hell? To... this... day I still give a sad, half-hearted wave whenever I pass a custard stand and she still tells us to do it if we're in the car with her.

[monavano]

My parents told me I'd get worms if I ate too much sugar (or, not wash my hands in the bathroom). Specifically, this was in reference to a treat which had a sour-sugar wand, that you licked and dipped it in a flavored sugar pouch. Can't remember the name of it, but think "Pixie stix".

[M.X.Hassett]

My parents told me I'd get worms if I ate too much sugar  (or, not wash my hands in the bathroom). Specifically, this was in reference to a treat which had a sour-sugar wand, that you licked and dipped it in a flavored sugar pouch. Can't remember the name of it, but think "Pixie stix".

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I used to love those things problem is I always ate the suger stick before the powder was gone.

[Mooshmouse]

My parents told me I'd get worms if I ate too much sugar  (or, not wash my hands in the bathroom). Specifically, this was in reference to a treat which had a sour-sugar wand, that you licked and dipped it in a flavored sugar pouch. Can't remember the name of it, but think "Pixie stix".

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Lik 'Em Stix is what they were called here. I loved them too.

[Ling]

When I was about 4 years old my Dad "tricked" me into eating my spinach by flexing his muscles and telling me that if I ate my greens I would get muscles like him AND Popeye (my favorite cartoon character at the time). Who knows why this promise of bulging muscles worked on this girl-child but it did. 

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Yeah...I didn't like snow peas as a kid. My mom tricked me into eating them by saying, "If you eat snow peas, you'll grow up to be as beautiful as Snow White!"

Oh man...I must've been a vain girl.

[Pan]

Yeah...I didn't like snow peas as a kid. My mom tricked me into eating them by saying, "If you eat snow peas, you'll grow up to be as beautiful as Snow White!"

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And it worked.

I can't think of anything in my past that's really analogous to the tales you all have told, but....When I was a little kid, I didn't like any part of the chicken except the skin and giblets (I wouldn't eat the meat), and my mother thought that was unhealthy, so she snuck little cubes of white meat into soup she fed to me. She thought she was tricking me, but when I realized what she was doing, I didn't care because the soup tasted good to me.

[Kent Wang]

I was too smart of a kid to be tricked!

[tsquare]

I was too smart of a kid to be tricked!

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what happened?

[Kent Wang]

what happened?

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Beer, wine and spirits. I'm quite easily tricked by Lady Liquor.

[canucklehead]

I was too smart of a kid to be tricked!

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what happened?

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BAM BAM!

[mjg]

As a fussy 4-year-old, I refused to eat vegetables. I also had an unhealthy obsession with dinosaurs. My dad, in a wily attempt to get me to eat my veggies, said "Look at how big a brontosaurus is...all it eats is vegetables!" To which I replied, "Look at how big a T-Rex is...all it eats is brontosaurus!"

My dad never tried to trick me into eating veg again.

[BeJam]

I'm not allowed to use the word "tuna" in reference to tuna steaks with my niece. She wouldn't eat it if she knew. My sister says she won't lie to her kids, but its ok if Uncle Bode does.

And for some reason my friends dad used to tell us as 8 year olds that pickle brine was made with sheep pee. To keep us from drinking it, maybe??? We weren't tricked.

I don't think I was being tricked, but my 80 year old neighbor who was bordering on dimentia at the time used to bring me plates of spagetti with thin, very wierd bones still in the sauce. They weren't chicken, they weren't beef, they weren't fish. ??? She told me one time that she would substitute canned tuna for beef when she cooked spagetti for her nephew and older brother because they would never know. They were tricked, but those small bones? Luckily she just gave me the plate and instructed me to return it empty later.

[jm chen]

I was a picky eater as a child and one of the things I hated most was ham salad. My enterprising older brother once stuffed ham salad into a french fry and covered it with ketchup, tricking me into consuming the fry and the ham salad inside.

If you're wondering how I could have possibly missed the bump of ham salad, well, I liked ketchup a lot and I was far, far too trusting.

[I_call_the_duck]

I must have mentally blocked out all the times I've been tricked or I just ate everything, because I'm still trying to remember if any of my family members tricked me into eating something.

But I did trick my older brother into eating sand. Back in the 70s, my sister made these terrariums that had different colored sand to make these pretty designs. One day we were putting sand in little baggies to take to school for an art project. Since we sometimes took some Nestles Strawberry Quik to school to add to our milk at lunch, I told my brother that the pink sand was Quik. He proceeded to lick his finger, dip it into the sand and taste it. I still remember him spitting it out in disgust!

[JennyUptown]

To get me to eat the crusts on bread, my mother used to tell me that doing so "might" turn my green/brown/hazel eyes blue. I REALLY wanted blue eyes like my Dad's. I'm still waiting...