Aquired Tastes... (Abilene, Howe: condo, eat, dinner)

[JamesAbilene]

Things I didn't like at first but have learned to love and now eat all of the time or like to eat when I can:

Fried oysters, chicken livers (fried or broiled), coffee, soft-shelled crab

Things I can't stand even though I have given them more than one try:

Raw oysters, peanut butter (except in candy or cookies), rabbit, frog in a stew or rue (I can tolerate the fried legs)

Things I liked from the first time I ate them that others don't like:

Jalopeno peppers, buttermilk and cornbread, calf fries

[hellpaso]

i think i'll pass on the calf fries. but i drink about a quart of buttermilk a day, and boy, do i love my fried chicken livers. and oysters anyway i can get them. my husband cringes on those special days i not only have buttermilk, but also fresh cornbread--

[MaryS80]

Originally Posted by TexasReb

I enjoyed reading -- and got a kick out of --reading this post! ESPECIALLY the "frito pie" part of it! LOL (psssst? Mary...don't keep us in suspense. Did you actually MAKE it that way? *grins*).

Anyway, you are pretty correct, I think, although I never really considered it before, that yeah, a lot of tradtional "Southern" style food WOULD be part of "culture shock" to many not from the region.

So far as chitlins go? Interesting. Although while white and black Southerners dine on most of the same fare (called "soul" in the North, and just plain "home-style" or "comfort" or "country cookin" in the South) I think chitlins are truly more a dividing point. I feel safe in saying, if you were to put a 100 native black and white Texans/Southerners in the same community kitchen and tell everyone to whomp up your own speciality, that when it was all said and done, all would, black and white, dig into pretty much the same creations.

The exception being chitlins...where things might -- good naturedly of course -- "segregate"! LOL

I almost made it that way, thank god I asked him first. He said he wanted Frito pie, and he explained to me that it wasn't actually a pie.

I grew up with things strange to Texans like Pork and Sauerkraut for New Years Dinner.

[Pontificator]

My Dad loved buttermilk & cornbread. And my sweetie loves.....FRITOS and buttermilk.

[SamKen]

My last meal would consist of chicken fried steak, cornbread, mashed potatoes, and green beans. A Texas staple.

I introduced my Kentucky friend to chicken fried steak when she came to visit. She'd had "chicken friend steak" before, but not the Texas version. You know you're getting Texas Chicken Fried Steak when steak comes in its own plate, while the sides come in a totally separate plate.

I laugh when I hear about a vegetarian in Texas. Then I just feel sorry for them.


Being that I am hispanic, food like barbecoa and gorditas are some of my favorites. You can get some pretty good enchiladas at restaurants, but there not how grandma makes em. Mmmmm, mmmm. I never did get into Menudo though.

[TexasHorseLady]

Cabrito. Love cabrito.

[SamKen]

Originally Posted by TexasHorseLady

Cabrito. Love cabrito.

We have that during Easter at the ranch.

[lonestar2007]

Originally Posted by TexasHorseLady

I'll likewise pass on the chitlins, grits, and liver. (And I qualify on the "been here forever" category - we've been here since before Texas was Texas.) That's more of a southern thing, maybe a bit of east Texas (though I grew up in East Texas and never ate them).

I thought everybody ate their watermelon with salt, just to bring out the flavor? Except when you go out in the watermelon patch and break one open and just eat it there, warm from the sun, that is.

In Hawaii, touring the pineapple fields, they taught us to salt our pineapple. I never had done that before - BOY, what a difference it makes, it doesn't taste salty, it just tastes more like pineapple!

I'll pass on the chitlins and grits and any liver with the exception of fried chicken livers, now those I like, especially with red beans and mexican cornbread. I also like cracklings, the fresh ones especially, but hard to come by unless you're at a hog killing. Otherwise a bag of pork skins will have to do.

I thought everyone put salt on watermelon, that's how I grew up eating it. When we were kids and heading out to the watermelon field, we'd carry a salt shaker with us. Bust the melon on the ground, salt it and eat the heart out and get another one! I know it sounds wasteful, but we fed all we didn't eat to the hogs. I put salt on everything, watermelon, fresh peaches, apples, grapefruit, beer, you name it. I have never put salt on pineapple for some reason, always ate the fresh ones either plain or with sugar sprinkled on. I bet the salt would make them taste better, it always seems brings out more flavor in anything sweet. Thanks, THL, I'll do this next time.

I never got to where I liked buttermilk, although I finally got to where I could drink fresh milk and eat real butter (the homemade kind, we kids churned it). I have chickens and we eat fresh eggs, they are so different from store bought and it takes a bit of getting use to.

I love sweet milk with cornbread crumbled up into it. That's as close as I can come to buttermilk with cornbread in it. I like buttermilk for cooking only, to bake with and to let chicken, round steaks, etc. soak in before breading and frying.

I like beans, such as red beans, butterbeans, but just never liked peas much. I made myself eat blackeyed peas on New Year's although I can't tell it's ever brought any good luck. Finally got to where I liked them and now eat them and purplehulls throughout the year, although still not as much as red beans.

[case44]

Originally Posted by TexasHorseLady

Cabrito. Love cabrito.

There's another one right there. I've only had it one time but I did enjoy it very much. I do remember that it was salty.

[lonestar2007]

I forgot about sweetbread. I never would have thought I'd like it, but I did. Of course the guys cooking had put a lot of work into cleaning and preparing it, had all the yucky stuff removed, look like backstrap and tasted as good too. That's something I could eat my weight, the backstrap of a deer, mmm, panfried w/cream gravy, nothing better. At the same cookout they also had goat (cabrito) and calf fries. I like cabrito and although I like the flavor of calf fries, the texture throws me off, so I generally avoid them.

All this talk of food I had to put a pot of red beans on this morning and fixing to make cornbread. I don't know if this was an aquired taste or not, we were started on it at such a young age, I just always remembered eating it and it's still one of my favorite meals, especially with panfried potatoes which to me are a must with this meal. Now I did have to aquire a taste for squash and to this day I can only eat yellow crookneck and it has to be fried (sliced very thin with lots of cornmeal on it) and sugar sprinkled on it just before you bring it out of the skillet.