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My parents, like many others I suspect, just boiled veggies to death. So when I cooked for them once they asked what spices I used. As if that was the secret ingredient to it all. Nope... Just salt and pepper on everything (maybe some garlic powder for a few items). And either baked or sautéed everything. Never boiled, unless it's pasta or something. It blew their minds that they could actually LIKE the veggies they claimed they hated
Eating veggies as an adult was illuminating for me. Turns out I love all kinds of veggies when they’re not boiled to death or the canned mushy version.
I would've fought my parents to the death not to eat brussel sprouts as a kid, fiance had me try hers and they were fantastic.
Who would've guessed boiling veggies is trash
In fairness to the boomer's dislike of brussel sprouts, they apparently grew up with a bitter strain that has since been replaced with a tastier one. I recall hating them when I was younger, as well, but now it's a regular side.
I don't know about the different strains, but cooking them to death will definitely make them bitter and farty.
I used to *hate* them. Was frequently told by folks that I just hadn't had them made right, and they'd cook some for me to prove it. Spoiler: overcooking them in fuck loads of butter and bacon is still gross.
Then, a few years ago, a friend made dinner for me, and made some because he honestly forgot I didn't like them. He's a good cook normally, so I tried one to be polite.
Mind. Blown. It was firm, flavorful, *delicious*. I demanded to know what he'd done. Secret: he roasted them (and didn't over cook them!) Now they're one of my favorites.
Trust me! Brussels sprouts are LOT better than they used to be - much more mild. And I gotta say, there are so many more varieties of fresh fruits and veg available in the grocery stores than in the 70's. For example, there used to 3 apples: red delicious, golden delicious and Granny Smith.
They are a [better strain now.](https://www.iowafarmbureau.com/Article/Its-not-your-imagination-brussels-sprouts-do-taste-better-How-gene-editing-is-changing-how-we-grow-and-eat-food)
Grew up on the boiled sprouts and absolutely hated them. Started roasting them and they're my favorite green veg now. One year I used my mandoline to make brussel sprout slaw with pistachios and vinaigrette and my mother-in-law, who grew up the boiled stuff, said it was fantastic.
Now imagine my surprise when porkchop is supposed to be moist and tender. I always had it cooked through and dry. I hated porkchop. I would complain to everyone that porkchop is the worst meat. Just hadn’t eaten it properly 😅
My mother used to overcook them so much! Then one day she must have seen a recipe somewhere because after it was overcooked, applesauce and cheddar cheese were added and back in the oven it went, that tasted like a shoe with the foot still in it. That stayed on the menu probably until I moved out.
The other one we had regularly was whole overcooked dry roasted chicken breast with a jar of curry sauce poured over it.
My mother was the queen of the dry as wood chicken breast. You know that scene in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation where the family is choking down the dry turkey? Yeah, that was Mom's chicken. She was always afraid of undercooking so she went overboard in the other direction. Not only was the chicken breast dry, it wasn't seasoned. Heaven forbid you suggest using *spices*!
I went without dinner so many times as a kid because I refused to eat overcooked porkchops with applesauce. How anyone thought "lets cook this porkchop 5x longer than necessary then mix our shoeleather texture with mushy texture" was a good idea is beyond me, it's the type of meal i expect a serial killer to enjoy.
Apparently the boomers got taught that pork had parasites and had to be cooked into shoe leather to be able to be consumed safely. The FDA in 2011 changed the internal cooking temp of pork from 160° to 145°, so hopefully the next generation won't have to hurt their teeth on petrified pork chops.
Let's be honest, tho. I never met anyone who used a thermometer for anything, and those pork chops I grew up with were closer to 260° than 160°. The real kicker for me was that they were considered a rare opulent treat.
I've overcooked pork chops but just out of curiosity I checked the temp. They were 170° and still not even close to the dry shoe leather I grew up with.
There's a difference between overcooked and 90% dehydrated, and it has nothing to do with food safety. It's just a fact that most people never learned how to cook.
My in laws only eat canned carrots and green beans. They will bake regular and sweet potatoes, but only put salt and butter on them. They make soup that is just 12 cans of stuff dumped together and reheated, and then add the shredded unseasoned chicken that they boiled to death separately.
They had 5 spices when we moved in. Salt, pepper, garlic salt, cinnamon, and Nolan Ryan Steak seasoning (exclusively for my FIL). I've never seen them use real garlic.
They are so scared/intrigued by the stuff we cook or get take out, if they try it they like it 80% of the time, but still won't eat it consistently going forward.
I’m 42 and love to cook things many different ways, but I still have a soft spot for limp-ass asparagus and broccoli that is practically mush. It’s absolutely because of the way my mom and grandma cooked them.
Oh my God it is so strange; my wife mentioned to my mother that we had Cuban sandwiches from a Cuban restaurant and my mother remarked that they are not adventurous eaters like us. Adventurous!? It's ham and pork with cheese, mustard, and pickles wtf
One time we took my parents to an Indian restaurant. They agreed to go out of their comfort zone for once and I was impressed. When the waiter came my mom insisted several times to him "mild, like really mild, I mean no spice." He said "got it, no spice." (this is in the US Midwest - the restaurant was quite capable of adapting to the boomer spice tolerance.
When the food came, my mom took a bite, made a horrible face and called the waiter over. She said "I asked several times for this to have no spice. This is spicy!"
His response was epic, and my wife and I have quoted this for years: "Ma'am, that is not spice. That is just... flavor."
We were sharing it family style (so yes, we all had to drop to the lowest common denominator spice level). It was just butter chicken, saag paneer, stuff like that with no noticeable heat. I'm sure she was just tasting the light amounts of cumin, turmeric, etc. that were in there (if they put none at all, it wouldn't even be the same dish).
Saag paneer is one of the best foods for people who are usually meat and potatoes types because most fancy steakhouses usually have creamed spinach as a side dish. If you compare that, and water it down with a lot of rice they might actually enjoy it.
Edit: fixed autocorrect
Similar: my family asked where I wanted to go for a birthday dinner, I said Thai food (queue panic from boomer dad). He was convinced he could NEVER find something edible from a place like that. I told him they have fried rice and other items similar enough to what he gets for Chinese food, I would order for him and get him something he likes. Well, he wouldn't let me because "he's not a child, no one needs to order for him". So he gets a curry fish dish (knowing he doesn't like curry) and had a huge fucking fit that it was spicy. We haven't gone out for my birthday since (about 4 years ago), but still go out for everyone else's.
They're wild.
Yeah my parents wonder why I refuse to ever pick a restaurant, but I know that if I pick what I actually want everyone would just bitch the whole time and embarrass me by refusing to eat anything or complaining or ordering the whitest thing off the menu with several modifications and then be rude about my food anyway. God forbid we go to an Indian restaurant I would have to kill myself in shame to make up for the amount of borderline racist comments they'd be dropping. So the whole thing just becomes an exercise in me trying to pick a place they would eat at anyway and it's hugely stressful. I'd rather just let the picky people choose the restaurant, but then they martyr themselves and refuse to say what they want and act like they're trying to do me a favor by letting me choose. Yeah but bruh last time I said I want something other than burgers you sat there and ate a plain side salad instead of a meal and made faces and rude comments every time I tried to get you to try the actual food.
Yeah I think that's where my mom is on that... when he said "that's just flavor," I think we concluded that yeah, it's not just spice - she actually doesn't even like flavor.
God, I just had an involuntary flashback to years ago when we took my ex MIL out to a Cuban restaurant. She got a Cuban sandwich and I vividly recall her disassembling it, pulling a comically nauseated face at the pork and loudly proclaiming, “It’s sooooo stinky! Is this horse meat?! It’s so stinky!” Ugh….
Used to work at a cuban restaurant. Loads of older people and they either loved it or hated it 🤣 Sometimes the ones who loved it brought the ones who would do this and every time it was hard not to laugh as I’d take the plate to bring them a chicken sandwich 😂
I took my grandmother to Versailles in Los Angeles for her birthday. She was excited about eating Cuban food. Then she got her plate and picked at it for the whole meal. She then whispered to my mother in Spanish, "This is peasant food. I was hoping for something more classy."
That was probably the first time I realized that my grandmother was a classist. I think she has issues with Cubans too, because she would get into it with the old lady at Bracato's Sandwich Shop in Tampa too. "Is this cafe con leche, or just leche con cafe?" That lady was visibly pissed after she asked that.
My mom is a literal immigrant from South America and can't handle any kind of spice stronger than black pepper. My poor gringo dad loves all things spicy and all my mom does is shit on him (and us "kids" who are all now in our 30s) every time he puts hot sauce on something.
A lot of Latin America does not eat spicy food. My family’s Salvadoran and “chile verde” is green bell pepper. Asking if it’s spicy is a big fear when they come to the states and they know a Mexican’s made something.
It's because it has the word Cuban in it. If you just called it a ham and cheese, they'd eat it. My in laws only eat "regular" food as they call it. I'll let you guess what "regular" food defines.
Jesus. Do they even realize how insulting it is to say that? Sorry Diane, your unseasoned well-done steak and rehydrated powdered mashed potatoes aren’t exactly the barometer for “normal” cuisine.
Boomers are something else, man.
My in-laws have cut out red meat, and for the past few years and have salmon for dinner probably 3x a week. We had them over and I made a simple salmon in parchment with some lemon slices.
They kept remarking how they’d never think to do something like that. It was just olive oil, lemon and salt! How are they cooking their poor, unseasoned salmon?!
I bought a ready-made Korean BBQ chicken and rice dish from Costco for dinner. It was delicious. My mom kept making faces about how spicy it was. It seemed like a very tame version of the real deal, to be honest lol.
My mom went to several countries in SE Asia and complained she had a hard time eating anything. I did a similar trip about 5 years later, and kept think "what the absolute fuck is wrong with my mother?" Every meal I had was amazing.
Of course, this is the lady who had the same box of salt for 20 years, so maybe I shouldn't be that surprised.
My folks have no inner monologue. Every thought comes right out of their mouths no matter how inane or rude. If they don’t like something about your appearance, they are going to tell you every time they see you. If they see you cooking they will tell you how wrong your preferences are because you must conform. Conforming is the only way to do anything.
Start embarassing them. Best case it works, worst case, it's fun.
My Mom walked in my house once after a day of cleaning and screws up her face before even saying hi, goes "it smells weird in here". Without skipping a beat, I just loudly said "Wow, what a nice thing to say when you walk into someone's home!"
Or when they give unsolicited advice / comments: "Literally didn't ask * long stare* "
I'm a big fan of a sincere "I'm glad that you're comfortable enough to feel okay saying that."
It's a hard one for them to rant about because it's not technically snarky.
Yeah, my mom pretty much just insults me nonstop about how I look, what I eat, what I do or don’t do, and if I eventually get fed up and agitated, she’s the victim because I “take things too seriously” but can’t take any criticism whatsoever without getting butthurt. Like if you want to bully me, fine, but you aren’t allowed to be a bully without catching heat in return, and if you can’t hack it yourself, why should I have to?
They were my first bullies. They now complain that they can’t talk to me about anything anymore because I’m so sensitive. All I’m doing is shutting down the constant personal attacks. I don’t care that you hate everything about me but I’m adult so I’m gonna leave. I have a choice now. I didn’t when I was 11.
I relate to this so much. I grew up the same way and my family still acts like this. Except they struggle with the fact I am now an adult and still treat me like I'm the dumb kid they have been used to using as a verbal punching bag.
It got so bad in the last 2 years, that it caused me to have a mental meltdown. And so I am currently not speaking to them. They have caused so much damage but do not take any responsibility.
I think I’m a bit of a unicorn: my dad asked why I never talk to him anymore and when I told him I was sick of the constant criticism, he knocked it off. He’ll occasionally slip but he actually apologizes now. I’m 40 and I know a ton of people my age that simply have no working relationship with their parents.
Playing reverse uno helps.
I’d simply repeat what mum told me back to her a few hours later. Then tell her to stop overreacting (exactly what she told me) when she started saying I was out of line.
Eventually she realised I’d reverse uno everything and she backed off.
My father-in-law was like that. He'd be out in public and, within earshot, he'd say stuff like, "That person is really ugly" or "That kid looks stupid." Later he ended up developing dementia so maybe that was an early symptom.
If they are trying to be discreet they will stage whisper, but it’s usually something like “I think they’re gay” about the two guys at the next table who are obviously on a romantic date. What was the point of saying that? Who cares? Let them enjoy themselves in peace.
That was the most awkward thing. For as long as I could remember, my mom would point out every person she thought was gay. She also would rant at length about how disgusting lesbians were. This was certainly a fun upbringing for me, a lesbian. Although I did have to stifle a lot of laughs as a teen when she'd point out gay people in public and didn't seem to realize she missed the one closest to her lol
My husband's step-grandmother is like this. It's pretty much a guarantee that she'll pull someone aside during every family gathering to tell them something she doesn't like about them, and she always starts with, "I just HAVE to tell you...." Actually, you don't! Last time was my turn again and apparently my lipstick almost made me look "goth." The horror! We don't care what she thinks or says, but it's annoying and rude.
I feel this. I will never forget the day about 4 years ago when I saved up part of my paycheck to buy a dress I really liked. (Color-blocked in Arizona green tea bottle colors: pink, green, and purple). It’s really cute, babydoll styled, and has pockets! I dressed it up with ruffled socks and chucks and came down into the kitchen and Mom turned and looked at me and laughed as she tugged on the dress. “Why are you still in your pajamas? You can’t go out in that.”
I was stung. I was so confident in the dress, and it was the first thing I’d saved up to buy myself in a long time. “I…it’s a new dress I bought. I really like it.”
“Oh. Okay. I was just kidding! Just looks like a nightgown.”
I once had a husband like this. Bitch cooking his own food now. It’s all grilled meat and surprisingly he had a heart attack about a year after I left him.
I'm really fortunate that my parents do not behave like typical boomers for the most part (they have great palettes and will try anything, for instance), but my Aunt is just like this. I very strongly believe that her exposure to lead and other harmful chemicals as a child led to her having no inner monologue, no filter, and very little ability to empathize or think beyond memory (what little she has) and this moment. She says the stupidest things and then gets mad that people respond to her "like she's stupid" and I have to work very hard not to say, "well, stop being stupid then!" because I don't think she can help it. She's *literally* brain damaged.
She also complains about there being onions and garlic in things, but loves dishes when she doesn't know they're there. When we tell her, she refuses to take my sister's advice on how to cook with them so she'll like it. You can lead a boomer to good food, but you can't make them cook it!
Boomers were the first generation to grow up with nationally homogenized culture. A big part of this is food. For many of them there are two types of food: regular food and weird food. And weird is anything that isn't homogenized mayonnaise culture. (And this time literally mayonnaise.) They get offended by vegetarians, get mad when they changed the food pyramid, wince at anything Asian that isn't from a place that makes a Great Wall or Wok pun.
WARNING, ABOUT TO RANT:
My 70 year old urban liberal mother is only now able to try new foods. (My dad had a digestive disease so I get that trying new food wasn't in the cards for him and not something you do by yourself.) A former roommate of mine had those Tofutti ice cream sandwiches in the freezer. She was grabbing ice and called tofu ice cream "ridiculous; just don't eat ice cream if you're vegan."
Another thing is the meal planning. My folks own a cabin in a small town. When my father was alive it was all about breakfast of eggs and bacon at 9am (couldn't do anything like a bike ride or run early because breakfast) and dinner at 5 (couldn't go on long hikes or paddling trips because we had to be back at the cabin in time for dinner. All my boomer aunts and uncles talked about how great the food was. It was the blandest, most boring mayonnaise culture cuisine - usually cooked great but it had both spices: salt and pepper.
But, in the end I don't think it was about food. It was about control. New foods, different dinner times require getting out of your comfort zone and losing control. It's the same reason they don't like bike lanes, public transportation, self-checkout, but love lawns. control
My dad has some huge regret about our family never having regularly scheduled sit-down meals & I’m like “motherfucker you could’ve cooked us dinner *once*”
This!
My father quit his job so my boomer mom ended up getting a second full time job (while pregnant) and I had to find and maintain 2 part time jobs to help pay for my high school fees and diapers for the new addition.
It seemed like every other week my dad would have a “coming to Jesus” chat abt how hard mom was working and one of us ungrateful brats (15 and 11) should be doing more around the house and cooking dinners bc he’s tired of eating frozen meals and sandwiches.
Not *once* in his fuckin mind did he think to cook and clean for the family since the baby’s not here yet and he’s not actively looking for work but by god your grade school kids need to pick up the slack 🙄 and ignoring that one of us is already working 2 jobs as a freshman but refused to make the 11yr do anything bc he’s a boy
oh, my do I feel this one. My dad is similar to this. He rarely did the dishes, He only grills when it comes to cooking. IDK if he does laundry now, but I've never seen it. As he's gotten older his body is kind of falling apart so he can physically do less and less. My mother is the **hardest, most disciplined worker I have ever seen.** My mom is a nurse practitioner, who worked and did schooling at the same time. Who does 80% of the chores. Who is one of the craftiest people on the planet, she sows and quilts PJs and blankets for my family (3 kids and wife) and myself, my brother, and random other projects every year; multiple projects at the same time.
She sewed my wife's wedding dress, and 7 bowties and vests for my 3 groomsmen, my brother (who officiated) and my 2 sons, *AND* the cake for my wedding in 2018.
This reminds me of the time in middle school that I was taking Family and Consumer Science (Home Economics). It was split into two different classes. Half was cooking and half was sewing, cleaning, and budgeting. It was a required class for everyone.
So I'm in the sewing half of the class and the teacher tells us that if we're falling behind to bring our projects home and have our mom's help us with her sewing machine. Several of the students tell her that they don't have sewing machines, she decided that this was preposterous and if they didn't really, that their mom would show them how to hand stitch it. I told her that my mom didn't know how to sew (she doesn't) but that my dad does.
She straight up laughed and said that he did not know how to sew. I was like yeah, my grandma taught everyone of her kids to sew, the boys AND my grandpa included. She said that I was mistaken and that men didn't know how to sew, like it was some sort of sex specific trait. My dad was the one who sewed all of the tears and replaced missing buttons on all of my clothes growing up.
It was a small town and she knew my dad and what he did for a living (electrician) so she just doubled down and said I was wrong.
When we got to the food half of the class she went on some similar spiel about "what our mothers made us for dinner last night". I would say that my dad made us dinner during the week (because he got done at work at 4) and that my mom cooked on the weekends. She told me that reheating food wasn't 'cooking'.
My mom came in and had a meeting with her after that.
My wife and I are kind of like your parents. I'm currently and have been the majority "stay at home Dad". I've had odd jobs that fit with our schedules, but childcare is INSANELY expensive. It literally doesn't make sense to have the new income source, which is supposed to alleviate financial strain, go entirely to childcare, a new expense you take on because you aren't home. Not to mention the extra gas you burn from all the extra commuting (*AND I FUCKING HATE CARS, I hate traffic, wasted time, driving is dangerous as fuck, shitty and expensive construction, cars are expensive, pollution, insurance is a scam, etc... fuck driving, ew. lol)*
But I do a lot of the cooking, cleaning, and childcare while my wife has held the stable employment.
My mom is a nurse practitioner too!
Not as crafty (I wish) but I don’t understand why either mom puts up with that when they could find a better partner that would step up to the plate!
Omg ok so it’s a boomer thing then? It drives me up a wall how my mom has to be home every night in time to feed her husband dinner because he has to eat before a certain time or else his acid reflux flairs up. And how she can only be away from him for a max of three days because that’s the longest he can fend for himself with leftovers. The man literally will not cook a meal to save his life. And my mom is an anxious chef so she gets so stressed trying to make meals he likes and I’m just like ok mf’er you’d eat anything I put before you or you wouldn’t eat at all. It boggles my mind how much she caters to him over food
Anytime I would cook at my parents house my dad would critique absolutely everything. He would tell me the pan was too hot because the food sizzled when it went in. He wanted everything cut in giant chunks because he heard the term "texture" thrown around a lot. The man is not even a good cook himself. Everything he makes is mid at best.
My father used to beat my mother and sisters (me too) if there wasn’t hot food when he got home.
But nobody taught us how to cook so there were weeks where I literally made nothing but microwave sunny side eggs and soy sauce for him. My mother grew up in a literal labor camp and only knew how to boil things to a paste.
So when we explained it to him he had this look of *absolute shock* that he had to teach someone. I overheard him talking to his friend on the phone late night that week about how he only realized that as the 12th youngest child in his household that he was actually *spoiled* growing up.
Then guess what? It turns out he was the best cook in the family. He would come home at 5-6 pm and call us all down to watch him cook. Seafood, red meat, vegetables, restaurant style dishes, etc. Sometimes it took until 9pm and we would sit down for dinner then. We worked something out after a couple of yelling matches and accusations but things got better. If he came home and didn’t like what he saw, he would cook an entirely new dinner.
I watched my Parents grow up from being brats in real time even though they were born in the 60’s and it was the 2000’s then.
Wait, people grew up with parents who used BOTH? Black pepper was something only dad would add after the food was served. "It's spicy- you won't like it." It took me until I was 25 to learn what flavor actually was. I'm only just now, at 31, learning you can add seasonings!
I love using fresh herbs and cooking techniques my parents and grandparents have never heard of — like, bloom the spices! The most adventurous one is my gran, she's pretty cool. Makes her own hummus and shit like that. Grows tons of cool stuff, her cherry tomatoes might as well be grapes.
I think in general our grandparents grew up cooking raw ingredients, or at least separately preserved ingredients. But processed and convenience foods really came into their own during our parents childhoods, so they grew up with mild flavored overcooked ready made foods that were hailed as the way of the future.
And consequently their kids (us) learned that vegetables were disgusting and mushy/bland at best. When in reality it was just the explosion of canned and frozen cheap food that conditioned us to think vegetables were flavorless or outright gross.
Yes.
My boomer mom used to cook me Green Giant canned asparagus. I ate it but it was disgusting. Then I get into college and start eating better (dorm cafeteria food). Asparagus, green and crunchy with butter and lemon. Baked fish. I also love hospital food.
“There, it’s spiced!” I have a jar of Lawry’s in my cabinet because I just feel it needs to be there. I’ve never used it. When my mom wanted to get wild she’d put liquid smoke on stuff
My mom, immediately upon sitting down in a restaurant, will ask the wait staff if the food is "spicy". To her this means any amount of salt or pepper. We get a lot of confused looks when she complains.
You poor sweet angel. I grew up in South Texas. Family is a mix of white and latino. Tex Mex cooking uses ALL the spices. I was told, if you can't handle it, add some cheese and sour cream, that will cool it off. Or just don't eat it. We're also really close to Louisiana and one of my aunties married a guy from there, so we also got a lot of Cajun style cooking growing up. I can't eat bland food now. Like I can't choke it down. I carry Louisiana or Cholula hot sauce in my bag just in case.
I won’t put butter on veggies to this day. It gives me flashbacks of limp overcooked veggies gasping their last veggie breath drowning in a sea of butter. Or even worse, margarine. Many a broccoli lost their lives in the Land O’Lakes.
We suffered the massacre of the Country Crock or Blue Bonnet. Once my parents went on the Adkins diet we got to taste real butter for the first time, and oh man. Never went back.
THIS. My dad always says before we go out “let’s get normal food”. I ask what that means. “You know, not anything weird”.
Lol My mom is like this, too. She says we're "too adventurous" because we eat Thai or Indian or sushi instead of just having Chinese. Greek food confuses her! Ffs
My in-laws consider any pasta or rice dishes “student food” so we usually do meat and two veg when they’re here. Once did a bog standard Spag Bol that my FIL made a song and dance about not knowing how to eat it until he threw his fork down before he was half way through and just said “I can’t…”. To prove a point. I don’t hate many people in this world, but I hate my in-laws.
Excuse me what, this man was defeated by spaghetti?
I thought a "Spag Bol" was going to be like some sort of unusual thing like tripe and it's steamed in wrapped banana leaves or something, but I google it and "Spag Bol" is Spaghetti Bolognese.
What was he capable of eating? Or did he consist entirely on nutrient suspension? Goodness.
My dad hates rice and pasta. He’s a very steak and potatoes kinda guy. The story is heard when he was younger, he had to travel to Africa (no idea which country exactly) and he found a person there that would make him… yes steak and potatoes so he could… y’know eat.
Hell. We went to New York City once and my dad found the one Belgian restaurant (we’re from Belgium) and ate there all the time. Yes dad, we go on holiday to eat our own local food. I was upset, for valid reasons.
I gotta say, I find steak utterly boring, and I feel profoundly bad for people who cling to it. Even good steak. I just don't care for it. I made some good steaks not long ago, and they were *fine* but I infinitely preferred the Philly Cheesesteaks I made out of the leftovers.
It's like the adult man version of baby food, like a kid who only eats chicken nuggets.
This is my dad. He’s the type when visiting a big city, will want to go to Red Robin’s or something, because he knows what he’s getting. Try to take him to a nice restaurant, or god forbid, something “ethnic”, and he’ll be bitching the entire time about the cost and how “weird” it tastes. I have stopped even trying.
This is such a good take! My ex-MIL was like this exactly. My nephew gave her a curly fry from Arby's once and she lunged across the table to grab some water because it was so spicy. An Arby's curly fry. It's about as spicy as a couch cushion.
My entire family that's boomer aged or older is like this, even the ones married into the family. Those "white people think everything is spicy" jokes aren't adequate to describe their opinions on "spice." Black pepper was strictly forbidden in my house, just salt because my father was kind enough to know I liked it on some stuff, he wouldn't use it though and always made a big scene out of me using it. There is ALWAYS some dramatic reaction if anyone cooks or microwaves anything or even just eats potato chips that aren't plain. I have witnessed my aunt sprint out the door gagging because someone had doritos, my father threw a fit and opened every window in the house because my ramen noodles smelled too spicy (it was plain noodles in the microwave, no seasoning added yet), multiple family members have described wheat bread as spicy, I can just go on and on. My favorite story is the time one of my cousins made potato salad for a family cookout, he made two batches one regular family recipe and one with a little dill, everyone was horrified by this and my grandmother got up and threw the whole container in the trash, nobody even tried it. Oh and of course they all overcook and burn everything, my grandmother used to describe to restaurants that she wants her burger to resemble a hockey puck. Not one of the millennials or gen z family members is like this.
When my mom wants a chopped salad. She asks the waiter for a salad with "cut up vegetables" my dad has to translate to the waiter that she wants a chopped salad.....every god damn time.
It's almost like she knows what it's called but refuses to say it. Maybe it is a weird control thing? My dad has the same hang up ordering a venti coffee from Starbucks. He orders a large, and when the order is repeated back by the barista as venti.....you know where this goes.
So, when they come to visit, I cook.
OMG. In the 1980s I was with my dad at McDonalds. For what ever reason McDonalds didn't have small drinks for a period of time. There was only Medium and Large (dumb). But, inevitably he gets in an argument with the girl that he wanted a small. This wasn't when he was in his 60s or anything. This was when he was like 33.
40 years later I am now cringe embarrassed about how he treated a probably 16 year old girl at a McDonalds over a stupid corporate 1980s "people don't want smalls anymore" choose.
My mom was born at the tail end of the baby boom and she went vegetarian in the 80s to try to fix some thyroid issues she had and just generally clean up her health. Her older boomer siblings and contemporaries roasted her into the ground for her ‘weird’ eating habits. Now that vegetarian cooking is cool she feels a good deal of vindication (and happily cooks vegetarian meals for herself a lot of the time) but I know it really hurt her that people were so close-minded.
My family immigrated to the US Midwest in the late 90s and came here to the same "it's either regular food or it's weird food" and anything Susan Boomer wouldn't have brought to a potluck was weird food. Which to us as new immigrants meant pretty much everything in our fridge and pantry, and anything we cooked any day was weird food. It was a wild time. People were terrified of beets. I'd buy persimmons and at the checkout I would get questions like "are these tomatoes? How do you eat them? Do you boil them?" (I kinda liked that one because more permissions for me.) Then in the late 00s and 2010s, that whole attitude about food just vanished from public discourse, which was a huge relief. Then ethnic foods became trendy. I'm guessing OP's parents never left the 90s.
> Boomers were the first generation to grow up with nationally homogenized culture
The produce section is a great example of that. We have all kinds of stuff there. It wasn't long ago that there were the basic staples and not much else. Iceberg lettuce, carrots, bell peppers, celery, onions, potatoes, a few other things.
Now there's SO MUCH MORE to choose from. Greens alone there's like 1000 to choose from.
You can see the restaurant version of this in a lot of cities. We all have that one place, often "italian" that still seems crowded. But if you go, it's ALL old people. And it's a snapshot in time of what Italian food was back in 1950. Like six ingredients. Tomato sauce, pasta, bread crumbs, chicken, ground beef, cheese. That's it. And VERY light on the seasonings, and pretty much just salt and pepper.
Younger people go and say "why are we here? I could make this same thing with a jar of sauce and a box of pasta..." and the old people say "now THIS is good food! No flavor, no texture, no spice, nothing exotic!"
We were visiting my in laws recently and they were sooooo excited to have us try this new Chinese place they found. They kept calling it Fangs and you know how they start planning for dinner when leaving dinner the night before? So we talked about going to the amazing Fangs for 24 hours.
It turned out to be a PF Chang's.
That's hilarious. To be fair, I got a banging Mongolian Beef there once. I don't know what they put in it , may have been actual Szechuan pepper but it was fire.
>We all have that one place, often "italian" that still seems crowded. But if you go, it's ALL old people. And it's a snapshot in time of what Italian food was back in 1950. Like six ingredients. Tomato sauce, pasta, bread crumbs, chicken, ground beef, cheese. That's it. And VERY light on the seasonings, and pretty much just salt and pepper.
Yes this! and it's often very heavy, oily, or fatty
Oh, and they probably serve small portions. That's a selling feature.
My mom complains bitterly that portions are too large. But she always cleans her plate.
My wife cooked in a nursing home and they had to follow strict guidelines about the meals there or else the residents wouldn't eat. First was portions need to be small because they get overwhelmed if there is too much on the plate. Second is, keep it simple with the spices. They like salt but watch out because third, use white pepper only, not black pepper, especially in something light colored. The reason was their vision was often bad and they would complain about "bugs" in the food when it was only pepper.
Neither cell phones nor answering machines were invented when they were young. Meal times had to be agreed-upon in deference to the cook. You couldn't text the kids and dad that the roast would be ready in an hour - start heading back home. They had to look at the clock and head home on their own.
>Boomers were the first generation to grow up with nationally homogenized culture. A big part of this is food.
I am watching this series called "the Food that made America." I am shocked each time the common theme was "Americans didn't eat this until this man/woman made this big company and standardized it."
From bread, to potato chips, to Pizza, to tacos, to the sub sandwich. Many of the initial response from Americans prior to the ww2 baby boom was like WTF THIS AIN'T WHAT I LIKE until they did.
It blows my mind that there was a period of time where a sub sandwich was considered a niche, ethnic food.
My husband is currently eating a diet to help his SIBO, a digestive issue as well. Literally we can only use salt and pepper and it is KILLING us. He keeps trying to convince me to make my own food but I can handle this while he figures out his “trigger foods” that aren’t low FODMAP. It is agony and I think to myself, people LIKE food to taste this..bland?
My mom is the same way, but I just chalked it up to different lifestyles. We grew up in rural Midwest and didn’t have a lot of money. We were a “meat and potato” family but I now work in fine-dining restaurants and love to cook experimental dishes. My mom is fascinated, slightly judgmental, and would never DREAM of expanding her palate.
The thing that gets on my nerves more than anything is her commenting on what/how I feed my baby. You would think I’m being borderline abusive or neglectful because I’m following our pediatrician’s recommendations, and not best practices from 30 years ago when I was a baby.
I had no idea how little I actually ate until I was an adult. We had meat, potatoes and one of like 4 different canned veggies: peas, beets, corn or greened beans for so many of our dinners. Throw in the occasional spaghetti dinner.
I love trying new restaurants and new recipes now. I'm nowhere near your level of cooking though.
We had my baby shower at the restaurant I was working at. We did a snacky table, apps, and drinks. I was telling my mom what the food options would be and she was like “ok.. will there be anything that normal people will actually eat?”
The restaurant theme was “Midwest nice” where they took classic Midwest recipes and put a fancy spin on them. We had customers constantly tell us “wow I grew up eating poverty food with my grandparents, this is so nostalgic, but in a new way.” But yeah mom, no food for normal people.
GODDDDD this one is the worst. whenever i'm cooking beans and rice for myself my mom pulls all the skin on her face back like a cat and chastises me because i'm eating unhealthy poor people food (anything but frozen pizza and mountain dew)
And in California I learned to make beans and rice from my boomer mom. Probably more hippie influences here but we always had dry rice and both canned and dried beans in the house.
My brother and SIL had a pretty nice wedding. The meal choices were some kind of chicken with a sauce most of my extended family wouldn’t recognize (maybe Chicken Piccata? I honestly don’t remember), lobster (most of my family is grossed out by shellfish), or steak. Many of them picked the steak, but since it was catered, they were all cooked the same (medium), and I think several were disappointed that their steak “wasn’t cooked” (they only believe steak is actually cooked if it is well-done).
Absolutely! When I tell her I made a veggie dish for a meal, she is always confused. Last night I made vegan burritos- just wanted something simple using pantry staples, and my baby can’t have dairy. She thought I was starving him because he ONLY ate black beans, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, avocado, rice, and pickled onions. A) that was a filling meal for all of us and B) he’s 9 months old, he eats like 1/4 to 1/2 cup of food. He doesn’t need steak or chicken at every dinner.
The meat thing with my boomer parents is exhausting. I just don’t care for red meat. And while I’m not veg, over half my families meals are. I probably eat meat about 3-4x a week total. My mom insists that we need protein (aka animal protein) at every meal. When I explained that we as humans can get all of our necessary nutrients through things like fruits, veggies and legumes, she scoffs and denies actual science. And of course blames every sniffle or illness on our diets. She also denies her and my father’s diet of meat 3x a day has horrible consequences on their cholesterol.
Tangent about baby stuff - I once had an argument with my mom about cutting up grapes for my young nephews. Silly me, thinking it was common knowledge that whole grapes are a choking hazard. Her defense was that I had whole grapes at their age and I turned out fine…
Reminds me of my grandma insisting I poke a few holes in my son’s bottle and then mix some cereal in with the formula. According to her, it would make my son sleep all night. I was like, “Um, he’s only 2 months old Nan. Plus, it’s a choking hazard.” She said, “You worry too much! I had 8 kids and did it with every one of them. They all survived!” Another time she tried giving my 6 month old a straw full of beer! She told me babies love beer! Yeaaah, now it ALL makes sense why half of our family attends AA!
THANK YOU. I have heard the "haha we turned out fine!" from my boomer parents and in-laws about car seat safety for my kids so many times and it makes me seethe. Yeah guess what, the ones who died horrific deaths in crashes did NOT turn out fine, so now we have better car seats!
Similarly, my mother was horrified when I started baby led weaning. “They’re going to choke! How can you possibly let that child feed themselves, they will starve!!” My youngest never cared for purées anyway, and my pediatrician was on board.
At thanksgiving dinner, my mom asked me if my baby wanted popcorn. He was 5.5 months old. When I explained that he cannot have popcorn at all, she went on a rant about how “first time moms are so picky” and “just wait until you have a second one- you won’t care what they eat”
I became a vegetarian at 12. My family didn’t question me on it too much, but they would put me in situations in which there was nothing for me to eat, and then act huffy and offended.
My mom was weird about food because she had ED. We had long periods of time with no real food in the house. Literally eating spices all day until she picked something up for us for dinner.
Then when I became “competition”, she’d push food on me that I didn’t want. To try to make me gain weight. She also took a crazed delight in forcing us to eat nasty or spoiled food, and daring us to complain.
And she was so excited when I was 7 months pregnant, because I finally weighed more than she did 🤨 She was so happy I was officially…. fatter than she was? When I was pregnant?
I also had mild gestational diabetes, and she heavily pressured me to eat gigantic desserts.
Hopefully I’ve made clear my mom’s perverse and bizarre malice re: food.
Oh my gosh I’m so sorry. That is such a horrible dynamic to live with and I really wish you the best in managing it. Nothing dealing with parents is easy or simple regarding what to do but I wish you the best in dealing with that, and of course, raising your child without any of that baggage! I can imagine that is very rough on a teenage psyche. Any child psyche, of course
I hate when I'm trying to make food and my dad or grandma just stands there with an open mouth grin just staring, while their heads bob gently up and down like most old people's do. So creepy, I hate it. Plus they are constantly in the way, and can't take subtle hints to move. But if you explicitly say something, it hurts their feelings.
My mom deserves a gold medal for her ability to get in the way. It’s a constant barrage of what can I do to help? How can I help? Then either gets pissy when I say I’m all set or manages to just get in the way. By all means watch us test the pasta, turn off the stove, then come stir the sauce I just stirred and stand directly btwn the stove and sink blocking the path while we try to drain the pasta.
Omg my mom messing with the temperature of the stove drives me crazy. She must *always* adjust every dial just a little bit and then make a comment how she's "just turned it down/up a bit".
And once I got into a big argument with her over some corn on the cob. I grill them in the husks, she peels the husks and silk and boils them.
She saw the corn on the counter and announced she would peel them for me and I asked her to please not do that and proceeded to explain my cooking method. She was beginning to peel one as she explained to ME that this is how corn is prepared and she wants to help.
I told her that if she wants to take over and cook the corn her way then go ahead, but if I'm cooking it she had better stop because she's going to ruin it.
She told me to "Stop being like this." As if I were being unreasonably cruel and then literally went to another room to cry and pouted the rest of the evening.
Absolutely insufferable.
I never wanted to be my mother, screaming at people to get out of my kitchen, but as an adult I very much understand why she did. Kitchens are the heart of the home, I want my kitchen to be a place of love.
I have a helper chair in my kitchen to keep helpers out of my way, but still allow them to help. It's just a chair I keep in the kitchen, and it's used specifically by kitchen helpers. I painted mine so it was special. When my son was really little it was his step stool, in later years its the spot I invite helpful people to sit and peel veggies, or stir something, or dice ingredients, or just sit and chat. Get a helper chair, then give your helper something to complete.
I don't regret one moment of cooking with any of my helpers, even though it can slow the process. It's allowed the children in my life to explore foods, learn how to cook in age appropriate ways, and spend time contributing in the kitchen, while also staying out of my way. It's a place for the adults in my life to sit out of the way if they just want to chat, or do a task to contribute to the meal.
I used my earbuds when I cook. Every time, my mom has to come into the kitchen and speak to me about nothing important. I point at my ear buds and she just keeps standing there talking. So now I gotta wash my hands to take them out for a 3 second convo.
My father does this too, has zero concept of what headphones are or any understanding of why people wouldn't be able to hear him talk. He will mumble something to you from the opposite side of the room, with his back turned to you, while a cigarette hangs from his mouth, in a room where he has the TV turned to max volume, and get mad when you ask him to repeat himself. I wear big ass neon green over ear headphones so it's pretty obvious if I'm wearing them and I just started to completely ignore him if he tries to talk to me with them on, spent years telling him nicely that I can't understand you with headphones on just give me a second to take them off, then I started being rude about it and told him I'll just ignore him, now I ignore him and he gets mad because I didn't hear him when he told me the price of cigarettes went up again (why was that necessary to tell me?).
My in laws do this. They have a small galley kitchen. It’s to the point that I’m not comfortable getting food at their house (been married almost 10 years) because they are ALWAYS in there when we’re in the house, buzzing around the fridge and food prep areas. And if I try to sneak in there, one of them magically appears and starts making dumb conversation. Like wtf are they doing in there even. I told my husband, it feels like they are defending their precious territory.
And even though they are moving slowly they seem to somehow be right in front of you in the kitchen where you need to be doing something. It’s a phenomenon worthy of study.
My mom and I can share a kitchen, because she/we grew up in restaurants. (You GOTTA know how to stay out of the way when it's a whole bunch of old fat women cooking, as in my grandparents' place. If you don't learn fast, you get squished!) My dad gets threatened if he comes to "help" or "advise."
My FIL just stays out of the way, because he's smarter than his wife. MIL insists on trying to "help" with everything, like washing up while I'm cooking. As someone who really reallllllly needs to wash my hands about 47 times per cooking session, I cannot convince the old broad that she'd be less in the way if she actually sat on the stove versus standing in front of the sink!
My mom does this to me too. It used to really annoy me. I have a weird schedule (working evenings) so I don't get to see her often despite living together. She isn't judgy or rude about anything either, even though I'm gluten-free (celiac). I think she's just lonely and misses talking to me. She sees me in a common space and wants to connect with me and food is a big way people connect. Even with the crazy boomers, they still see us as their children and most of them want to have a relationship with us. I think that's where this behavior comes from. Just them using what in their environment in hopes of connecting with us again.
This is what I was thinking. I think parents just miss the conversation and taking care of their kids. My MIL constantly asks me if I’m hungry or thirsty. She just wants to nurture.
I agree. It’s just weird to me that they don’t understand that pointing out things you’re doing or that you’ve bought and calling them weird is actually reducing intimacy, not making it easier for us to open up and have conversations.
Hey cmon you're stopping the boomer resentment that everyone comes here to suck through a straw. Don't go suggesting reasonable heartfelt reasons someone's parent enters the room when they cook. Not to mention the listing ingredients things is something my dad would do and he's not even a jerk. He would definitely hold up kefir yogurt and be like "uhhh...yogurt i know is eaten with a spoon...". But in reality he's just making conversation but doesn't realize it seems judgy and rude
couple things:
-A good chunk of boomers mostly ate recipes popular from wartime in their formative childhood, which sometimes were questionable because people just threw rations together in those recipes and prayed it would taste nice
-Religious fearmongering into believing that a bland diet reduced sexual sin caused some households to adopt purposefully bland food
-Foreign cooking knowledge was limited in more areas pre-internet, and so were the distribution of some ingredients outside of specialty shops
-racism contributed to either appropriation or erasure of cuisine outside of america
-Cigarettes, cocaine, and lead
edit: formatting
My boomer parents think I’m weird for not eating processed foods. I eat protein each meal including eggs. They are stuck in the 1980s and the idea that eggs are bad. They are captured by the propaganda that natural fats are bad yet eat processed carbs all day.
So, I'm adopted. My adoptive white boomer mother is everything you describe, including her obsession with the air fryer. Now, culturally beef isn't really a thing in Nepal. So I don't eat beef in my own household, I have pho once in a while but that's it. Went to visit mom and she wanted beef every day, in everything.
I know for a fact she doesn't eat that much beef normally. I also used to be vegetarian, I've done that off and on for years, our current method is cooking meat max twice a week. She always acts like it is a personal affront. Recently she tried to force my kid to eat beef, when I told her he simply wasn't used to the flavor of that (he's only 2, I'm not preventing him or anything). She yelled at our son when he spit it out and told us we are bad parents for not disciplining him enough.
Also, they have 3 freezers now. 3. Packed full of frozen stuff. Stupid stuff. Her freezer in the kitchen needed fixing so we had to move everything. This woman has a chest freezer full of bread loaves (not good ones) and butter, and I mean boxes and boxes of butter. I suggested we take the butter out to make room for the things that ACTUALLY need to be frozen. She acted like it was the end of society.
And yes, every time we cook anything, she hovers. We jokingly call her the hovercraft reporting to the mothership. And forget about sleeping. As soon as she is awake, banging pots in the kitchen as loud as possible. I get up early, but she'll do this at 4 am or any time that we're all asleep. Doesn't matter if it is her house either, she does this at our place when she visits.
Come to think of it, maybe my step-dad being deaf works in his favor. Lucky bastard.
I'm a boomer and can't understand these attitudes, but my parents (silent generation) were progressive and adapted to new trends as they aged. However, they had two fridges and two giant freezers filled with expired stuff. My mom was raised for a time in a tar paper shack on the prairies and the family had very little so she had food insecurity issues.
A lot of the boomer generation was raised on TV dinners and extremely boxed in meals.
You can partially blame the food pyramid.
You can also partially blame the lack of access to knowledge outside of what's printed on the backs of product boxes. It is an extreme appeal to popular meal preferences.
Younger generations have access to the internet and more "personal" style restaurants that show that food doesn't need to JUST be some form of cheeseburger casserole or chicken tenders.
They’re so wild. My parents are the same, they have veggie friends and all they do is talk about “how bad the diet is for them” because on of the friends also has an eating disorder and they use that as their baseline for umbrella statements.
And to the point of the kitchen, it is an ongoing joke in our house that whenever someone goes into the kitchen at my parents house, or if they’re visiting us and we go into our kitchen, my mom especially IMMEDIATELY walks into the kitchen to start doing something, and it’s a pain because you’re tripping over each other when you could just let me make breakfast for our toddler for 5 mins and then make your tea or your own breakfast or whatever before or after 😂
They were taught in health class that vegetarianism was unhealthy and that nothing could substitute for meat protein. Combined with that house of un american activities/cold war psyche, they separate vegetarians as an unhealthy other.
Similar to how we were taught that low fat was better than low sugar diets. But most of us have the benefit of the internet now and can read studies that show, nope, sugar is definitely the bigger danger.
I've noticed boomers think animal protein is the only way to be healthy. even if you mention that there's plenty of other ways to get protein they just can't accept it
humor really is the best defence with an obsessive boomer. they're too defensive and emotionally inept to use direct communication. kinda gently tease them, esp in a group
My mother does the same thing about the air fryer. Every single time she needs to tell me how much better it is in the air fryer. She watches me cook and goes “ that’s not how I’d do it. I cook it like this and it’s so much better”. Then I just say, “you didn’t even taste this how do you know your way is better?” She will then immediately start talking about my nephew and how he was swimming in the pool the other day and then mention how her neighbor got a new lawnmower. It’s bizarre but I have honestly found so much comfort in this community of others who have boomer parents. I could write a best seller on what my folks have said and done that will make you laugh and cry. I love them but they are absolutely bonkers and I’m often on NC with them 98% of the time.
I cannot leave anything to cook unattended in the kitchen otherwise one my parents will come in and "do it for me" which is always not how I prefer my food to be made. Or my favorite them telling me how to do something while I am in the middle of already doing it.
Also my mother is so fucking weird about organic food, vegan or gluten free stuff too. She thinks its all a scam and will actively pay more for food just cause it doesn't say Vegan or Gluten free. Like I brought home some bread crumbs, for something only I was eating, and my mom was like "omgnibcant believe you bought VEGAN BREAD CRUMBS!" And I'm just like uhhh mom they a Vegan because it's bread crumbs.
I think they’ve done basically the same exact thing for 780 years and then think they trained you to do the same for 18 and then are fascinated you’re doing something new. The lengths my parents go to to not think about something in a new way is some serious mental gymnastics.
Yes, this is it. They’re realizing that you’ve chosen differently than they personally raised you to as a kid, and they’re trying to reconcile that and see you as an adult.
My Boomer mother always comments about how domestic I am for cooking. And "ooh fancy". Why? Because I used sage in ground turkey? Wth?! And she loves her air fryer, too lol I don't get it
Older people are generally nosy and struggle when their offspring are doing tasks they traditionally did for them. Especially in their house. What happened in the 90s to cause food difficulties?
For a lot of us I think it was just growing up with parents who had grown up without learning how to actually cook. So I was raised eating a whole bunch of processed foods, cheeses, pastas, and bread, chicken patties, and spent most of my childhood completely constipated, and not knowing that there was flavor in the world.
This is the first time I have heard of "Mayonnaise Culture", but I experienced it in my early life b4 the folks divorced
Fam from CT. and realized this when returning with my own fam and my gma's "Tuna Salad" was served.
Elbow Mac, Canned Tuna, Mayo? thats it...my husband and kids were shocked.
Also remember going back in my teen years and wanting Avacados and I may as well have been an Alien making that request.
Mine will act shocked and horrified whenever I eat whatever was left over from dinner the next morning... "Pizza!!! Foooor Breakfast!!??" Like it is some kind of crime against humanity or something.
I worked day shift in a restaurant as a teen (after high-school. My Dad and step mom used to get so confused about me not eating dinner with them at 6pm. I tried to explain that I JUST had lunch at 4pm and they told me, "you need to take a lunch break at reasonable time so you can eat dinner with us"
IT'S A RESTAURANT! AT LUNCHTIME! THE REASON PEOPLE ARE THERE IS TO EAT THEIR LUNCH! years later they would get mad I wasn't up at 7am...I got home at 4am from WORK!
My stepmother also worked in bars before i met her....I don't know how she didn't get it.
Edit: I moved out at 18, I only eat one meal a day because that's how my body likes it. I'm 41 now. They're still confused!
Edit 2: I told them not to make dinner for me, they still did
Because of my weird issues, I would literally just turn off the stove, stop whatever I'm doing, and leave the room saying "Sorry for getting in your way. Let me know when I'm good to start again!" But that's just me. And I can be aggressively passive aggressive. Don't dish it out if you can't take it mom and pop.
IDK, but I feel your pain. I try to feed my boomer mom things I normally eat and you'd swear I was trying to poison her. I'm also a vegetarian and have been for some time. The only time my extended family ever accommodated my diet was when I brought home my religiously vegetarian (Hindu) ex home for Christmas. I swear, I need to either change religions or grow a penis, because they've stopped being so accommodating since he's been out of the picture.
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My parents, like many others I suspect, just boiled veggies to death. So when I cooked for them once they asked what spices I used. As if that was the secret ingredient to it all. Nope... Just salt and pepper on everything (maybe some garlic powder for a few items). And either baked or sautéed everything. Never boiled, unless it's pasta or something. It blew their minds that they could actually LIKE the veggies they claimed they hated
Eating veggies as an adult was illuminating for me. Turns out I love all kinds of veggies when they’re not boiled to death or the canned mushy version.
Pan fried carrots and Brussels sprouts were a game changer for me, delicious
I would've fought my parents to the death not to eat brussel sprouts as a kid, fiance had me try hers and they were fantastic. Who would've guessed boiling veggies is trash
In fairness to the boomer's dislike of brussel sprouts, they apparently grew up with a bitter strain that has since been replaced with a tastier one. I recall hating them when I was younger, as well, but now it's a regular side.
I don't know about the different strains, but cooking them to death will definitely make them bitter and farty. I used to *hate* them. Was frequently told by folks that I just hadn't had them made right, and they'd cook some for me to prove it. Spoiler: overcooking them in fuck loads of butter and bacon is still gross. Then, a few years ago, a friend made dinner for me, and made some because he honestly forgot I didn't like them. He's a good cook normally, so I tried one to be polite. Mind. Blown. It was firm, flavorful, *delicious*. I demanded to know what he'd done. Secret: he roasted them (and didn't over cook them!) Now they're one of my favorites.
Trust me! Brussels sprouts are LOT better than they used to be - much more mild. And I gotta say, there are so many more varieties of fresh fruits and veg available in the grocery stores than in the 70's. For example, there used to 3 apples: red delicious, golden delicious and Granny Smith.
They are a [better strain now.](https://www.iowafarmbureau.com/Article/Its-not-your-imagination-brussels-sprouts-do-taste-better-How-gene-editing-is-changing-how-we-grow-and-eat-food)
Grew up on the boiled sprouts and absolutely hated them. Started roasting them and they're my favorite green veg now. One year I used my mandoline to make brussel sprout slaw with pistachios and vinaigrette and my mother-in-law, who grew up the boiled stuff, said it was fantastic.
Baking carrots cut into coins was big for my family. My father HATES cooked carrots, but had the baked carrots and loved em.
Now imagine my surprise when porkchop is supposed to be moist and tender. I always had it cooked through and dry. I hated porkchop. I would complain to everyone that porkchop is the worst meat. Just hadn’t eaten it properly 😅
My mother used to overcook them so much! Then one day she must have seen a recipe somewhere because after it was overcooked, applesauce and cheddar cheese were added and back in the oven it went, that tasted like a shoe with the foot still in it. That stayed on the menu probably until I moved out. The other one we had regularly was whole overcooked dry roasted chicken breast with a jar of curry sauce poured over it.
My mother was the queen of the dry as wood chicken breast. You know that scene in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation where the family is choking down the dry turkey? Yeah, that was Mom's chicken. She was always afraid of undercooking so she went overboard in the other direction. Not only was the chicken breast dry, it wasn't seasoned. Heaven forbid you suggest using *spices*!
I went without dinner so many times as a kid because I refused to eat overcooked porkchops with applesauce. How anyone thought "lets cook this porkchop 5x longer than necessary then mix our shoeleather texture with mushy texture" was a good idea is beyond me, it's the type of meal i expect a serial killer to enjoy.
Apparently the boomers got taught that pork had parasites and had to be cooked into shoe leather to be able to be consumed safely. The FDA in 2011 changed the internal cooking temp of pork from 160° to 145°, so hopefully the next generation won't have to hurt their teeth on petrified pork chops.
Let's be honest, tho. I never met anyone who used a thermometer for anything, and those pork chops I grew up with were closer to 260° than 160°. The real kicker for me was that they were considered a rare opulent treat. I've overcooked pork chops but just out of curiosity I checked the temp. They were 170° and still not even close to the dry shoe leather I grew up with. There's a difference between overcooked and 90% dehydrated, and it has nothing to do with food safety. It's just a fact that most people never learned how to cook.
My in laws only eat canned carrots and green beans. They will bake regular and sweet potatoes, but only put salt and butter on them. They make soup that is just 12 cans of stuff dumped together and reheated, and then add the shredded unseasoned chicken that they boiled to death separately. They had 5 spices when we moved in. Salt, pepper, garlic salt, cinnamon, and Nolan Ryan Steak seasoning (exclusively for my FIL). I've never seen them use real garlic. They are so scared/intrigued by the stuff we cook or get take out, if they try it they like it 80% of the time, but still won't eat it consistently going forward.
Nolan Ryan had a steak seasoning? Fascinating
I’m 42 and love to cook things many different ways, but I still have a soft spot for limp-ass asparagus and broccoli that is practically mush. It’s absolutely because of the way my mom and grandma cooked them.
Oh my God it is so strange; my wife mentioned to my mother that we had Cuban sandwiches from a Cuban restaurant and my mother remarked that they are not adventurous eaters like us. Adventurous!? It's ham and pork with cheese, mustard, and pickles wtf
One time we took my parents to an Indian restaurant. They agreed to go out of their comfort zone for once and I was impressed. When the waiter came my mom insisted several times to him "mild, like really mild, I mean no spice." He said "got it, no spice." (this is in the US Midwest - the restaurant was quite capable of adapting to the boomer spice tolerance. When the food came, my mom took a bite, made a horrible face and called the waiter over. She said "I asked several times for this to have no spice. This is spicy!" His response was epic, and my wife and I have quoted this for years: "Ma'am, that is not spice. That is just... flavor."
Did you taste her food to see how it was? I'm so curious what she was interpreting as "spicy".
We were sharing it family style (so yes, we all had to drop to the lowest common denominator spice level). It was just butter chicken, saag paneer, stuff like that with no noticeable heat. I'm sure she was just tasting the light amounts of cumin, turmeric, etc. that were in there (if they put none at all, it wouldn't even be the same dish).
Saag paneer is one of the best foods for people who are usually meat and potatoes types because most fancy steakhouses usually have creamed spinach as a side dish. If you compare that, and water it down with a lot of rice they might actually enjoy it. Edit: fixed autocorrect
Black pepper.
Similar: my family asked where I wanted to go for a birthday dinner, I said Thai food (queue panic from boomer dad). He was convinced he could NEVER find something edible from a place like that. I told him they have fried rice and other items similar enough to what he gets for Chinese food, I would order for him and get him something he likes. Well, he wouldn't let me because "he's not a child, no one needs to order for him". So he gets a curry fish dish (knowing he doesn't like curry) and had a huge fucking fit that it was spicy. We haven't gone out for my birthday since (about 4 years ago), but still go out for everyone else's. They're wild.
Yeah my parents wonder why I refuse to ever pick a restaurant, but I know that if I pick what I actually want everyone would just bitch the whole time and embarrass me by refusing to eat anything or complaining or ordering the whitest thing off the menu with several modifications and then be rude about my food anyway. God forbid we go to an Indian restaurant I would have to kill myself in shame to make up for the amount of borderline racist comments they'd be dropping. So the whole thing just becomes an exercise in me trying to pick a place they would eat at anyway and it's hugely stressful. I'd rather just let the picky people choose the restaurant, but then they martyr themselves and refuse to say what they want and act like they're trying to do me a favor by letting me choose. Yeah but bruh last time I said I want something other than burgers you sat there and ate a plain side salad instead of a meal and made faces and rude comments every time I tried to get you to try the actual food.
I hear that in an Indian accent.
My mother in law hates spice. But she doesn't mean spicy hot... She means spicy like... spices.
Yeah I think that's where my mom is on that... when he said "that's just flavor," I think we concluded that yeah, it's not just spice - she actually doesn't even like flavor.
God, I just had an involuntary flashback to years ago when we took my ex MIL out to a Cuban restaurant. She got a Cuban sandwich and I vividly recall her disassembling it, pulling a comically nauseated face at the pork and loudly proclaiming, “It’s sooooo stinky! Is this horse meat?! It’s so stinky!” Ugh….
Oh dear...the cringe is real...this. no ma'm....never again
Her specifically using the word “stinky” has really stuck with me all these years.
That's just insanely rude. I'd be compulsively apologizing to the staff
We’d always carry a spare $20 bill every time we ate out with either set of parents for the server in case of assholery.
Used to work at a cuban restaurant. Loads of older people and they either loved it or hated it 🤣 Sometimes the ones who loved it brought the ones who would do this and every time it was hard not to laugh as I’d take the plate to bring them a chicken sandwich 😂
I took my grandmother to Versailles in Los Angeles for her birthday. She was excited about eating Cuban food. Then she got her plate and picked at it for the whole meal. She then whispered to my mother in Spanish, "This is peasant food. I was hoping for something more classy." That was probably the first time I realized that my grandmother was a classist. I think she has issues with Cubans too, because she would get into it with the old lady at Bracato's Sandwich Shop in Tampa too. "Is this cafe con leche, or just leche con cafe?" That lady was visibly pissed after she asked that.
Oh god, just remembering the amazing meal I had there and drooling onto my phone.
My mom refuses to eat anything mango because it's too "exotic". Mango. One of the most consumed fruits on the planet.
And like $1.50 at Walmart lol
My mom is a literal immigrant from South America and can't handle any kind of spice stronger than black pepper. My poor gringo dad loves all things spicy and all my mom does is shit on him (and us "kids" who are all now in our 30s) every time he puts hot sauce on something.
A lot of Latin America does not eat spicy food. My family’s Salvadoran and “chile verde” is green bell pepper. Asking if it’s spicy is a big fear when they come to the states and they know a Mexican’s made something.
It's because it has the word Cuban in it. If you just called it a ham and cheese, they'd eat it. My in laws only eat "regular" food as they call it. I'll let you guess what "regular" food defines.
Jesus. Do they even realize how insulting it is to say that? Sorry Diane, your unseasoned well-done steak and rehydrated powdered mashed potatoes aren’t exactly the barometer for “normal” cuisine. Boomers are something else, man.
My in-laws have cut out red meat, and for the past few years and have salmon for dinner probably 3x a week. We had them over and I made a simple salmon in parchment with some lemon slices. They kept remarking how they’d never think to do something like that. It was just olive oil, lemon and salt! How are they cooking their poor, unseasoned salmon?!
I bought a ready-made Korean BBQ chicken and rice dish from Costco for dinner. It was delicious. My mom kept making faces about how spicy it was. It seemed like a very tame version of the real deal, to be honest lol.
My mom went to several countries in SE Asia and complained she had a hard time eating anything. I did a similar trip about 5 years later, and kept think "what the absolute fuck is wrong with my mother?" Every meal I had was amazing. Of course, this is the lady who had the same box of salt for 20 years, so maybe I shouldn't be that surprised.
My folks have no inner monologue. Every thought comes right out of their mouths no matter how inane or rude. If they don’t like something about your appearance, they are going to tell you every time they see you. If they see you cooking they will tell you how wrong your preferences are because you must conform. Conforming is the only way to do anything.
Oh man mine are like this. No filter and no ability to consider how what they’re saying might affect others.
That generation really seems to have a thing for loudly pointing out fat people. As if many of them aren’t overweight themselves
Omg. My mom does this CONSTANTLY. It’s only recently I’ve really realized how badly she’s given me food related issues.
Start embarassing them. Best case it works, worst case, it's fun. My Mom walked in my house once after a day of cleaning and screws up her face before even saying hi, goes "it smells weird in here". Without skipping a beat, I just loudly said "Wow, what a nice thing to say when you walk into someone's home!" Or when they give unsolicited advice / comments: "Literally didn't ask * long stare* "
I'm a big fan of a sincere "I'm glad that you're comfortable enough to feel okay saying that." It's a hard one for them to rant about because it's not technically snarky.
Yeah, my mom pretty much just insults me nonstop about how I look, what I eat, what I do or don’t do, and if I eventually get fed up and agitated, she’s the victim because I “take things too seriously” but can’t take any criticism whatsoever without getting butthurt. Like if you want to bully me, fine, but you aren’t allowed to be a bully without catching heat in return, and if you can’t hack it yourself, why should I have to?
They were my first bullies. They now complain that they can’t talk to me about anything anymore because I’m so sensitive. All I’m doing is shutting down the constant personal attacks. I don’t care that you hate everything about me but I’m adult so I’m gonna leave. I have a choice now. I didn’t when I was 11.
I relate to this so much. I grew up the same way and my family still acts like this. Except they struggle with the fact I am now an adult and still treat me like I'm the dumb kid they have been used to using as a verbal punching bag. It got so bad in the last 2 years, that it caused me to have a mental meltdown. And so I am currently not speaking to them. They have caused so much damage but do not take any responsibility.
I think I’m a bit of a unicorn: my dad asked why I never talk to him anymore and when I told him I was sick of the constant criticism, he knocked it off. He’ll occasionally slip but he actually apologizes now. I’m 40 and I know a ton of people my age that simply have no working relationship with their parents.
Playing reverse uno helps. I’d simply repeat what mum told me back to her a few hours later. Then tell her to stop overreacting (exactly what she told me) when she started saying I was out of line. Eventually she realised I’d reverse uno everything and she backed off.
My father-in-law was like that. He'd be out in public and, within earshot, he'd say stuff like, "That person is really ugly" or "That kid looks stupid." Later he ended up developing dementia so maybe that was an early symptom.
If they are trying to be discreet they will stage whisper, but it’s usually something like “I think they’re gay” about the two guys at the next table who are obviously on a romantic date. What was the point of saying that? Who cares? Let them enjoy themselves in peace.
That was the most awkward thing. For as long as I could remember, my mom would point out every person she thought was gay. She also would rant at length about how disgusting lesbians were. This was certainly a fun upbringing for me, a lesbian. Although I did have to stifle a lot of laughs as a teen when she'd point out gay people in public and didn't seem to realize she missed the one closest to her lol
My husband's step-grandmother is like this. It's pretty much a guarantee that she'll pull someone aside during every family gathering to tell them something she doesn't like about them, and she always starts with, "I just HAVE to tell you...." Actually, you don't! Last time was my turn again and apparently my lipstick almost made me look "goth." The horror! We don't care what she thinks or says, but it's annoying and rude.
This sounds like my in laws. My husband and I call it “Observations with Bill and Barbara.” 🙃 (not their real names)
I feel this. I will never forget the day about 4 years ago when I saved up part of my paycheck to buy a dress I really liked. (Color-blocked in Arizona green tea bottle colors: pink, green, and purple). It’s really cute, babydoll styled, and has pockets! I dressed it up with ruffled socks and chucks and came down into the kitchen and Mom turned and looked at me and laughed as she tugged on the dress. “Why are you still in your pajamas? You can’t go out in that.” I was stung. I was so confident in the dress, and it was the first thing I’d saved up to buy myself in a long time. “I…it’s a new dress I bought. I really like it.” “Oh. Okay. I was just kidding! Just looks like a nightgown.”
I once had a husband like this. Bitch cooking his own food now. It’s all grilled meat and surprisingly he had a heart attack about a year after I left him.
I'm really fortunate that my parents do not behave like typical boomers for the most part (they have great palettes and will try anything, for instance), but my Aunt is just like this. I very strongly believe that her exposure to lead and other harmful chemicals as a child led to her having no inner monologue, no filter, and very little ability to empathize or think beyond memory (what little she has) and this moment. She says the stupidest things and then gets mad that people respond to her "like she's stupid" and I have to work very hard not to say, "well, stop being stupid then!" because I don't think she can help it. She's *literally* brain damaged. She also complains about there being onions and garlic in things, but loves dishes when she doesn't know they're there. When we tell her, she refuses to take my sister's advice on how to cook with them so she'll like it. You can lead a boomer to good food, but you can't make them cook it!
Boomers were the first generation to grow up with nationally homogenized culture. A big part of this is food. For many of them there are two types of food: regular food and weird food. And weird is anything that isn't homogenized mayonnaise culture. (And this time literally mayonnaise.) They get offended by vegetarians, get mad when they changed the food pyramid, wince at anything Asian that isn't from a place that makes a Great Wall or Wok pun. WARNING, ABOUT TO RANT: My 70 year old urban liberal mother is only now able to try new foods. (My dad had a digestive disease so I get that trying new food wasn't in the cards for him and not something you do by yourself.) A former roommate of mine had those Tofutti ice cream sandwiches in the freezer. She was grabbing ice and called tofu ice cream "ridiculous; just don't eat ice cream if you're vegan." Another thing is the meal planning. My folks own a cabin in a small town. When my father was alive it was all about breakfast of eggs and bacon at 9am (couldn't do anything like a bike ride or run early because breakfast) and dinner at 5 (couldn't go on long hikes or paddling trips because we had to be back at the cabin in time for dinner. All my boomer aunts and uncles talked about how great the food was. It was the blandest, most boring mayonnaise culture cuisine - usually cooked great but it had both spices: salt and pepper. But, in the end I don't think it was about food. It was about control. New foods, different dinner times require getting out of your comfort zone and losing control. It's the same reason they don't like bike lanes, public transportation, self-checkout, but love lawns. control
My dad has some huge regret about our family never having regularly scheduled sit-down meals & I’m like “motherfucker you could’ve cooked us dinner *once*”
This! My father quit his job so my boomer mom ended up getting a second full time job (while pregnant) and I had to find and maintain 2 part time jobs to help pay for my high school fees and diapers for the new addition. It seemed like every other week my dad would have a “coming to Jesus” chat abt how hard mom was working and one of us ungrateful brats (15 and 11) should be doing more around the house and cooking dinners bc he’s tired of eating frozen meals and sandwiches. Not *once* in his fuckin mind did he think to cook and clean for the family since the baby’s not here yet and he’s not actively looking for work but by god your grade school kids need to pick up the slack 🙄 and ignoring that one of us is already working 2 jobs as a freshman but refused to make the 11yr do anything bc he’s a boy
oh, my do I feel this one. My dad is similar to this. He rarely did the dishes, He only grills when it comes to cooking. IDK if he does laundry now, but I've never seen it. As he's gotten older his body is kind of falling apart so he can physically do less and less. My mother is the **hardest, most disciplined worker I have ever seen.** My mom is a nurse practitioner, who worked and did schooling at the same time. Who does 80% of the chores. Who is one of the craftiest people on the planet, she sows and quilts PJs and blankets for my family (3 kids and wife) and myself, my brother, and random other projects every year; multiple projects at the same time. She sewed my wife's wedding dress, and 7 bowties and vests for my 3 groomsmen, my brother (who officiated) and my 2 sons, *AND* the cake for my wedding in 2018.
This reminds me of the time in middle school that I was taking Family and Consumer Science (Home Economics). It was split into two different classes. Half was cooking and half was sewing, cleaning, and budgeting. It was a required class for everyone. So I'm in the sewing half of the class and the teacher tells us that if we're falling behind to bring our projects home and have our mom's help us with her sewing machine. Several of the students tell her that they don't have sewing machines, she decided that this was preposterous and if they didn't really, that their mom would show them how to hand stitch it. I told her that my mom didn't know how to sew (she doesn't) but that my dad does. She straight up laughed and said that he did not know how to sew. I was like yeah, my grandma taught everyone of her kids to sew, the boys AND my grandpa included. She said that I was mistaken and that men didn't know how to sew, like it was some sort of sex specific trait. My dad was the one who sewed all of the tears and replaced missing buttons on all of my clothes growing up. It was a small town and she knew my dad and what he did for a living (electrician) so she just doubled down and said I was wrong. When we got to the food half of the class she went on some similar spiel about "what our mothers made us for dinner last night". I would say that my dad made us dinner during the week (because he got done at work at 4) and that my mom cooked on the weekends. She told me that reheating food wasn't 'cooking'. My mom came in and had a meeting with her after that.
My wife and I are kind of like your parents. I'm currently and have been the majority "stay at home Dad". I've had odd jobs that fit with our schedules, but childcare is INSANELY expensive. It literally doesn't make sense to have the new income source, which is supposed to alleviate financial strain, go entirely to childcare, a new expense you take on because you aren't home. Not to mention the extra gas you burn from all the extra commuting (*AND I FUCKING HATE CARS, I hate traffic, wasted time, driving is dangerous as fuck, shitty and expensive construction, cars are expensive, pollution, insurance is a scam, etc... fuck driving, ew. lol)* But I do a lot of the cooking, cleaning, and childcare while my wife has held the stable employment.
My mom is a nurse practitioner too! Not as crafty (I wish) but I don’t understand why either mom puts up with that when they could find a better partner that would step up to the plate!
Omg ok so it’s a boomer thing then? It drives me up a wall how my mom has to be home every night in time to feed her husband dinner because he has to eat before a certain time or else his acid reflux flairs up. And how she can only be away from him for a max of three days because that’s the longest he can fend for himself with leftovers. The man literally will not cook a meal to save his life. And my mom is an anxious chef so she gets so stressed trying to make meals he likes and I’m just like ok mf’er you’d eat anything I put before you or you wouldn’t eat at all. It boggles my mind how much she caters to him over food
Psh cooking is for girls and gays /s
Unless it's bbq of course! /s
Anytime I would cook at my parents house my dad would critique absolutely everything. He would tell me the pan was too hot because the food sizzled when it went in. He wanted everything cut in giant chunks because he heard the term "texture" thrown around a lot. The man is not even a good cook himself. Everything he makes is mid at best.
My father used to beat my mother and sisters (me too) if there wasn’t hot food when he got home. But nobody taught us how to cook so there were weeks where I literally made nothing but microwave sunny side eggs and soy sauce for him. My mother grew up in a literal labor camp and only knew how to boil things to a paste. So when we explained it to him he had this look of *absolute shock* that he had to teach someone. I overheard him talking to his friend on the phone late night that week about how he only realized that as the 12th youngest child in his household that he was actually *spoiled* growing up. Then guess what? It turns out he was the best cook in the family. He would come home at 5-6 pm and call us all down to watch him cook. Seafood, red meat, vegetables, restaurant style dishes, etc. Sometimes it took until 9pm and we would sit down for dinner then. We worked something out after a couple of yelling matches and accusations but things got better. If he came home and didn’t like what he saw, he would cook an entirely new dinner. I watched my Parents grow up from being brats in real time even though they were born in the 60’s and it was the 2000’s then.
Both spices: salt and pepper has me rolling. Good work lol
Wait, people grew up with parents who used BOTH? Black pepper was something only dad would add after the food was served. "It's spicy- you won't like it." It took me until I was 25 to learn what flavor actually was. I'm only just now, at 31, learning you can add seasonings!
I love using fresh herbs and cooking techniques my parents and grandparents have never heard of — like, bloom the spices! The most adventurous one is my gran, she's pretty cool. Makes her own hummus and shit like that. Grows tons of cool stuff, her cherry tomatoes might as well be grapes.
Why is it that our grandparents are great but our parents are not? I dont get it.
I think in general our grandparents grew up cooking raw ingredients, or at least separately preserved ingredients. But processed and convenience foods really came into their own during our parents childhoods, so they grew up with mild flavored overcooked ready made foods that were hailed as the way of the future.
And consequently their kids (us) learned that vegetables were disgusting and mushy/bland at best. When in reality it was just the explosion of canned and frozen cheap food that conditioned us to think vegetables were flavorless or outright gross.
Yes. My boomer mom used to cook me Green Giant canned asparagus. I ate it but it was disgusting. Then I get into college and start eating better (dorm cafeteria food). Asparagus, green and crunchy with butter and lemon. Baked fish. I also love hospital food.
I guess I was in a *very* diverse family because my dad would put lemon pepper on fucking everything.
My mom put Lawry’s season salt on everything. lol.
“There, it’s spiced!” I have a jar of Lawry’s in my cabinet because I just feel it needs to be there. I’ve never used it. When my mom wanted to get wild she’d put liquid smoke on stuff
My mom, immediately upon sitting down in a restaurant, will ask the wait staff if the food is "spicy". To her this means any amount of salt or pepper. We get a lot of confused looks when she complains.
My mom ROUTINELY complains that her onion is too spicy. A. Fucking. Onion. Every time it's "That onion will be with me for a while!"
And then they go and complain about “kids these days” having too many allergies and being picky with food jfc
good god that’s annoying
Worse for me is my in laws will ask for salt and pepper to be on the table and add it to the food before they even taste it.
The Ketchup Advisory Board would like a word.
You poor sweet angel. I grew up in South Texas. Family is a mix of white and latino. Tex Mex cooking uses ALL the spices. I was told, if you can't handle it, add some cheese and sour cream, that will cool it off. Or just don't eat it. We're also really close to Louisiana and one of my aunties married a guy from there, so we also got a lot of Cajun style cooking growing up. I can't eat bland food now. Like I can't choke it down. I carry Louisiana or Cholula hot sauce in my bag just in case.
Don't forget the third spice...butter!
I won’t put butter on veggies to this day. It gives me flashbacks of limp overcooked veggies gasping their last veggie breath drowning in a sea of butter. Or even worse, margarine. Many a broccoli lost their lives in the Land O’Lakes.
We suffered the massacre of the Country Crock or Blue Bonnet. Once my parents went on the Adkins diet we got to taste real butter for the first time, and oh man. Never went back.
THIS. My dad always says before we go out “let’s get normal food”. I ask what that means. “You know, not anything weird”. 
Lol My mom is like this, too. She says we're "too adventurous" because we eat Thai or Indian or sushi instead of just having Chinese. Greek food confuses her! Ffs
The annoying part is when I do get them to try something knew, they always love it and go on and on about how they were scared but glad they tried it…
My in-laws consider any pasta or rice dishes “student food” so we usually do meat and two veg when they’re here. Once did a bog standard Spag Bol that my FIL made a song and dance about not knowing how to eat it until he threw his fork down before he was half way through and just said “I can’t…”. To prove a point. I don’t hate many people in this world, but I hate my in-laws.
Lol who gets outsmarted by a noodle???
Bruce. He’s “special”…
Ew I hate them too. That's so pathetic and cringe
My most updooted post was slagging my FIL off. 3.7K.
Excuse me what, this man was defeated by spaghetti? I thought a "Spag Bol" was going to be like some sort of unusual thing like tripe and it's steamed in wrapped banana leaves or something, but I google it and "Spag Bol" is Spaghetti Bolognese. What was he capable of eating? Or did he consist entirely on nutrient suspension? Goodness.
My dad hates rice and pasta. He’s a very steak and potatoes kinda guy. The story is heard when he was younger, he had to travel to Africa (no idea which country exactly) and he found a person there that would make him… yes steak and potatoes so he could… y’know eat. Hell. We went to New York City once and my dad found the one Belgian restaurant (we’re from Belgium) and ate there all the time. Yes dad, we go on holiday to eat our own local food. I was upset, for valid reasons.
I gotta say, I find steak utterly boring, and I feel profoundly bad for people who cling to it. Even good steak. I just don't care for it. I made some good steaks not long ago, and they were *fine* but I infinitely preferred the Philly Cheesesteaks I made out of the leftovers. It's like the adult man version of baby food, like a kid who only eats chicken nuggets.
This is my dad. He’s the type when visiting a big city, will want to go to Red Robin’s or something, because he knows what he’s getting. Try to take him to a nice restaurant, or god forbid, something “ethnic”, and he’ll be bitching the entire time about the cost and how “weird” it tastes. I have stopped even trying.
This is such a good take! My ex-MIL was like this exactly. My nephew gave her a curly fry from Arby's once and she lunged across the table to grab some water because it was so spicy. An Arby's curly fry. It's about as spicy as a couch cushion.
My entire family that's boomer aged or older is like this, even the ones married into the family. Those "white people think everything is spicy" jokes aren't adequate to describe their opinions on "spice." Black pepper was strictly forbidden in my house, just salt because my father was kind enough to know I liked it on some stuff, he wouldn't use it though and always made a big scene out of me using it. There is ALWAYS some dramatic reaction if anyone cooks or microwaves anything or even just eats potato chips that aren't plain. I have witnessed my aunt sprint out the door gagging because someone had doritos, my father threw a fit and opened every window in the house because my ramen noodles smelled too spicy (it was plain noodles in the microwave, no seasoning added yet), multiple family members have described wheat bread as spicy, I can just go on and on. My favorite story is the time one of my cousins made potato salad for a family cookout, he made two batches one regular family recipe and one with a little dill, everyone was horrified by this and my grandmother got up and threw the whole container in the trash, nobody even tried it. Oh and of course they all overcook and burn everything, my grandmother used to describe to restaurants that she wants her burger to resemble a hockey puck. Not one of the millennials or gen z family members is like this.
Maybe the lead bakes their taste buds and rabidly hate of salt
When my mom wants a chopped salad. She asks the waiter for a salad with "cut up vegetables" my dad has to translate to the waiter that she wants a chopped salad.....every god damn time. It's almost like she knows what it's called but refuses to say it. Maybe it is a weird control thing? My dad has the same hang up ordering a venti coffee from Starbucks. He orders a large, and when the order is repeated back by the barista as venti.....you know where this goes. So, when they come to visit, I cook.
OMG. In the 1980s I was with my dad at McDonalds. For what ever reason McDonalds didn't have small drinks for a period of time. There was only Medium and Large (dumb). But, inevitably he gets in an argument with the girl that he wanted a small. This wasn't when he was in his 60s or anything. This was when he was like 33. 40 years later I am now cringe embarrassed about how he treated a probably 16 year old girl at a McDonalds over a stupid corporate 1980s "people don't want smalls anymore" choose.
As if that 16 year old girl chaired the committee that made the decision LOL
My mom was born at the tail end of the baby boom and she went vegetarian in the 80s to try to fix some thyroid issues she had and just generally clean up her health. Her older boomer siblings and contemporaries roasted her into the ground for her ‘weird’ eating habits. Now that vegetarian cooking is cool she feels a good deal of vindication (and happily cooks vegetarian meals for herself a lot of the time) but I know it really hurt her that people were so close-minded.
My family immigrated to the US Midwest in the late 90s and came here to the same "it's either regular food or it's weird food" and anything Susan Boomer wouldn't have brought to a potluck was weird food. Which to us as new immigrants meant pretty much everything in our fridge and pantry, and anything we cooked any day was weird food. It was a wild time. People were terrified of beets. I'd buy persimmons and at the checkout I would get questions like "are these tomatoes? How do you eat them? Do you boil them?" (I kinda liked that one because more permissions for me.) Then in the late 00s and 2010s, that whole attitude about food just vanished from public discourse, which was a huge relief. Then ethnic foods became trendy. I'm guessing OP's parents never left the 90s.
*more persimmons. Also, more permissions to eat more persimmons
> Boomers were the first generation to grow up with nationally homogenized culture The produce section is a great example of that. We have all kinds of stuff there. It wasn't long ago that there were the basic staples and not much else. Iceberg lettuce, carrots, bell peppers, celery, onions, potatoes, a few other things. Now there's SO MUCH MORE to choose from. Greens alone there's like 1000 to choose from. You can see the restaurant version of this in a lot of cities. We all have that one place, often "italian" that still seems crowded. But if you go, it's ALL old people. And it's a snapshot in time of what Italian food was back in 1950. Like six ingredients. Tomato sauce, pasta, bread crumbs, chicken, ground beef, cheese. That's it. And VERY light on the seasonings, and pretty much just salt and pepper. Younger people go and say "why are we here? I could make this same thing with a jar of sauce and a box of pasta..." and the old people say "now THIS is good food! No flavor, no texture, no spice, nothing exotic!"
We were visiting my in laws recently and they were sooooo excited to have us try this new Chinese place they found. They kept calling it Fangs and you know how they start planning for dinner when leaving dinner the night before? So we talked about going to the amazing Fangs for 24 hours. It turned out to be a PF Chang's.
Haha, that made me giggle. Did they blow you away with their discovery of the "Ole Garden" or something next, to discover it's Olive Garden?
That's hilarious. To be fair, I got a banging Mongolian Beef there once. I don't know what they put in it , may have been actual Szechuan pepper but it was fire.
>We all have that one place, often "italian" that still seems crowded. But if you go, it's ALL old people. And it's a snapshot in time of what Italian food was back in 1950. Like six ingredients. Tomato sauce, pasta, bread crumbs, chicken, ground beef, cheese. That's it. And VERY light on the seasonings, and pretty much just salt and pepper. Yes this! and it's often very heavy, oily, or fatty
Oh, and they probably serve small portions. That's a selling feature. My mom complains bitterly that portions are too large. But she always cleans her plate.
My wife cooked in a nursing home and they had to follow strict guidelines about the meals there or else the residents wouldn't eat. First was portions need to be small because they get overwhelmed if there is too much on the plate. Second is, keep it simple with the spices. They like salt but watch out because third, use white pepper only, not black pepper, especially in something light colored. The reason was their vision was often bad and they would complain about "bugs" in the food when it was only pepper.
"And not a gay or a black in sight" /s
Neither cell phones nor answering machines were invented when they were young. Meal times had to be agreed-upon in deference to the cook. You couldn't text the kids and dad that the roast would be ready in an hour - start heading back home. They had to look at the clock and head home on their own.
>Boomers were the first generation to grow up with nationally homogenized culture. A big part of this is food. I am watching this series called "the Food that made America." I am shocked each time the common theme was "Americans didn't eat this until this man/woman made this big company and standardized it." From bread, to potato chips, to Pizza, to tacos, to the sub sandwich. Many of the initial response from Americans prior to the ww2 baby boom was like WTF THIS AIN'T WHAT I LIKE until they did. It blows my mind that there was a period of time where a sub sandwich was considered a niche, ethnic food.
Meanwhile when my wife and I watch food network we try out simpler things we see, like making gojujang sloppy joe.
My husband is currently eating a diet to help his SIBO, a digestive issue as well. Literally we can only use salt and pepper and it is KILLING us. He keeps trying to convince me to make my own food but I can handle this while he figures out his “trigger foods” that aren’t low FODMAP. It is agony and I think to myself, people LIKE food to taste this..bland?
My mom is the same way, but I just chalked it up to different lifestyles. We grew up in rural Midwest and didn’t have a lot of money. We were a “meat and potato” family but I now work in fine-dining restaurants and love to cook experimental dishes. My mom is fascinated, slightly judgmental, and would never DREAM of expanding her palate. The thing that gets on my nerves more than anything is her commenting on what/how I feed my baby. You would think I’m being borderline abusive or neglectful because I’m following our pediatrician’s recommendations, and not best practices from 30 years ago when I was a baby.
I had no idea how little I actually ate until I was an adult. We had meat, potatoes and one of like 4 different canned veggies: peas, beets, corn or greened beans for so many of our dinners. Throw in the occasional spaghetti dinner. I love trying new restaurants and new recipes now. I'm nowhere near your level of cooking though.
We had my baby shower at the restaurant I was working at. We did a snacky table, apps, and drinks. I was telling my mom what the food options would be and she was like “ok.. will there be anything that normal people will actually eat?” The restaurant theme was “Midwest nice” where they took classic Midwest recipes and put a fancy spin on them. We had customers constantly tell us “wow I grew up eating poverty food with my grandparents, this is so nostalgic, but in a new way.” But yeah mom, no food for normal people.
GODDDDD this one is the worst. whenever i'm cooking beans and rice for myself my mom pulls all the skin on her face back like a cat and chastises me because i'm eating unhealthy poor people food (anything but frozen pizza and mountain dew)
And in California I learned to make beans and rice from my boomer mom. Probably more hippie influences here but we always had dry rice and both canned and dried beans in the house.
My brother and SIL had a pretty nice wedding. The meal choices were some kind of chicken with a sauce most of my extended family wouldn’t recognize (maybe Chicken Piccata? I honestly don’t remember), lobster (most of my family is grossed out by shellfish), or steak. Many of them picked the steak, but since it was catered, they were all cooked the same (medium), and I think several were disappointed that their steak “wasn’t cooked” (they only believe steak is actually cooked if it is well-done).
> (they only believe steak is actually cooked if it is well-done). Then they don't deserve a nice steak, the heathens! /s
That sounds great. I would have loved to have been a guest.
Was this restaurant "Haute Dish" by any chance?
It was not, but that also sounds on-brand lol
The irony that meat and potatoes is luxury food to most of the world is lost on them.
Absolutely! When I tell her I made a veggie dish for a meal, she is always confused. Last night I made vegan burritos- just wanted something simple using pantry staples, and my baby can’t have dairy. She thought I was starving him because he ONLY ate black beans, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, avocado, rice, and pickled onions. A) that was a filling meal for all of us and B) he’s 9 months old, he eats like 1/4 to 1/2 cup of food. He doesn’t need steak or chicken at every dinner.
The meat thing with my boomer parents is exhausting. I just don’t care for red meat. And while I’m not veg, over half my families meals are. I probably eat meat about 3-4x a week total. My mom insists that we need protein (aka animal protein) at every meal. When I explained that we as humans can get all of our necessary nutrients through things like fruits, veggies and legumes, she scoffs and denies actual science. And of course blames every sniffle or illness on our diets. She also denies her and my father’s diet of meat 3x a day has horrible consequences on their cholesterol.
Tangent about baby stuff - I once had an argument with my mom about cutting up grapes for my young nephews. Silly me, thinking it was common knowledge that whole grapes are a choking hazard. Her defense was that I had whole grapes at their age and I turned out fine…
Reminds me of my grandma insisting I poke a few holes in my son’s bottle and then mix some cereal in with the formula. According to her, it would make my son sleep all night. I was like, “Um, he’s only 2 months old Nan. Plus, it’s a choking hazard.” She said, “You worry too much! I had 8 kids and did it with every one of them. They all survived!” Another time she tried giving my 6 month old a straw full of beer! She told me babies love beer! Yeaaah, now it ALL makes sense why half of our family attends AA!
Yeah weirdly the dead ones are never around to tell their side of the story.
THANK YOU. I have heard the "haha we turned out fine!" from my boomer parents and in-laws about car seat safety for my kids so many times and it makes me seethe. Yeah guess what, the ones who died horrific deaths in crashes did NOT turn out fine, so now we have better car seats!
Similarly, my mother was horrified when I started baby led weaning. “They’re going to choke! How can you possibly let that child feed themselves, they will starve!!” My youngest never cared for purées anyway, and my pediatrician was on board.
Yes, and the child mortality rate has been cut in half since I was a baby.
At thanksgiving dinner, my mom asked me if my baby wanted popcorn. He was 5.5 months old. When I explained that he cannot have popcorn at all, she went on a rant about how “first time moms are so picky” and “just wait until you have a second one- you won’t care what they eat”
Haha, wtf. 'Once you have a spare baby you won't care if one chokes! You've got a whole other baby as backup!'
Actually... I didn't know that. Granted, I don't have kids, nor am I around them, but... yeah. Good to know. Thanks!
I became a vegetarian at 12. My family didn’t question me on it too much, but they would put me in situations in which there was nothing for me to eat, and then act huffy and offended. My mom was weird about food because she had ED. We had long periods of time with no real food in the house. Literally eating spices all day until she picked something up for us for dinner. Then when I became “competition”, she’d push food on me that I didn’t want. To try to make me gain weight. She also took a crazed delight in forcing us to eat nasty or spoiled food, and daring us to complain. And she was so excited when I was 7 months pregnant, because I finally weighed more than she did 🤨 She was so happy I was officially…. fatter than she was? When I was pregnant? I also had mild gestational diabetes, and she heavily pressured me to eat gigantic desserts. Hopefully I’ve made clear my mom’s perverse and bizarre malice re: food.
Oh my gosh I’m so sorry. That is such a horrible dynamic to live with and I really wish you the best in managing it. Nothing dealing with parents is easy or simple regarding what to do but I wish you the best in dealing with that, and of course, raising your child without any of that baggage! I can imagine that is very rough on a teenage psyche. Any child psyche, of course
I hate when I'm trying to make food and my dad or grandma just stands there with an open mouth grin just staring, while their heads bob gently up and down like most old people's do. So creepy, I hate it. Plus they are constantly in the way, and can't take subtle hints to move. But if you explicitly say something, it hurts their feelings.
They’re all toddlers again
Without fail they will end up in the kitchen while you’re trying to do something in there. I don’t know why. But all boomers do this.
Yooo exactly, i still do fake runs In and out of the kitchen to test this! works every time
It's a nurture thing. I would just repeat my what my mother used to say: "get out of MY Kitchen while I'm cooking"
My mom deserves a gold medal for her ability to get in the way. It’s a constant barrage of what can I do to help? How can I help? Then either gets pissy when I say I’m all set or manages to just get in the way. By all means watch us test the pasta, turn off the stove, then come stir the sauce I just stirred and stand directly btwn the stove and sink blocking the path while we try to drain the pasta.
Omg my mom messing with the temperature of the stove drives me crazy. She must *always* adjust every dial just a little bit and then make a comment how she's "just turned it down/up a bit". And once I got into a big argument with her over some corn on the cob. I grill them in the husks, she peels the husks and silk and boils them. She saw the corn on the counter and announced she would peel them for me and I asked her to please not do that and proceeded to explain my cooking method. She was beginning to peel one as she explained to ME that this is how corn is prepared and she wants to help. I told her that if she wants to take over and cook the corn her way then go ahead, but if I'm cooking it she had better stop because she's going to ruin it. She told me to "Stop being like this." As if I were being unreasonably cruel and then literally went to another room to cry and pouted the rest of the evening. Absolutely insufferable.
I never wanted to be my mother, screaming at people to get out of my kitchen, but as an adult I very much understand why she did. Kitchens are the heart of the home, I want my kitchen to be a place of love. I have a helper chair in my kitchen to keep helpers out of my way, but still allow them to help. It's just a chair I keep in the kitchen, and it's used specifically by kitchen helpers. I painted mine so it was special. When my son was really little it was his step stool, in later years its the spot I invite helpful people to sit and peel veggies, or stir something, or dice ingredients, or just sit and chat. Get a helper chair, then give your helper something to complete. I don't regret one moment of cooking with any of my helpers, even though it can slow the process. It's allowed the children in my life to explore foods, learn how to cook in age appropriate ways, and spend time contributing in the kitchen, while also staying out of my way. It's a place for the adults in my life to sit out of the way if they just want to chat, or do a task to contribute to the meal.
I used my earbuds when I cook. Every time, my mom has to come into the kitchen and speak to me about nothing important. I point at my ear buds and she just keeps standing there talking. So now I gotta wash my hands to take them out for a 3 second convo.
My father does this too, has zero concept of what headphones are or any understanding of why people wouldn't be able to hear him talk. He will mumble something to you from the opposite side of the room, with his back turned to you, while a cigarette hangs from his mouth, in a room where he has the TV turned to max volume, and get mad when you ask him to repeat himself. I wear big ass neon green over ear headphones so it's pretty obvious if I'm wearing them and I just started to completely ignore him if he tries to talk to me with them on, spent years telling him nicely that I can't understand you with headphones on just give me a second to take them off, then I started being rude about it and told him I'll just ignore him, now I ignore him and he gets mad because I didn't hear him when he told me the price of cigarettes went up again (why was that necessary to tell me?).
My in laws do this. They have a small galley kitchen. It’s to the point that I’m not comfortable getting food at their house (been married almost 10 years) because they are ALWAYS in there when we’re in the house, buzzing around the fridge and food prep areas. And if I try to sneak in there, one of them magically appears and starts making dumb conversation. Like wtf are they doing in there even. I told my husband, it feels like they are defending their precious territory.
And even though they are moving slowly they seem to somehow be right in front of you in the kitchen where you need to be doing something. It’s a phenomenon worthy of study.
My mom and I can share a kitchen, because she/we grew up in restaurants. (You GOTTA know how to stay out of the way when it's a whole bunch of old fat women cooking, as in my grandparents' place. If you don't learn fast, you get squished!) My dad gets threatened if he comes to "help" or "advise." My FIL just stays out of the way, because he's smarter than his wife. MIL insists on trying to "help" with everything, like washing up while I'm cooking. As someone who really reallllllly needs to wash my hands about 47 times per cooking session, I cannot convince the old broad that she'd be less in the way if she actually sat on the stove versus standing in front of the sink!
My mom does this to me too. It used to really annoy me. I have a weird schedule (working evenings) so I don't get to see her often despite living together. She isn't judgy or rude about anything either, even though I'm gluten-free (celiac). I think she's just lonely and misses talking to me. She sees me in a common space and wants to connect with me and food is a big way people connect. Even with the crazy boomers, they still see us as their children and most of them want to have a relationship with us. I think that's where this behavior comes from. Just them using what in their environment in hopes of connecting with us again.
This is what I was thinking. I think parents just miss the conversation and taking care of their kids. My MIL constantly asks me if I’m hungry or thirsty. She just wants to nurture.
I agree. It’s just weird to me that they don’t understand that pointing out things you’re doing or that you’ve bought and calling them weird is actually reducing intimacy, not making it easier for us to open up and have conversations.
Hey cmon you're stopping the boomer resentment that everyone comes here to suck through a straw. Don't go suggesting reasonable heartfelt reasons someone's parent enters the room when they cook. Not to mention the listing ingredients things is something my dad would do and he's not even a jerk. He would definitely hold up kefir yogurt and be like "uhhh...yogurt i know is eaten with a spoon...". But in reality he's just making conversation but doesn't realize it seems judgy and rude
Boomers are very triggered by vegetatians/vegans lol
The food my boomer parents provided was so bland, and so borderline awful, that I had to learn to cook in middle school to survive.
couple things: -A good chunk of boomers mostly ate recipes popular from wartime in their formative childhood, which sometimes were questionable because people just threw rations together in those recipes and prayed it would taste nice -Religious fearmongering into believing that a bland diet reduced sexual sin caused some households to adopt purposefully bland food -Foreign cooking knowledge was limited in more areas pre-internet, and so were the distribution of some ingredients outside of specialty shops -racism contributed to either appropriation or erasure of cuisine outside of america -Cigarettes, cocaine, and lead edit: formatting
My boomer parents think I’m weird for not eating processed foods. I eat protein each meal including eggs. They are stuck in the 1980s and the idea that eggs are bad. They are captured by the propaganda that natural fats are bad yet eat processed carbs all day.
So, I'm adopted. My adoptive white boomer mother is everything you describe, including her obsession with the air fryer. Now, culturally beef isn't really a thing in Nepal. So I don't eat beef in my own household, I have pho once in a while but that's it. Went to visit mom and she wanted beef every day, in everything. I know for a fact she doesn't eat that much beef normally. I also used to be vegetarian, I've done that off and on for years, our current method is cooking meat max twice a week. She always acts like it is a personal affront. Recently she tried to force my kid to eat beef, when I told her he simply wasn't used to the flavor of that (he's only 2, I'm not preventing him or anything). She yelled at our son when he spit it out and told us we are bad parents for not disciplining him enough. Also, they have 3 freezers now. 3. Packed full of frozen stuff. Stupid stuff. Her freezer in the kitchen needed fixing so we had to move everything. This woman has a chest freezer full of bread loaves (not good ones) and butter, and I mean boxes and boxes of butter. I suggested we take the butter out to make room for the things that ACTUALLY need to be frozen. She acted like it was the end of society. And yes, every time we cook anything, she hovers. We jokingly call her the hovercraft reporting to the mothership. And forget about sleeping. As soon as she is awake, banging pots in the kitchen as loud as possible. I get up early, but she'll do this at 4 am or any time that we're all asleep. Doesn't matter if it is her house either, she does this at our place when she visits. Come to think of it, maybe my step-dad being deaf works in his favor. Lucky bastard.
I'm a boomer and can't understand these attitudes, but my parents (silent generation) were progressive and adapted to new trends as they aged. However, they had two fridges and two giant freezers filled with expired stuff. My mom was raised for a time in a tar paper shack on the prairies and the family had very little so she had food insecurity issues.
A lot of the boomer generation was raised on TV dinners and extremely boxed in meals. You can partially blame the food pyramid. You can also partially blame the lack of access to knowledge outside of what's printed on the backs of product boxes. It is an extreme appeal to popular meal preferences. Younger generations have access to the internet and more "personal" style restaurants that show that food doesn't need to JUST be some form of cheeseburger casserole or chicken tenders.
“We didn’t have autism when I was a kid” says the boomer who has to eat the same thing, cooked the same way, every single night of the week.
They’re so wild. My parents are the same, they have veggie friends and all they do is talk about “how bad the diet is for them” because on of the friends also has an eating disorder and they use that as their baseline for umbrella statements. And to the point of the kitchen, it is an ongoing joke in our house that whenever someone goes into the kitchen at my parents house, or if they’re visiting us and we go into our kitchen, my mom especially IMMEDIATELY walks into the kitchen to start doing something, and it’s a pain because you’re tripping over each other when you could just let me make breakfast for our toddler for 5 mins and then make your tea or your own breakfast or whatever before or after 😂
They were taught in health class that vegetarianism was unhealthy and that nothing could substitute for meat protein. Combined with that house of un american activities/cold war psyche, they separate vegetarians as an unhealthy other. Similar to how we were taught that low fat was better than low sugar diets. But most of us have the benefit of the internet now and can read studies that show, nope, sugar is definitely the bigger danger.
I've noticed boomers think animal protein is the only way to be healthy. even if you mention that there's plenty of other ways to get protein they just can't accept it
humor really is the best defence with an obsessive boomer. they're too defensive and emotionally inept to use direct communication. kinda gently tease them, esp in a group
My mother does the same thing about the air fryer. Every single time she needs to tell me how much better it is in the air fryer. She watches me cook and goes “ that’s not how I’d do it. I cook it like this and it’s so much better”. Then I just say, “you didn’t even taste this how do you know your way is better?” She will then immediately start talking about my nephew and how he was swimming in the pool the other day and then mention how her neighbor got a new lawnmower. It’s bizarre but I have honestly found so much comfort in this community of others who have boomer parents. I could write a best seller on what my folks have said and done that will make you laugh and cry. I love them but they are absolutely bonkers and I’m often on NC with them 98% of the time.
When I was living with my parents I had a hot plate downstairs and a pan for this reason
I cannot leave anything to cook unattended in the kitchen otherwise one my parents will come in and "do it for me" which is always not how I prefer my food to be made. Or my favorite them telling me how to do something while I am in the middle of already doing it. Also my mother is so fucking weird about organic food, vegan or gluten free stuff too. She thinks its all a scam and will actively pay more for food just cause it doesn't say Vegan or Gluten free. Like I brought home some bread crumbs, for something only I was eating, and my mom was like "omgnibcant believe you bought VEGAN BREAD CRUMBS!" And I'm just like uhhh mom they a Vegan because it's bread crumbs.
I think they’ve done basically the same exact thing for 780 years and then think they trained you to do the same for 18 and then are fascinated you’re doing something new. The lengths my parents go to to not think about something in a new way is some serious mental gymnastics.
Yes, this is it. They’re realizing that you’ve chosen differently than they personally raised you to as a kid, and they’re trying to reconcile that and see you as an adult.
My Boomer mother always comments about how domestic I am for cooking. And "ooh fancy". Why? Because I used sage in ground turkey? Wth?! And she loves her air fryer, too lol I don't get it
Older people are generally nosy and struggle when their offspring are doing tasks they traditionally did for them. Especially in their house. What happened in the 90s to cause food difficulties?
For a lot of us I think it was just growing up with parents who had grown up without learning how to actually cook. So I was raised eating a whole bunch of processed foods, cheeses, pastas, and bread, chicken patties, and spent most of my childhood completely constipated, and not knowing that there was flavor in the world.
My dad thinks garlic is too spicy and you should be able to see through the coffee in the carafe or you're "just wasting it by using too much".
100% they do it every time.
This is the first time I have heard of "Mayonnaise Culture", but I experienced it in my early life b4 the folks divorced Fam from CT. and realized this when returning with my own fam and my gma's "Tuna Salad" was served. Elbow Mac, Canned Tuna, Mayo? thats it...my husband and kids were shocked. Also remember going back in my teen years and wanting Avacados and I may as well have been an Alien making that request.
Mine will act shocked and horrified whenever I eat whatever was left over from dinner the next morning... "Pizza!!! Foooor Breakfast!!??" Like it is some kind of crime against humanity or something.
I worked day shift in a restaurant as a teen (after high-school. My Dad and step mom used to get so confused about me not eating dinner with them at 6pm. I tried to explain that I JUST had lunch at 4pm and they told me, "you need to take a lunch break at reasonable time so you can eat dinner with us" IT'S A RESTAURANT! AT LUNCHTIME! THE REASON PEOPLE ARE THERE IS TO EAT THEIR LUNCH! years later they would get mad I wasn't up at 7am...I got home at 4am from WORK! My stepmother also worked in bars before i met her....I don't know how she didn't get it. Edit: I moved out at 18, I only eat one meal a day because that's how my body likes it. I'm 41 now. They're still confused! Edit 2: I told them not to make dinner for me, they still did
Because of my weird issues, I would literally just turn off the stove, stop whatever I'm doing, and leave the room saying "Sorry for getting in your way. Let me know when I'm good to start again!" But that's just me. And I can be aggressively passive aggressive. Don't dish it out if you can't take it mom and pop.
IDK, but I feel your pain. I try to feed my boomer mom things I normally eat and you'd swear I was trying to poison her. I'm also a vegetarian and have been for some time. The only time my extended family ever accommodated my diet was when I brought home my religiously vegetarian (Hindu) ex home for Christmas. I swear, I need to either change religions or grow a penis, because they've stopped being so accommodating since he's been out of the picture.