My son has developed this interesting habit. If he is eating a package of Dare "Bear Paws" (I know, you probably don't let your child eat those unhealthy snacks), before he begins eating one, he examines both paws, decides which one has more chocolate chips, asks me for a consultation to confirm the chocolate chip numbers, and then sets aside the paw with the most chocolate chips in order to eat it last. My first reaction when he started this ritual was a bit of concern. Was he showing signs of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder at his young age? But then some of my own quirky food and eating preferences began popping into my mind.
This desire to save the "best" food item for last is something I have done for as long as I can remember! In fact, if I ate a "Bear Paw" I would likely do EXACTLY what my son does. If a plate of food has several different items on it, whether it be a meal or a plate of party appetizers, I save my favourite for last! There is something appealing about finishing and remembering the best food as the last thing I ate.
Oh boy, I feel like this post is going to turn into a full-on weirdness confessional! If you have trouble looking me in the eye after reading this, I will understand. If you will feel guilt about not being able to look me in the eye after reading this, you may want to stop reading now!
I will start off lightly. I think my next food quirk is actually pretty common and I think I am closer to the right on the spectrum of severity on this one. I don't like my food to mix on a plate. While I do like to keep different foods separate, I can still eat them if there is some inter-mingling. Although I do eat the mixed up foods first to get rid of them. And once everything is in it's proper place on the plate, I like to eat one food item at a time. For example, if I am feasting on a chicken souvlaki platter, I will eat the salad first (preferably from a different dish), then I will eat the cooked veggies. Once the veggies are gone, I then move onto the potatoes and once they are done, I will eat the chicken and rice together. I have recently been trying to push myself on this one. I have been trying to mix up my bites a bit but I don't love the mix of flavours in my mouth. I'd rather enjoy the flavours of each kind of food separately.
When I was a kid, I remember stirring up my ice cream until it was melted and in liquid form before I would eat any of it. I still do enjoy bites of melted ice cream but I seem to have grown out of the need for it to be complete liquid. Perhaps though, it is more a lack of time to sit and wait before I can start eating it, rather than actually growing out of this habit. Come to think of it, I don't actually remember the last time I sat and enjoyed a bowl of ice cream at all!
Now, I drink a lot of water and I have since I was a teenager. I drink so much water that I feel some anxiety at the thought of not having water readily available. So I have developed this other strange drinking habit of holding my last sip of water in my mouth as long as possible before I swallow it. Often this is when I am leaving the house, because of course I need to drink a few sips of water before I walk out the door! I wouldn't want to die of dehydration on my drive to work! If you ever run into me on the street and I slightly pause before saying hello and you think you see me do a slight head dip, it is quite likely that I had to swallow that last sip of water before I could speak! Weird right?!
I also only drink water with a meal. I think this quirk reflects back on not loving the mixing of flavours in my mouth. The thought of drinking milk (not my preferred drink ever, mind you!) or even a cocktail while eating, does not appeal to me at all. I do have a couple of exceptions to this rule, however. Those are coffee with a creamy dessert (delish!) and milk with warm chocolate chip cookies (yum!). I guess those flavours just work together for me. Santa's got it all figured out!
I wonder if Santa feels the same as me about dips. I feel the need to preface this one with the fact that when I am at home and enjoying some kind of dip (i.e. hummus), I occasionally dip right out of the original container. I know, I know! But rest assured, I will never serve you anything I have dipped into and I am the only person in my home eating these dips. But once I am finished dipping, I cannot put the lid back on and return the container to the fridge without making sure all the dip is cleaned off the inside of the walls of the container and the remaining dip is as level as humanly possible. And I will take as much time as it takes to make this happen! I am wincing with shame right now. I can only imagine what you all are thinking about me!
As weird as I feel right now, I know I am not the only person out there with some funny food habits. I mean seriously, there are people out there eating dirt and glass! With absolutely no science to back me up, I feel like maybe in a world where we sometimes feel as if we have very little control over what is going on around us, we develop these kinds of habits as a way to have some control over our own environments. Maybe, just maybe, that isn't so weird after all! Now please excuse me...I need to go check for the eleventh time today, that my doors are locked and the porch light is turned off.
Feel free to share your eating quirks in the comments below! I'd love to hear them!
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