Why are almost all of our food revulsions directed at foods of animal origin?

Maybe because spoiled animal products are more likely to kill you.

Ah, no. I have stomach-turning revulsion to several vegetables, including parsnips, turnips and most forms of squash. I “don’t like” some animal products, but considering some of the things that I’ve eaten in India and Indonesia (without asking many questions, but following the lead of my hosts), I’m not so worried about that.

Except “spoiled animal products”, yeah. That’s not cool.

I’m also reading Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken, about Louis Zampirini and his pilot friend’s survival across the Pacific through 46 days of privation in a life raft with next to no survival supplies, followed by over two hellish years of captivity in Japanese POW (and torture) camps. She describes an albatross (and later, a shark) that they killed on the raft “that smelled like ammonia” when they opened it up, intending to eat it. Not many vegetables have odors like that, I think.

@CWOTUS I’m guessing, though, that your opinions about parsnips, turnips and squash are based on having tried them at some point. But wouldn’t you say that most people would find the idea of eating an eyeball so revolting that they wouldn’t even try it? I think that animal foods just tend to come with a higher psychological barrier to even trying them than do plant foods. I’m willing to believe you might be an exception to this, but I doubt you’re the rule.

@thorninmud

No, I’m not so exceptional (well, in that regard, anyway). I would be repulsed at the idea of eating an eyeball. But if the choice was between an eyeball and a turnip, I’d look that eyeball straight in the eye – and look for the other one, too.

@thorninmud very very interesting question. You are correct. I would much rather try an exotic/odd looking plant or vegetable as opposed to some random fowl or weird part of body.

It’s probably so because I know that a cow’s stomach is used for digestion, or that someone’s eyes are used for sight and so I can’t immediately see it as food. I can maybe relate to an animal more so than a plant so I don’t put it down to being edible. It used to be aliveee.

I’m pretty confused about this myself because this is the first time I’ve been made to think about it. But that is what comes to mind for me.

Insects are another interesting case in point. We hear all the time that they’re tasty and very nutritious. And I don’t imagine the spoilage threat being much of a factor in our revulsion toward eating bugs. There aren’t many toxic bugs to worry about. But there’s something about the thought of those innards, isn’t there?

It’s funny, because when you think about a lot of the seafood that we most enjoy and pay premium prices for, such as shrimp, crab and lobster, those are “ocean bugs”. I expect that a cooked grub (the big African kind) would be more or less indistinguishable from lobster meat, except for shape or color (where the lobster meat meets the shell is a pretty distinctive color).

In fact, in Colonial days, if your family was so poor that you couldn’t afford to eat anything else, you ate lobster and hid the shells so the neighbors wouldn’t know. It was that shameful to be so “reduced” to eating that.

How many hog anuses are there in a typical hotdog?

Probably because the average industrial human is completely divorced from any connection to their food and their own animal nature.

@ratboy Very few. They’re mostly meat scraps left over from elsewhere, and cartilege.

@CWOTUS It hurts my heart to hear that you don’t like turnips and rutabagas and squash.

I used to hate all of those things too (before I became a vegetarian) but I’ve discovered several yummy recipes for preparing those scary or icky sounding veggies and now I can’t imagine not eating them.

One of my favorites, that involves another veggie that you may be leery of is Raw Kale Salad with Root Vegetables. I always thought you had to cook kale, but this recipe shows you how to marinate the kale in apple cider vinegar, a little bit of Kosher or Sea Salt and a bit of olive oil. You massage it into the leaves and let it sit there for about 20 minutes and it tenderizes the leaves. This recipe has grated rutabagas, turnips and I even used beets. It has a pleasing sweet and sour flavor and has a nice crunch to it. It was the hit of my last potluck party.

I also love Thai Style Curried Butternut Squash Soup although I used veggie broth instead of chicken broth. Maybe you’d like this. Just roasting butternut squash or rutabaga (they’re sweet) in the oven with a little bit of salt and pepper and olive oil is divine!

I guess for me the squeamishness about eating animal products icky or otherwise stems from the idea that another life form, higher than humans, might find it perfectly OK to eat us and that just doesn’t sit well with me.

I’ve found that most people who are really picky about eating vegetables, tend to like most vegetables when they’re pickled. This recipe for Middle Eastern Style Pickled Turnips. is really yummy. I first discovered these when I ate at a Lebanese restaurant in my town and I practically at the whole bowl full of them!

Well, I will not eat anything that has looked at me, it makes me sad and grosses me out at the same time. We ate crabs once, and I had someone else break the shells so they wouldn’t look at me.

There are definitely gross animal products, but the one thing that really turns my stomach is squishy lettuce. Especially delicate leaves like mesclun mix tend to go mushy fast, and if you accidentally eat a bite of that, it’s so revolting and so…. wrong.

I would assume that it’s because both human and non-human animals are still part of the same animal kingdom. no vegetarian snark intended here, I swear!