One Course, or Two?

So if you know me, you know that I am not an adventurous eater at all...at least compared to the general population. However, compared to certain members of my family, I'm pretty daring. For example, I've had salmon, crab cakes, shrimp, an oyster, Clamato juice, Jaeger Schnitzel and various types of sushi. I realize that to most of you reading this, these food items are weak sauce, and occur regularly in your diet. But they are not for this raised on meat and potatoes Idaho girl. Some of them I've really liked, and others not so much. 

Most, if not all of these food adventures have occurred after I married Brian. The only thing that I have turned down and refused to try when Brian has asked me to try something during our marriage was pickled herring. I was just getting over the stomach flu and just couldn't do it. Whenever I think about pickled herring, my stomach gets a little nauseous...so I still haven't and probably never will try that one. Brian has been very understanding of my food preferences and has introduced me to new things slowly, starting with basic foods and working his way upwards. 

 Brian loves, I mean LOVES food, and is super adventurous. He once ate a pickled egg in a fish and chips place while he was in London, England on a family vacation. He tells me that the guy behind the counter hadn't even tried one before. Some of his food adventures since we've been in New York have included escargot (yes, my husband has eaten snails and I don't know how I feel about that), and squid salad (I couldn't watch him eat that one because you could see the suction cups on one side of the tentacles). My food adventures have included falafel and pad tai noodles. 

I include all of this so you can see the difference between us, and so you can understand the remainder of this post. We were out grocery shopping the other night and I thought why not take pictures of the interesting things I see while shopping. Some of them are gross and make me squeamish, others are just interesting things that I would maybe like to try. Below are pictures of our grocery shopping adventure. 

There are lots of varieties of fish available here. I don't like fish, and I hate the smell of seafood. So I usually hold my breath and hurry past the seafood section in the store. However, when I'm shopping with Brian he likes to stop and peruse the selection. These ones creeped me out because they were looking back at me.

You will probably laugh at me for this one. I like eggs on occasion, and I use them in my cooking and baking. I know eggs come from chickens. I grew up on a farm. We raised chickens and I would help collect eggs from our laying hens. For some reason, I could never eat the eggs from our chickens. I would only eat the ones my mom would buy from the store. I'm still that way. I like the nice clean white ones from the store. I don't like to make the connection between the chicken and the egg. I know I'm weird. I also cannot stand milk and our farm was a dairy farm. So anyways, they have tons of egg varieties at the store. We found these quail eggs. They were so tiny and cute, but I don't think I would ever eat them.

This next picture is not for the faint of heart....or stomach. In particular I'm warning my Aunt Audra to look away. Whenever I am buying chicken, I have to pass over all the lovely packaged parts of chickens that I would rather not have to see. The ones that get to me the most are the chicken feet and the chicken hearts. I'm used to encountering them now, but the first few times really got to me. They also have packages of chicken and turkey giblets and smoked turkey necks.

Here is a close up of the chicken feet. Pretty horrific if you ask me.

I enjoy shopping in the produce section. They have so many fruits and vegetables, some of which I'm only familiar with their names through some of my plant classes in college. It is cool to actually see them. These are Ugli Fruit (catchy name) which are a hybrid cross between a grapefruit and a tangerine. The sign says that they are tasty though so maybe we'll have to give them a try.

These little green guys caught my eye. They are Karela or bittermelon. I was looking them up online and they are very bitter and added to Chinese stir fries and soups.

I'm sure you're all familiar with onions, however the rolled up sock is new.

They have a full bench covered with different types of roots. One of them is the Yuca root. I always see these and wonder what they are used for.

They have an olive bar in our grocery store. That's right, no salad, just various types of olives. I never knew there were so many kinds.

Back to the meat section. We found pork tongues...

...and pork kidneys. I didn't find these too enticing.

Now you've had a small, very small glimpse into the adventures of grocery shopping here in New York. I'm sure some if not all of these items are available in stores across the country, but I guess I've just never really paid attention to them before. New York has definitely opened my eyes to a lot of new things.