Belated Day Seven: Must You, Mushroom?

Let’s talk about mushrooms.

I fucking hate mushrooms.

Okay. “Hate” might be too harsh of a word, but it gets close to the root of my feelings for the spongy evil that seems ever-present in most recipes nowadays.

I also want to add that these feelings come not from a lack of trying to like mushrooms. I have tried eating them different ways with cheese, eggs, sauce, fish, veggies, pasta, curry — you name it, I’ve probably tried it. And occasionally I can get over my distaste of the fungi. But there’s always a point where I end up hitting a wall: everything just seems to meld into the mildly earthy sponginess of the mushroom, and I lose my ability to take another bite.

Now I HAVE grown to like them more as I’ve gotten older, and since I’ve adopted a new vegetarian diet, they’ve become a reluctant partner in my day-to-day. Part of me really wants to like them. I’ve bought mushrooms for the sole purpose of making a meal specifically out of/around them. I encourage my friends to make meals with them when I’m over so I have no choice but stare them down and cry a little on the inside as I slowly… very slowly… but surely make my way through some of them (again… very slowly so that my tongue doesn’t revolt and dislodge itself straight out of my mouth).

And then I hit the wall.

So in order to get them into my diet, I’ve reverted to childhood: I cut them up into teeny, tiny pieces so small that I *almost* forget what they are. But let’s not kid ourselves: some primal parts of my brain would always be able to pick out the smallest of morel morsels from within a thick layer of sauce covering the most delicious pasta on the planet. And while the pasta would make things better, I’d still sweat just a little. At least I’ve got that pasta.