[TotoMimo]

Back in the day, we would gladly munch down on the most saccharine-sweet, sugar-laden sweets until our eyes bled, and would grimace when mum said there was swede with dinner.

If the food was green, and didn't have "NUCLEAR" or "SOUR" written on the wrapper, it was going to be something we'd say "BLECH!" to.


But as we age, our palates changed. Got fancier. We grew accustomed to subtler flavours. We grew to appreciate new foods, understand the simpler flavours, more exotic items. And oddly, some of those commonplace foods we had before seem garish and less appealing now.


Did your taste for fish evolve, perhaps?


So TSR, tell me, how have your palates changed? What do you love and hate now you're older? Did you often eat kilos of sherbet and now can't stand the stuff? Chicken Dippers just not appeal? Perhaps now you're partial to Bran Flakes where before you couldn't accept they were brown.. and WEREN'T CHOCOLATE. Maybe now you can appreciate the finer, less... colourful foods!


TSR, How has your Palate changed?

[tl,dr]

Don't like Shephards Pie. Will never change.

[Kate.]

I used to love bananas and cheese, absolutely can't stand either now. The smell makes me sick, ergh.

And I used to refuse to eat peppers, tomatoes, kidney beans (any beans except baked beans tbh haha), most vegetables in general...love them all now and have loads of different veg in most of my meals! I basically just used to like really plain boring food - mostly beige coloured freezer crap, haha. I don't think I liked spicy things much and now I'll put chilli in almost everything. I used to detest dark chocolate and now I think it's ten times nicer than milk chocolate.

[TotoMimo]

I used to be mad for Babybel. Now, I think they just taste like cheese erasers.

[ihaveyourcat]

I was never a very fusssy child so I ate pretty much everything that I was given. The only thing I absolutely hated that I now love is aubergines.

[py0alb]

I think most people's tastes change from enjoying simple flavours like sweet (chocolate and icecream) and salty (chips and crisps) when they are children to enjoying more complex flavours, with hints of bitterness and sourness when they are adults. This process occurs between 10 and 25 roughly. It seems to happen more in boys than girls for some reason, and more in some than in others.

I think ancient man probably had (what we would now consider today to be) quite childish tastes. It's only through experience that we are able to overcome our instinctive dislike for anything that isn't either sweet or salty and appreciate more subtle flavours.


If I think what my favourite foods and drinks are now - things like beer and coffee and blue cheese and rare steak and spices, none of it is stuff I liked until I was a teenager. I think its a shame when people don't make themselves try to learn to like something just because they initially find it unpleasant, think of all the joy you might miss out on later on.

[Jemmy ♥]

(Original post by TotoMimo)
I used to be mad for Babybel. Now, I think they just taste like cheese erasers.

LOL SAMMMMMEEE, I used to love Haribo, but I can only eat a few before I feel i'll now And I used to munch them by the bucket loads

[TotoMimo]

I also used to be against any food that "looked at you", like shellfish (prawns etc), and refused them outright saying "I hate them" despite never having eaten them.

Then I grew up and now Scottish Langoustines rank amongst my top five favourite foods!

[Ellsbells3032]

Is it wrong that I love the look of your "kids" meal but think the adult one looks awful?

[skunky x]

Eggs. I wish I wish I still liked eggs, they're so quick and nutritious and easy, but I cannot stand the things. Used to love boiled eggs with soldiers, and scrambled eggs and stuff.

[jardantuan]

(Original post by skunky x)
Eggs. I wish I wish I still liked eggs, they're so quick and nutritious and easy, but I cannot stand the things. Used to love boiled eggs with soldiers, and scrambled eggs and stuff.

I'm the complete opposite!

I would never even entertain eggs, the closest you could get to making me eat an egg would be the ones in Haribo These days, I eat eggs so much, although I'm still not set on poached eggs

Ironically, I can't stand the Haribo eggs anymore

[nadiah]

I us to hate homous, now I can't get enough! Conversely I used to love chocolate cereal (e.g. coco pops) now I can't stand 'fake' chocolate

Having said that I'm pretty adventurous, most thinks I disliked as a child (peas, sweetcorn, banana, e.t.c.) I now love since I always re-taste things. I still hate peanuts though, haha.

[Vohamanah]

I don't think mine has changed very much at all. I still crave crispy pancakes and beans and mashed potato, still have the same cravings for sweets and chocolate.

I do like vodka, which is something I would have spit out when I was a teenager. I love spicy food, which I had never eaten before I went to uni (not because I disliked it, but because we never had it at home. An Indian restaurant has opened in my village now - I still can't believe it!). I also much prefer sorbet over ice cream, but I always preferred sorbet even as a child.

I will drink tea about once per day simply to get away from my desk for a couple minutes. I will also drink coffee (though it gives me a terrible headache) to fit in with someone else. I had a meeting with a client last week. I poured him a cup of coffee (very strong as per his request) and myself one too, for politeness. He had no cream or sugar in his so neither did I. I forced it down but had a banging headache for the rest of the day. Whoops.

[dirtyoldriver]

I never used to eat curry, when my parents had it I just had a bowl with rice and yoghurt, but I love it now. Although not eating it for so long means I now have a really low spice tolerance. Same applied to chinese and Sushi which I just inexplicably thought was gross but is now in my top 3 favourite meals. Never used to eat stuffing but now it's one of my favourite parts of christmas dinner

Also hated mint until the age of about 9 for some reason. Not much else has changed though apart from the fact that my sweet tooth has seriously deteriorated and I can't handle an entire dessert or more than a few squares of chocolate. I'm also fussy on chocolate, cadbury's dairy milk is the only one I don't find too sickly.

My hate for mushrooms, peas, sweetcorn, nuts and courgettes has never changed, nor has my undying love for mcdonalds.

[Sabertooth]

I used to not eat bananas or eggs but now not a week goes by when I don't buy and eat both in vast quantities.

My love for sweeties will never change though, I loved them as a child and I still love them now. Never liked chocolate, still don't.

[Pochi_X]

I hate and will always hate coconuts, but can eat the cream of coconut.

[Jessticles]

Meat that was less than well done used to completely gross me out - now my taste for meat is getting progressively rarer and rarer, I go for Medium Rare these days and it's going more towards rare. I got a beautiful fillet a while ago - and the poor thing got ****ing sizzled and overcooked, and when I tried it it just tasted so awful to me. I actually had to send it back - and it was probably medium/well, I just couldn't eat it.

Anyway. I really wasn't a picky eater :P My mother says I would always try typically 'weird' food for a child when I was younger and far preferred that to chicken nuggets, chips, sausages, etc. In fact you could say I've gone SOMEWHAT the opposite way, in that I didn't really eat chips/french fries until I became a teenager, now I'll eat them semi-regularly. I know, I'm a freak! :P

[Zebracolors]

I think texture of food can be just as big a factor as taste when it comes to palate evolution. Which is why there are cases of where someone may despise one kind of food in certain forms but will eat it if prepared, cooked or flavored a certain way. Such as in Pochi's case about coconuts.

Perhaps it also has to do with the foods we are given early in life after we can start having solids that is İf you grow up in a family where, for example, Fettuccine Alfredo is never made, you'd never know if you liked it or not but as children maybe we don't understand this concept yet. So we automatically assume we won't like it. So I'd agree with Py0alb when he said its later in life that we get curious perhaps and are willing to try new things.

That's essentially how it was with me. When I was a child my parents only would cook the same certain kinds of American meals all the time and the same way, very routine. So it was not until later in like I began to realize there were other things out there that I could like eating, as I grew older. Lıke Fettuccine Alfredo, Shepherds Pie, foods from other countries, Greek Yogurt, etc. I also learned that a desert does not always HAVE to be chocolate to be delicious.

[noodles!]

Peppers in things. I hated everything about them when I was younger, now really like them. I still won't sit and eat a load of cooked peppers or anything but I've improved a lot!

Also I love pesto now- used to detest it.

[Ooo'Yeah]

I used to absolutley hate pizza and now it's one of my favourite foods