In a recent poll taken among two thousand Gen Z Brits, the following are ones that these kids refuse to eat, ranking by the negative percentages, so to speak.
Liver (35% refuse to eat)
Blue cheese (32%)
Anchovies (30%)
Black pudding (29%)
Prawns (26%)
Duck (25%)
Tofu (23%)
Mushrooms (23%)
Olives (23%)
Plant-based cheese (21%)
My take, as a Boomer:
Liver — as a rule, I prefer liver in pâté form, but I love me some deep-fried chicken livers, with a passion.
Blue cheese — by itself, a tad strong; crumbled over a burger: yummy.
Anchovies — whether on toast or on pizza, I’ll eat them any day of the week
Black pudding — ugh. The best thing you can say about black (i.e. “blood”) pudding is that it’s tasteless.
Prawns — or as we Murkins call them, shrimp: love ’em.
Duck — little oily, but tastier than chicken. (Duck fat, by the way, is the ultimate cooking ingredient.)
Tofu — nope. Not ever.
Mushrooms — are you kidding me? I must eat mushrooms of one sort or another at least three times a week. My favorite: a substitute for a bun in a hamburger (giant Portobella fried in butter, oh my).
Olives — nope. Not ever.
Plant-based cheese — LOL, forget that shit.
The Daily Mail article which fostered this post had the usual scare headline — “These Foods Are Going To Disappear!!!!!”
# 
…but I don’t think we need to panic. If it were only true of olives (never gonna happen), tofu (ugh) and that strange plant cheese (we can but hope, plus all “plant-based” meats), I’m fine with the prognosis.
I’ll eat prawns, shrooms, and olives.
Ban the rest as far as I’m concerned – never tasted any of them and never will. Cept that (beef?) liver. My mother used to make it weekly and I always hated it. The very smell of it cooking…eeeeuuuuwwww
Liver and onions, pan fried, yum yum. Haven’t had it in decades, wife won’t cook it and no restaurant serves it. Dang.
Follow up, wouldn’t Gen Z Brits be eating Halal, or am I off by a generation?
I had a pompous neighbor who once served pate at a small dinner party. Being that I am a uneducated boob who never had it before, I gave it a taste. He couldn’t understand why I started laughing. It seems us poor country folk have been eating it since we were kids, only we call it liver sausage. It makes a great sandwich, with a slice of sweet onion.
As to mushrooms: LOVE ’em! And I have been known to buy the big jars of green olives and hoard them for myself, because nobody else around here likes them.
We called it liver mush in East Tennessee, but still good stuff.
Aside from the not-real-food item (plant cheese, with tofu being right on the edge) I’d eat any of those things with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Anchovies are low on the scale, shrimp and olives are high. Tofu, bleu cheese, and most mushrooms need to be adjuncts to a dish, not the main element. If I were invited to a table and served any of the other items, I’d eat it without hesitation.
Liver — never tried it, want to just to say I did.
Blue cheese — yeah…no. Sorry, I cannot get past the fact that it has freaking mold in it.
Anchovies — never tried ’em, not really eager to.
Black pudding — Never tried, but I’ll try most anything once. Sound weird enough that I might actually enjoy it.
Prawns — love ’em, but only if they’re deep-fried (and preferably beer-battered).
Duck — Again, never had it. Really want to because I know it’ll gross my mom out.
Tofu — Tried it when I was a kid. IIRC, I thought it was decidedly “meh”. Doesn’t taste like anything unless you smother it with some kind of sauce.
Mushrooms — Sorry, but no. I don’t mind the flavor, but absolutely cannot stand the texture.
Olives — To the shame of my Italian ancestors, I can’t stand ’em. But I’m a fiend for good olive oil.
Plant-based cheese — I know I said I’ll try most anything once, but pigs will be flying through a blizzard in hell before I ever willingly consume plant-based cheese.
My mom made us liver and onions because she loved it. We as kids hated it and told her that, even my dad wasn’t thrilled with the meal.
Mom They have liver and onions at West Point The cadets love it
Dad Eat it or no dessert.
Years later my cousin goes to West Point. Yes they have liver and onions for dinner and they all hate it.
They eat it because you must finish what on your plate.
Small world.
Don Curton: I go to lunch at Luby’s (a local cafeteria chain here in Texas) once a week. They always have Liver and Onions on offer. You might sneak out of the house some weekday and find a local place like that.
Tofu as an ingredient is pretty good, mostly in American-style Chinese food. Hot and Sour soup, Hunan tofu in rich beef sauce, cubed, breaded, and fried in a variety of sauces.
Olive. Who doesn’t like olives? Romans used to judge “inferior” conquered nations on their level of sophistication in utilizing olives. Spanish,j Green, Ripe, Kalamata. Love them all. Especially in Martinis. Robert Bork notwithstanding: “Once, having ordered a martini, Bob was presented with a drink containing two olives. He sent it back. “If I had wanted a salad,” he told the waiter, “I would have ordered one.”
I’m in Texas. Most of the Luby’s shutdown and the chain went bankrupt during covid cough season. Just googled it and apparently they’re making a comeback. Wonderful news. I remember eating the liver and onions there myself. Always preferred Furr’s for the cafeteria experience, but as a sometimes Baptist the Luby’s experience is right up there with the Lord’s Supper and dunking in the baptismal booth. Preacher used to let us out 15 minutes before the Lutherians, so we didn’t have to stand in line. Now that Luby’s is back, might have to give it a try soon.
Liver: Nope. Nope. Nope. Not in any form
Bleu Cheese: Sometimes. Wife loves it
Anchovies: Love them.
Black Pudding: Never tried it. I suspect like most Brit food its revolting. Brit & Jew food is the worst of all the ethnic foods.
Prawns: Hell yes.
Duck: Whenever I’ve ordered it, I’m disappointed. That may be because I’ve never had the good stuff.
Tofu: Meh, as an ingredient ok, as a “meat-replacement” go fuck yourself.
Shrooms: Gawd no. Hated them since I was a kid.
Olives: Like the green kind, Black & Kalmatta…nah.
Plant based anything (except plants): Go fuck yourself again.
Liver – most people have no idea how to cook it – they usually overcook it by about 400%. A college room-mate taught me that it should be fast-fried, lightly coated with an egg wash to make the following dredge in salty flour stick, super hot pan, well greased with bacon fat to make it crispy, take it out of the pan after about a minute a side. The outside is hot salty and crunchy, the inside is rare and delicious.
Onions need to be cooked for a long time over medium heat at most, so liver and onions is an impossible one pot dish.My wife picks mushrooms out of grass in the park across the street from us and we are lucky enough to get about 3 morels near a cabin we have in BC. Lots of store bought ones too.
We eat and enjoy to some degree all the rest on the list except the plant based garbage.
I avoided Olives until on a trip to Spain most bars where we stopped for a drink gave us a small plate of olives, usually quite different from bar to bar and nothing like what is commonly available in North America. I ate them because I’m a cheapskate and I knew I’d paid for them in the price of he drinks. I grew to like them, a lot.
Liver – Meh, I’ll pass.
Blue cheese – Good, but I don’t have it too often
Anchovies – Don’t taste of fish at all. Pure salt, so I’ll just pour salt on my tongue next time.
Black pudding – Never tried, but I’ve eaten Haggis and loved it, so I’ll give a try if it’ ever offered.
Prawns – Sure. Yummy.
Duck Tasty, but a bit too oily for me. I’d prefer pheasant or quail.
Tofu – tastes like nothing, or unflavored gelatin. If you marinate it, it tastes only of the marinade. Big pass.
Mushrooms – Yummy!
Olives – Green or black, yes. Ask me about my “pizza with olive” experiences, in Paris, sometime.
Plant-based cheese – If it’s plant based, it ain’t cheese. Big pass.
Liver? Yes to pate, but no to fried etc – it’s far too powerful a taste for my buds – but the primary blame likely goes to school dinners. I’ve tried tofu and don’t like it. As for the rest, yum! And if your black pudding is tasteless, buy one that isn’t.
De gustibus non est disputandum.
I have pretty eclectic tastes, apparently
Liver: My mother claimed to like it, my brothers and I did not. She also bought a big chub of Liver sausage and we got liver sausage sandwiches. They were good enough to eat. Later we got Liverwurst which was also pretty good.
Blue cheese: I’ve had that a few times, I can’t say I particularly like it. The blue flavor (the mold) dominates.
Anchovies: I’ve had this a few times, too, my cousin’s boyfriend who owned a hamburger joint in Oregon said the secret was to order the anchovies on the side if you order pizza, because they put them on the pizza with a heavy hand. I must admit that does help.
Black Pudding: I’ve never had this either, your description of it as tasteless doesn’t encourage me to try. We often got Blood Tongue and Blood Sausage from a sausage maker at a German market we used to frequent.
Prawns: I eat these frequently, and with gusto. I’ve found the larger ones (bigger than an inch and a half, say) easily take all of whatever sauce you want to use on them, and the flavor is improved. Smaller ones retain a prawn/ seafood flavor and your sauce has less influence.
Duck: I don’t know how to cook this myself so it is acceptable to my stomach. I’ve enjoyed it whenever I’ve been to a Chinese restaurant for Dim Sum.
Tofu: There are soft varieties and firm varieties. I’ve had the firm variety in soups with chicken. It takes the flavor of the soup ingredients and seasoning. I don’t understand the objection.
Mushrooms: These are pretty good, too. I have a recipe for appetizers with pork sausage in mushroom caps that never quite reached the level of special requests like blueberry pie or Deviled Eggs Florentine (That sounds better than merely Deviled Eggs with Spinach.
Olives: I like just about any black olive you can find, Kalamata, Nicose, even the black California olives that are bland by comparison. Green olives, on the other hand . . . I consider them to have been picked too soon.
Plant-based cheese: Like plant-based meat, an oxymoron. I have not knowingly eaten either one. I might eat bean burgers if I am inspired to make the recipe. There is some kind of ersatz bacon out there that I have had the misfortune of eating. It cooks up to strips of bacon-colored styrene plastic, with the flavor you’d expect from eating a plastic airplane model. These have all appeared on the market after I was easily convinced that if I could not pronounce nor recognize the ingredients, put it back on the grocery shelf. These three products seem to violate that rule. So, flavorings colorings, and texturizers make these mystery ingredients into close simulation of cheese or meat? The same can be said of dirt.
I have eaten rattlesnake, too, saute’d with a bit of some bland cooking oil. It does not taste like chicken. It did, however, taste like Sagebrush, which I suppose was the main diet of its diet.
cows eat plants and produce milk that is turned into cheese. Is that what they mean by plant based cheese or are they skipping the cow’s contributions to the process?
Tofu and weird cheese are the only two I avoid.
Tofu has one rightful place;min Chinese hot-and-sour soup. Otherwise it’s a squishy version of rice cakes; something totally without flavor that trendy people eat for some reason.
Plant-based ‘cheese’ is a godsend to me. My lady has breathing problems associated with milk proteins (not lactose, go figure) and cheese substitutes make her life more tolerable.
Don’t like anchovies. Not sure why, although I’m not too fond of most fish other than salmon and swordfish. Deep fried is ok, but that just says I like fried batter coating.