Carob is the only chocolatey thing I can eat. I developed an allergy to chocolate in my 20s. People have suggested that its one of the ingredients in the product, but I'm not allergic to eggs, or milk, so it's either the cocoa butter or the chocolate.

Don't cry for me, tho. I associate chocolate with not feeling quite right, or worse. All I miss is fudge, and Reese's peanut butter cups.

And I can get those in white chocolate. And that leaves more chocolate for the rest of y'all.

Food allergies can be quite strange. I can't eat most fish. Not fatal or anything but I do get to reenact the exorcist. Tuna is included in that list. But I can eat chicken of the sea. All I can conclude from this is despite what the label says that ain't tuna.

Wouldn't surprise me in the least, Ben. I used to work in the meat department of a grocery store, which included seafood. I was constantly being surprised to discover that things didn't have to be what they were clearly labeled as.

Scallops weren't scallops. Or any kind of shellfish, for that matter. Steelhead trout was marked as salmon, etc.

When I hear "scallops" I think "shark meat".

I was constantly being surprised to discover that things didn't have to be what they were clearly labeled as. ~ Patrick at February 8, 2018 7:43 AM

You really don't want to know what the FDA allows food manufacturers to put into your food and not disclose on the label.

For Ben on his tuna thing

https://www.google.com/search?q=albacore+vs+tuna&rlz=1C1AVNE_enUS686US686&oq=albeco&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0l5.7492j1j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

But I can eat chicken of the sea. All I can conclude from this is despite what the label says that ain't tuna. ~ Ben at February 8, 2018 6:43 AM

Flashback

Who da thunk Jessica Simpson could be onto something?

F-cking carob!
There is nothing more disappointing to one’s tastebuds than thinking you’re biting into a delicious chocolate brownie and ending up with a mouthful of nasty-ass carob.
I was a kid in the 80’s, not the 70’s, but one of my aunts, and my grandma, were still into gross hippie health food.
The other horrible, horrible “healthy substitute” they tried to sell me on was molasses. Uhhhhg! Vomit! Molasses is NOT syrup, you a$$holes!

My experience with carob in the 70s was that it tasted good at first. But if I had more than a couple of bites, it started tasting funny.

ahw: I LOVE molasses!

I am a child of the 70’s and 80’s too and can remember the one Easter when my mother susbsituted our chocolate bunnies with carob bunnies...it was awful...straight into the trash.

And I am with awh, molasses is gross! Someone suggested taking a tablespoon of it to cure severe cramps and I gagged just dipping the spoon into the jar. I literally chose suffering over molasses. Ha!

"Who da thunk Jessica Simpson could be onto something?" ~ Conan

Very good, Conan! I've seen that one before. The look that Nick Lachey is giving her is priceless.

But I'll see your Jessica Simpson and raise you a Tara Reid.

Warning: Cringe alert.

My experience with carob in the 70s was that it tasted good at first. But if I had more than a couple of bites, it started tasting funny. ~ Fayd at February 8, 2018 8:27 AM

Mine too.

After a few bites, you started wondering what you were eating.

Future generations will regard kale the same way.

Future generations will regard kale the same way.

Kevin at February 8, 2018 10:11 AM

We already do.

Chocolate isnt the problem. It always was, and always will be, the sugar.

Carob is an awful waste of perfectly good sugar. There otta be a law.

molasses is gross!

Well, you know what one can do with molasses? convert it into rum.

Why is the rum gone?

I was going to top both Conan and Patrick with a Tela Tequila clip but my other phone crashed in protest

I don't think it is the albacore vs. other types of tuna for me. I can't eat salmon, cod, and a wide variety of other fish. Shrimp is probably ok. And I suspect crayfish is ok. But given the risk/benefit analysis I'm not really interested in checking. Nights of worshiping the porcelain god have left me a bit gunshy on all aquatic proteins.

On the kale, molasses, and even tofu these foods have a place. They can be cooked in very delicious forms. So I suspect carob is the same (never had the stuff). But don't pretend things are what they aren't. Carob isn't chocolate, tofu isn't turkey, and by god cashews aren't cream cheese. People need to stop pretending these things are what they aren't.

People need to stop pretending these things are what they aren't. ~ Ben at February 8, 2018 2:19 PM

Soy Milk, Almond Milk, etc. are not milk.

On the kale, molasses, and even tofu these foods have a place. They can be cooked in very delicious forms.
______________________________________

Sure can. I like gingerbread and molasses cookies, though I suspect both were considered far more delicious in the 19th century, when cocoa was a lot harder to come by. Or candy in general, sometimes. (I remember a Wall Street Journal story on gingerbread that told of a party - in the 1990s - where kids were served frosted gingerbread cookies, but they simply licked off the frosting and abandoned the rest.)

Anyway, while I don't know of any scrumptious recipes where kale is the MAIN ingredient, here's a Portuguese soup that gets rave reviews; I cook it regularly. The ingredients include sausage and sweet potatoes.

http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/sweet-potato-sausage-kale-soup

Warning: Unless you want it really hot, if you can only get spicy sausage, do NOT include the pepper flakes. I didn't make that mistake, so I don't know just how hot that would be. You also might want to use less chicken broth and more water. (Or omit the salt.)

Yep Conan and Lenona. And yes kale shouldn't be the main ingredient. But that holds for lots of foods. The protein is almost always the main ingredient. Mustard greens, collard greens, any other greens there are good recipes for even if they aren't the main ingredient. Little different from kale as far as I can tell.

My sister once sent me a box of ingredients with a recipe for a vegan cheese cake. Essentially they used cashews instead of cream cheese. We ended up eating all the ingredients and never made the cake. If the name is a lie I'm not too interested. I like cashews. If they called it a cashew cake I might have tried it. But cashews are not cream cheese. The cake was a lie.

Well actually, since spinach is usually more expensive, I might just boil some kale and put some soy sauce on it. (With spinach, I like soy sauce or butter.)

@Ben,

Stir-fried Mustard greens work as a side-dish. The bitterness balances with rich, savory meals such braised pork belly with potato and fermented bean curd.

Tip for stir-frying leafy greens: Cook the stems first, and once you see the stems become translucid, add the leaves; that keeps them from going mushy.

I started liking carob a lot more when I stopped thinking of it as a chocolate substitute and started thinking of it as a dried fruit like dates or figs or something.

That is what my wife said NicoleK. Thought it tasted like figs. And figs aren't chocolate. Not even close. Just because two things are the same color doesn't mean they taste anything like each other.

Honestly the issue extends far beyond food. Movies suffer from this too. Like Starship Troopers which drew more from Starcraft the game than the Heinlein book. Or even classics like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory where they had to add a scene of Charlie being bad messing up a major point of the book.

The reason so few books make great transitions is because most good books collaborate with the reader to create a world no Hollywood director could replicate even if they tried.

Take LOTR really good movies, still cut out alot of source material and added that things that never existed.

Starship troopers pissed me off, was a good movie in and of itself, but the director made an evil universe equivalent of the book.

Pissed of Heinlein s family to the point the have refused to licence any of his other works for film though

"There is nothing more disappointing to one’s tastebuds"

I'd have to say gluten-free pastries. WTH are they making those things from?! They look right but the taste and texture are straight outta Hades.

Agreed Gog. Gluten is what makes cake spongy, what makes pastries flaky. If you don't want to eat gluten then eat something else. Don't try to make cookies, cakes, and pastries without gluten. Have some ice cream instead.

It wasn't cutting things out that made Starship Troopers not Starship Troopers. I understand needing to edit and even modify a bit due to technical capabilities. But Starship Troopers the movie was based on StarCraft the video game. It was the Terrans vs. the Zerg. If you watch movie 2 and 3 it becomes even more obvious. This is just false advertising. It is tofurkey all over again. Tofu ain't bad. But it isn't turkey. And no amount of pretending will change that. As far as video games that become movies go Starship Troopers was pretty good (most are abominable after all). But they needed to fess up they were making StarCraft the movie and not claim it was Starship Troopers.