Pickles Are the Devil’s Candy and I Have Video Evidence

Folks, I tried, I really did! I just can’t do pickles.

I like to consider myself an open person when it comes to food, movies, books, politics, you name it, but there are three items I simply have never been able to enjoy food-wise:

1. Mushrooms, and yes, even sautéed.
2. Olives of any kind.
3. Pickles, which includes the sliced ones for sandwiches and the spears kind.

For all three, they hit the trifecta of repulsiveness for me: Their texture, taste and smell are all off.

Pickles, though, I’m most upset about. I don’t understand my aversion to them. I enjoy cucumbers! Salt! Vinegar! Garlic! Red peppers! Other spices and such, like let’s GO. And yet.

My first introduction to pickles as a phenomenon was through my sister, who would quite literally eat those giant spears right out of the jar one after the other and I can still remember the smell of them being something that repulsed me and as a kid, there was the added factor they were all green and slimy looking from afar!

But even the sliced ones for sandwiches or burgers, which I’ve inadvertently encountered many a time, don’t do it for me. You would think that little slither of pickle mixed in with a beef patty, cheese, onion, tomato, lettuce, ketchup, mustard and whatever else happens to be on my burger (or chicken sandwich!), would obscure the pickle enough. Nope. If that little slithering son of a gun is on my sandwich, it instantly ruins the sandwich experience for me. I regret even having bought the sandwich at all.

Like I said though, I’m open-minded and am always willing to give it another shot. My friend, who likes pickles, recommended Claussen’s Kosher Dill Pickles Spears to me specifically as among their favorites.

These ones are fancy, okay? Because the Kroger I go to has such a marketplace (the new stores are literally called Marketplaces), that they can devote an entire half of an aisle to freakin’ pickles. I look on with dismay every time I pass that aisle. Nonetheless, these Claussen pickles are so fancy, they aren’t even in that aisle! Instead, that aisle is filled with vlasic’s pickles, Mt. Olive’s and the Kroger brand of pickles for the most part and all the varieties each has.

Claussen on the other hand is in the meat and seafood section of the store in the cold section. I don’t know what’s different about Claussen that their pickles need to be kept refrigerated whereas vlasic’s and Mt. Olive’s pickles are considered shelf stable.

I believe I got a 64-ounce jar at $7.29.

And well. Here’s the evidence that I tried and just can’t do pickles:

I’m not even hamming it up that much for the friend, who I sent the video to for recommending this monstrosity to me. I genuinely was repulsed!

And again, I don’t understand it. The texture. The crunch. The taste. The smell. All of it freaks me out and I can’t eat them.

But if it was a fresh cucumber from the produce section I threw some vinegar, salt, garlic and whatever else on, I’d be okay with it!

I DO NOT GET IT.

Do you like pickles? Yes, you probably do because you’re weird. Gah.