When the holidays come up, many start to think about the traditional holiday food that is served every year: the good, the bad and the plain old ugly.
A portion of Boone students were surveyed on what they believe is the worst holiday food, and these are the top–or bottom?–five and the history behind them.
Even though these foods may be terrible, there is no doubt that they bring back funny holiday memories every time people eat it.
No. 5 Cole Slaw
Coming in at number five is coleslaw.
“Coleslaw is so cold and slimy it’s weird,” said an anonymous student.
This side dates all the way back to the Romans who made a similar dish using cabbage, eggs, vinegar, and different spices. This dish was then introduced to the U.S. by Dutch immigrants.
The name comes from the Dutch word “kool sla.” “Kool” means cabbage and “sla” means salad.
Coleslaw is a chopped cabbage that is topped with different dressings, the main one being a mayonnaise dressing. This is then kept cold and normally served as a side at barbecues.
No. 4 Green Jell-O Salad
In fourth place is green Jell-O salad AKA the nasty green Jell-O.
Green Jell-O salad is a lime Jell-O that contains many different things such as marshmallows, nuts, cottage cheese, and carrots inside of it.
It’s said to be from Utah and was very popular in the 70s. Utah is the home to many of the Mormon faith, and this salad is something that has been enjoyed by many of their families allowing for it to also be known as Mormon salad.
However, what seems to be a very popular dish is absolutely disgusting.
“Only old people like it,” said an anonymous student.
Mormon Jell-O is like one of those bad fashion trends that people hope don’t come back.
N0. 3 Turkey
Somehow topping green Jell-O salad in third place is turkey.
Turkey is normally the main centerpiece of most Thanksgiving meals even though it has no history of ever being at the “First Thanksgiving.”
So why is turkey served at Thanksgiving?
Turkey became popular to serve during big occasions in the 19th century due to the large abundance of around 10 million turkeys in America. On farms, they were almost always available for slaughter because they didn’t provide any other assets like cows and chickens do, and one turkey was large enough to feed a family.
However, around Boone, turkey is extremely unpopular.
“Turkey Is the most overrated thing to eat on Thanksgiving,” said an anonymous student.
“Turkey ain’t that good y’all,” agreed another student.
N0. 2 Cranberry Sauce
The second most popular dish for being absolutely terrible is cranberry sauce.
Cranberry sauce is a tart yet sweet dessert normally served on Thanksgiving that has a jam-like texture.
One of cranberry’s earliest documented appearances is in a cookbook from 1796 called “American Cookery” by Amelia Simmons. The recipe was made simply with sugar and water and was served with meat like turkey.
Cranberry sauce is one of those things that people either love or hate.
“This might be a little controversial, but I’m going to say cranberry sauce is the worst,” said one anonymous student. “It is too sour. Something is wrong with the people who eat it.”
No. 1 Stuffing
In the first place, the worst holiday food is stuffing.
Stuffing originates all the way back to the Roman Empire where a book was discovered from somewhere between the second century BC and the first century AD called “Apicius de re Coquinaria” (A little more about cooking). In this book, there were over 400 Roman food recipes.
This book contained many different recipes for stuffed animals such as pig, chicken, and rabbit leading to naming the food stuffing.
The Romans would stuff their animals with things like vegetables, herbs, and nuts, and then would cook them over the fire. They believed that stuffing the bird then cooking it was the most efficient way to cook stuffing instead of trying to cook it separately over the fire.
Today this popular dish is now cooked on the stove and prepared as a side.
However, this dish isn’t popular in Boone for being good.
When surveying a population of Boone students, stuffing gets first place in being the worst holiday food. An anonymous student said, ¨It is disgusting! I’d rather walk to Target which is also the worst store than eat stuffing.¨
