Shapes of food?

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does anyone else only like certain food to be certain shapes, my parents think its weird and say different shapes don't taste better, but they really do.

I really love small squared potatoes, other shaped potatoes don't taste as nice.

I only like spiral pasta, I really hate any other types.

I like small cut food, I don't think big food tastes as nice. e.g. chicken, beef, carrots, onions.

anyone else feel the same?

I asked my mother to make all my food into spheres, but she refused and told me to do it myself, but of course I am too lazy to do that myself.

When I was little I had an aversion to what's known as elbow macaroni (the typical shape, I think).

I think hamburgers should be round. I can't do square-burgers.

Coincidentally, tonight I ate something I never ever dreamed I'd eat. First, a little background:

Last year I planted my very first vegetable garden. We planted a little bit of everything that we typically like, but we also were confronted with bad soil (buckshot), uneven drainage, fungus, bugs, etc. Our squash and zucchini did modestly well and I enjoyed a couple of months of fresh squash and zucchini almost daily.

Time passes.

I decide to widen the garden to take advantage of some deeper soil, also in hopes of maybe improving soil quality, etc., and we decide to drastically reduce the TYPES of items we planted so we'd get some good stuff that would tolerate poor soil. As it turns out, we had some poor quality squash and zucchini we didn't bother to pick and just left it to rot at the end of the season. I didn't count on the seeds actually being any good (I'm pretty ignorant about this kind of thing, still just learning and experimenting, a lot of trial-and-error, etc.). I also didn't count on those seeds being the result of cross-pollination between the squash and zucchini, and I REALLY didn't think squash and zucchini would do that. Oh, and the squash is just plain old yellow crook-necked squash.

The plant that came up was obviously in the wrong part of the garden, but apparently the soil quality and drainage is just right for it, because the plant is HUGE?I mean, huge on the level of ornamental it's so big. The fruit has a distinct crook-neck and large oval body as you'd expect from yellow squash, but it also grow to over a foot long and so almost has the shape of a zucchini--actually somewhere in between. Color is yellowish wish a slight green tint. The wife cubed it and cooked it tonight with some rice and onion. You can see the skin had gotten just a little thicker than optimal, and it's enough to see that the inner skin is a distinct bright yellow while the fruit underneath the skin is a pale green. The flavor isn't bad, either, but it's definitely different.

I don't know what you'd call this thing?I'm calling it a "squini." It's the oddest shaped/colored thing I've ever seen. I'm debating deliberately hybridizing our current stock of squash/zucchini to see if I can do it again next year. It has definitely outperformed anything else we've had in our garden thus far (although our beans and tomatoes are looking better than last year).

Franknfurter - I agree that different pasta shapes taste differently. I like penne the best myself and do not like spiral very much. A lot of that has to do with how the spiral feels on my tongue. Interestingly, certain types of sauces are designed to go on certain types of pasta.

It makes sense to me that one would prefer certain shapes/sizes to food. Smaller food tends to cook more quickly and more evenly and be less susceptible to be ruined by bad cooking. Big pieces of meat can be dry on the outside by the time the inside is fully cooked. Big pieces of potato can still end up a little "crunchy" in the middle.

"Foodies" of all kinds would probably be full of opinion and preferences about the shape & size of food.

AngelRho - good for you getting the garden going! I have a huge garden, though I'm now taking time off from it since I am back in school.

If you pick your "squini" when it is smaller, the skin should not be so thick. Summer sqaush and zucchini are meant to be picked small (less than 8 inches, and for the most tender less than 6 inches.) The big ones are excellent for stuffing, though, if you let it get too big.

Why yes- yes we would be full of opinions on shape and size of food.

Shape and size dictate how a food interacts with both the cooking format (boiling, frying, grilling etc.) and with the other foods.

Spiral pasta holds onto sauce better than spaghetti. The sauce gets stuck in its' grooves and this affects taste. The small cut food the OP prefers has more surface area exposed to cooking (if cut before cooking) which affects its' taste. Whether cut before or after cooking it has more surface area to interact with its food neighbors in the dish and with the sauce, if any. There is more blending of flavors.

thank you foodies I shall tell my parents this, there is a logical reason for preferring certain shapes, I knew it tastes better.