Would you rather...

I get invited to random conferences, educational seminars, etc. on a fairly regular basis. I actually secretly like them – one because I like to learn new things (otherwise I wouldn’t keep trying to go back to school) and two because it breaks up the day a bit. I just got invited to a lunch meeting next week.

Let’s sidebar for a second and talk about lunch meetings. Here is my acceptable list of food for a lunch meeting: Panera who doesn’t like a regular old turkey sandwich or some other variety of deli meat, chicken breast with some sort of vegetable (thinking green beans or carrots – something a lot of people universally like), hamburgers or hotdogs (had them at one conference, it’s different I’ll go with it), salad, pasta… Basically the point of a lunch at a conference is basic universally pleasing food. This isn’t the time to test your new cooking skills on a captive group of 50 plus attendants.

So I clicked on the registration form and started to sign up. I got to meal choices: seafood crepes with shrimp and crab, potatoes and asparagus or the vegetarian choice of mushroom soufflé and asparagus. This is what I heard in my head would you rather eat bugs or dirt, worse or worser. Sick! I almost decided against going to the conference.

First off let’s talk about why these are bad choices: 1. People are allergic to shellfish – as in people die from eating it. 2. There are people out there (me being one of them) who avoid seafood at all costs. I am very proud of the fact I haven’t eaten seafood since I was 5 years old. It smells funny. I see no point in eating it. I’m perfectly happy with chicken. I don’t need to eat over-grown head lice (Google it – I read somewhere head lice and shrimp are related, as are crabs and spiders). If that doesn’t make you want to throw up then I can’t help you. 3. Mushrooms – really? I also don’t eat mushrooms. I think they’re sick. I know I’m not alone. Offer someone a Portobello burger or a hamburger and watch how many choose option 2. And 4. Asparagus? I know a lot of people who hate asparagus (again me being one of them). What did good old green beans do to you that they can’t be on the menu?

I don't think I'm being picky here. I think seafood crepes and mushroom soufflé are basically up there as classic do not picks for lunch meetings. I get you're trying to be fancy and sophisticated but you couldn't dress up a good old chicken breast?

Basically in my head this menu sounds like my worst nightmare (aside from any weird things they eat on Survivor). It was basically that game of Would You Rather and someone rattles off two horrible choices and you have to pick which you’d rather have happen to you. I picked mushrooms. But I plan to not eat and grab a burger on the way back to work.

And to make it worse, this same group had lunch a few months ago where they weren’t kind enough to tell you their sick menu choices in advance and so I had selected non-vegetarian option. They sat in front of me a non-descript piece of meat with a slice of lemon on top. Chicken or fish? Chicken or fish? Ran through my head. It didn’t give off any weird fish odor but didn’t look like chicken. I was not taking any chances. I picked at my roll and drank lots of water. The waiter came by (and let’s say he was trying to be nice and helpful) but I felt like he was basically screaming “what you don’t like fish?” to everyone. I begged off that I was allergic and he ran back with a vegetarian lasagna which in the scheme of things was okay (better than mushroom soufflé).