Among the many weird and wondrous quirks people have, odd cravings have always been my favourite. There’s just something so exciting about the rebelliousness of cravings themselves: breaking the laws of culinary nature, transgressing beyond the ordinary limits of taste - cravings are like Uno Wild Cards, but instead of being able to pick any colour, they allow you to break any boring food boundary you ever had to previously abide by. Sugar and sausages? There’s no one stopping you. Broccoli and banana? The stomach wants what it wants - who are you to say otherwise? When you’re hungry, the kitchen’s your oyster. In this article, I’ll be offering my expert opinion on the 5 weirdest cravings Google’s hungry community has to offer.
1) Bananas and Lemon Juice.
This was actually the third weird craving I found whilst scouring the internet, yet it’s the one I tried first - just because of the immediate “EWWW” it evoked from my sister when she asked to inspect what I’ve now baptised as my ‘Weird Cravings List’. The combination, I will admit, was not one I was expecting. And yet, the banana was peeled and chopped, and the lemon was squeezed. Oh. My. God. I don’t think I’ve EVER tasted anything so good. It was amazing - the soft, smooth banana texture mingled with the zesty, tingle of lemon? Heaven. Pure heaven. I genuinely think I’ve found my new breaktime snack - I advise all Godolphin girls to share in my genius. I literally cannot overstate how tasty it was. 1000000/10. Really positive start.
2) Boiled Eggs and Horseradish
This combo particularly struck my fancy because of the rare opportunity it gave me to use my favourite ever egg holder (which is Superman-themed!!!!). Driven by this motivation, I boiled the eggs, bought the horseradish cream - which cost me an entire pound, by the way (#commitment) - just to tragically discover my evil brother took said egg holder to uni with him three years ago. So rude. It was all I could do to push away the dejection and bravely continue with my investigation. First off: the smell. Having barely unscrewed the lid from the jar of horseradish cream, my kitchen was immediately and wholly swallowed by the tangy stench - so much so I heard my mum, who was innocently attempting to prepare herself a salad, make the classic, confused sniffs of one who finds her nose suddenly attacked by pungently-perfumed particles. In a vain attempt to make the dish seem somewhat appealing, I tried to place the cream artistically on top of my egg, but it landed unevenly and just ended up sort of sliding sadly towards the side - at which point I accepted defeat, held my nose and just went straight in. Looking back, I’m actually 100% sure I heard my tastebuds scream. It was so unbelievably gross, I was forced to abandon my eggcup, flee to the sink and purge my mouth of the disgusting taste. The horseradish was so awful I completely forgot about the egg - that’s how strong the taste was. 2/10. And that’s being generous. There’s £1 I’ll never see again.
(I have also attached below a photo of said Superman-themed egg holder, so the tragedy of it being 58.3 miles away can be fully understood)
3) Chocolate wrapped in Lettuce
This combination brought about some initial hesitancy. I wasn’t sure what to make of it - the disguising of the chocolate in a lettuce-blanket made me feel like a desperate mum, seeking any means to bait her annoying toddler into consuming some form of healthy food. I also found my artistic spark (that had attempted so bravely to dilute the horror of Craving No. 2) had deserted me - I had no clue how to effectively go about wrapping the lettuce around my stick of Flake 99. I blame the yet-to-be-completed summer-to-school mindset transition for this unexpected drop in practical skills. My dumbfoundedness left me sitting in front of my two foods for an alarmingly long time, debating the crucial problem - how to wrap. Lengthways? Yet that would leave either the top or the bottom of the chocolate stick hanging out of its lettuce-blanket - which would throw off the delicate lettuce-chocolate ratio and upset the balance of the dish entirely. Vertically? That still didn’t feel right, as there would only be a very thin lettuce layer surrounding the thick chocolate trunk. Exasperated and none the wiser, I took inspiration from the ever-artful Gordon Ramsey (though I’m sure he’d find something wrong with my composition anyway and yell for roughly 30-40 minutes) and created a pigs-in-blanket replica. Note: wrapped up in the lettuce, the whole thing actually looked really cute, so I allowed myself 5 seconds of “Awww” time before the dish was shoved (very gracefully) into my mouth. Honestly...it was unusual, but I didn’t HATE it - it just felt a bit...uneventful. I’ve felt the same way about mint chocolate - it’s just a bit bland. The richness of the chocolate definitely dominated the taste but I will say: the lettuce added a super satisfying crunchy texture - so extra points for that. 5/10.
4) Pickles wrapped in Prosciutto
Another craving involving wrapping. Clearly wraps are a big hit. I went to my fridge, grabbed the prosciutto and was ready to get wrapping when I realised that we do not, in fact, own pickles. This staggering revelation had me stumped, but as it was 7:45 on a Tuesday evening and I already had my pyjamas on (no judgement please - pyjamas are an acceptable form of clothing at any time of the day xx), stepping outside to the corner shop was not an option. Luckily, my mum is a huge gherkin fan, so the chosen gherkin valiantly acted as a substitute for the pickle in this dish. Having already practised my wrapping skills during the preparation of Craving No. 3, I found wrapping the singular gherkin in the length of prosciutto a quick, easy task, and in no time held in my hand a (once again) pig-in-blanket-style creation. Gherkins have always given me mixed feelings - there’s a love-hate relationship between me and the reptilian-looking green vegetables, honestly I think it's because gherkins just look like they're from some alien land. The smell of it was also quite strong and somewhat intimidating - the prosciutto was a tad more reassuring, so, after some initial mental preparation, I once again closed my eyes and dove straight in. First bite: good! Definitely better than what I was expecting. The saltiness of the prosciutto and the sour, vinegary taste of the gherkin worked really well together - but I will say the texture was not it. I felt the crunchiness of the gherkin was too strong and outweighed the soft cushion of the prosciutto. Hmmm...I think a solid 7.5/10 is fair.
5) Ice Cream and Salt and Vinegar Chips
Onto our last weird craving. The main wow factor of this particular combo is just the absolute lawlessness of mixing crisps and ice cream. I mean, really? Salt and Vinegar? With ice cream? Traditionally those sound like two things which should without a doubt be kept at opposite ends of a room - attempting a mix feels like trying to force together two like-ended magnet poles (#GCSEPhysics). I did actually find a craving which suggested pickles as a substitute for crisps, but honestly after the previous experiences it was time to put a stop to the pickles. Enough is enough. Driven by the motivation of this being my last craving-tasting, I popped to my trusty local corner shop, bought a tub of Ben and Jerry’s classic cookie dough (a staple item and WITHOUT A DOUBT the best Ben and Jerry’s ice cream flavour), grabbed a small packet of Walkers Salt & Vinegar crisps and got to business. Hoping the combo wouldn’t ruin two of my favourite foods and indulging in a few preparatory spoonfuls of ice cream for courage, I selected a sufficiently large crisp from its packet and dumped a few sizeable lumps of Ben and Jerry’s on top. Biting into the dish was frightening at first - the possibility of an ice-cream-induced brain freeze along with a sharp crisp-acidity-attack was scarily overwhelming...but...it wasn’t actually...THAT bad??? Honestly, the saltiness of the crisps kind of balanced out the cold sweetness of the Ben and Jerry’s. What WAS weird, however, was hearing the loud crunch of the crisp whilst at the same time being aware of the ice cream’s runny/liquidy texture - an odd combo of soft and hard. Honestly, 8/10. No regrets.
As we sadly come to the end of yet another Unpublished article, I feel it is important to conclude by listing below other weird cravings I found in my research, but was not brave enough to experiment with…
Xoxo
The Unpublished Team
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