My least favorite ingredient is white pepper. To me, it has an awful, dusty smell and flavor. Even though it’s good for preventing specks in sauces, I can’t get myself to use it.

I know, I know.

Most people love olives, but I hate them. The ruin the taste of any dish they are in. I do fully respect that there are people that love them, but I just can't get behind that.

For me the flavor is too strong and sometimes overpowers the food, but that's just me.

I know a pinch is supposed to enhance savory dishes... but I just don't like the surprise of a sweet taste when I'm not expecting it. I don't bake alot either so maybe it's just ignorance? Hmmmmm.....

I also hate olives, green or black. I can taste them on every part of a dish they are cooked in. Normally, on pizza I can just pull them off but I can still taste them sometimes.
If I can have 2, I don't care for mushrooms. I know most people I know love both olives and mushrooms! It's really hard being Italian and not liking these two major ingredients! But for me, olives are the worst as they do have a much stronger flavor.

I would starve before I would let a lima bean pass my lips.

Celery is one of the most disgusting thing's I ever ate , it has this weird smell and taste that I cant' stand .

Except I like chicken liver pate...other than that, liver makes me want to never eat again. I remember it as a kid...I used to have to have "just one bite"...that one bite would be in my mouth for hours, I just couldn't force myself to swallow it...yuck!

It is interesting to see the things that people don't like, thanks for sharing.

I will try anything at least once. When I was overseas in the Marine Corps I ate a lot of unusual stuff and dont recall any of it being bad. With eel once was enough..PEEYOU! The first time I had real sushi I tried smoked eel, that was enough.

Though not my fav I am a cauliflower convert which was not so long ago a top contender for my least favorite. I still don't think there is anything that can be done with a turnip to make it edible at all. This is a bad veg that should just leave the kitchen, return to the field and rot.

My late father used to cook tripe with beef, chorizos and tomatoes at home. But even though it's cooked to death until tender with lots of ginger, it still stinks. I don't like the texture either. Aside from tripe, I don't like other innards such as liver, etc. My father also cooks the intestine. He cuts them into pieces and tie it into knots and then simmer in pork soup. Yikes. I'm also not really fond of bitter melon. It's an Asian vegetable that has the length of an English cucumber. Although it's good for diabetes, it's very bitter.

I hate it when I go to the supermarket and I see a label saying "Artificially Flavored" I need food that is real and fresh.

I have tried it many times and it has a very chemical-like flavor to me. The only papaya that didn't taste that way was when I was in Jamaica, so I ate it at every meal during that vacation. I know most people are nuts for it, but it is just strange to me.

Reminds me of baby food

I know, I know all the arguments about how good it is for me and I'll live forever if I eat it and I'll be able to run marathons and lift great weights but I couldn't stand it when I was a kid and I can't stand it now....sorry mom.

Ditto on the Italian Parsley and Liver, too. And I'm Italian; sorry mom, dad, grandma etc to all my ancestors, but..... and liver, well that I can blame on my Mom's love of it, with onions. A yuck pooh at the max. Not very articulate for someone with a grad degree, but it comes from the heart of my childhood dislike of it to put it mildly. I'm sure I could think of a few others if I tried, oh yes creme brulee, and flan, and I think I will stop now.

I hate cooked mushrooms.

Allow me to quote the Wicked Witch of the West, " What a world, what a world." Clearly there is no accounting for taste. I guess that's why they call it cooking.

I love, love, love olives. Any color. I had some purpleish ones the other day. Liver 'n onions? Bring it on. Papaya - how about a nice Hawaiian Punch? Lentils make you STRONG! Love my brassicas.

But I must agree with Mr/Mz fungus. Nix de 'shrooms.

My least favorite ingredient? Money. Food should be free.

To misquote Disney, Fungus is neither food nor friend.

That is sacreligious, what about various forms of blue cheese? Life would not be worth living, or a cheese plate not worth presenting.

Okay that just be my least favorite thing. Sorry...growing up we always had to "try at least on bite" of everything. I can still feel that chunk of liver in my mouth. I would chew it...then gag...and then I could never ever swallow it. I had to stay at the table until it was done, so I would sit there for what seemed like, forever!

After awhile I would excuse myself and then go into the bathroom and spit it in the toilet...yuck! :-( I hear that it is actually good, but I just can't seem to make myself try it.

Now as for fungus....yum yum yum! Me love-a-da-fungus!

And Chris I agree, food should be free. In fact, I was just talking about that the other day.

I know, they're pretty and colorful. but to me they just overpower any dish they're cooked in. And raw or cooked, they always make me burp the taste of peppers for some time after I've eaten them.

Ripe olives are fine with me, but I don't like the green ones.

Oh, and in some Greek places, vinegar becomes my least favorite ingredient, because they seem to put it in EVERYTHING.

Don't even get me started... I'm almost to the point that I will bring kosher or gray sea salt with me if I'm going to eat at a friend's house...

If they have cooked with iodized salt during the cooking process, does it really matter what type of salt you add after the dish has been cooked with an overpowering iodized salt? Just a question, I think a dish needs to be gently, but properly seasoned throughout the cooking process. My stepmom doesn't season anything, I mean anything. I think it is pointless to glop on salt at the end on the cooking process to try and correct it. Am I wrong? I just use different types of salt, there are many lovely ones out there.

There's very, very few exceptions where adding salt or really any seasoning other than peppers after the fact actually HELPS the seasoning process.

A good example would be fried bits that can absorb the salt when they leave the fryer like potatoes or salting a soup or other broth/liquid based dish where you can actually incorporate the seasoning to the whole meal.

However, that being said... I cannot STAND the taste of iodized salt, and will happily go hungry or over-salt with something that doesn't taste like chlorine rather than eat something that tastes like that hyper-processed garbage.