Note: this article carries no serious intent, and any text appearing hateful toward the person interviewed carries no malicious meaning. All comments should receive lighthearted interpretation as this person remains my best friend and approved the creation of this article (blame her).
Throughout history, cheese remains a staple in world wide dishes. Cheese, with all of its unique attributes, whether found in a sandwich, dessert, or unconventional beverage, proves its foundational complexity makes it a dietary necessity. Arguably, cheese serves as one of the most culturally significant, and globally praised dairy products in existence. Despite its high fat content and artery-glogging abilities, cheese acts as an excellent whole-food source of protein, calcium, and various vitamins, but most importantly, it connects diverse people together. The art of loving this milk product brings humans from all lengths of life together, allowing connectivity through a shared compassion for cheese. However, despite this ingredient holding high significance universally, some people remain unfazed by its widespread adoration..
Although the ratio between people who love cheese and people who hate it differs greatly, I managed to find someone that absolutely loathes cheese. Meet Naomi Volinsky, a strong disliker of cheesy ingredients. She acts as a representative for the portion of people discarded, isolated, exiled, and outcasted in our cheese loving world.
Habits, typically negative ones, develop rather than exist as characteristics innate to humans. The strong dislike for a specific food generally arises from its unfavorable presence in meals. Volinsky, serves as a perfect example of human disdain for a dish. While presenting as a normal person, she stands out in her community due to her dietary disposition. Unfortunately for her, her culture embraces a dairy-based diet, and Volinsky does not appreciate cream cheese atop a well toasted bagel. Outcast by her fellow humans, Volinsky finds it difficult to blend into society as a normal diner. However, this spiteful cheese disdaining trait Volinsky possesses developed due to a combination of cheesy factors. The lack of love in her heart for curd, although not hereditary, was heavily influenced by her sister’s disapproval. In my interview with the cow-product castaway, she states that the starting point of her detest to digest this particularly yellow dairy product began when she learned her two older sisters absolutely despised cheese. As the youngest of three, Volinsky subconsciously picked up certain attributes from her kin—like most do—learning to use the potty, walk, and most significantly, having a distinct hatred for cheese. As reported by Volinsky, one moment she was “chomping on cheese with my dear mother who was spoon feeding me, and the next I decided to never pick up another ooey gooey, sour, dairy product again.”
Although mirroring her sister’s mutual revulsion, Volinsky claims that this sibling-shared, cheese-hating bond did not serve as the peak instigator behind her provolone-induced nausea. Notably, the real reason for repulsion of the renowned melty, golden glob started in her seventh grade science classroom. Whilst participating in her teacher’s live demonstration of the making of cheese, Volinsky—at first—played along with her mentor’s curd creation. However, amidst her typically comforting laboratory, Volsinky, at the tender age of twelve, experienced a traumatic situation, one leaving her disheveled and with an atrocious cheddar twinge odor lingering in her nose, seeping into her cerebrum, forever influencing her opinion of cheese. To put in perspective, have you ever had to squeeze a cloth with chunky milk? Volinsky had to. Additionally, from her own account, her mother’s breath always left trails of cheesy aromas throughout the house. Reportedly, her guardian’s “foul odor” leaves her shaken and in a sad state of melancholy.
The contempt Volinsky demonstrates for a generally gratifying grub leads ordinary people to question: what aspect of this substance bothers her on such a massive level? To answer, Volinsky reveals her scornful stance on cheese was also brought on by an event earlier in life. As a young girl, Volinsky indulged in countless tasty beef sausages, packaged in a neat red bag that her father delivered to her weekly. One day, she reached into the bag, per usual, yet, unsuspectedly, as she fumbled for the delectable link, she was met with cheese—cold, stinky, mushy cheese. Consequently, this texture induced dairy disaster left her with a feeling she could never quite forget. She remembers the ten minutes she stood bent over the kitchen sink, slaving away, begrudgingly scraping straggly chunks of cheddar cheese out of her fingernails. Lamentably, her chin still trembles in fear at the mere mention of sausage-containing bags.
To typical people—such as myself—the relevancy of cheese in daily diets fills a person with pure jubilance, but in a distorted dairy world view, such as the one Volinsky traps herself in, she is left with traces of sorrow, because simply put, she really wishes she could eat cheese. Yes, she admits she maintains a decently diverse food palate, but her resentment for cheese exiles so many nutritional options. A quesadilla, a food staple in many lives, actually represents the Volsinky equivalent to mosquito repellent. Even a small grilled cheese sandwich proves too heavy to handle in the Volinsky dairy department. Her lack of lactose love remains a crisis, for every night, she lays awake, eyes open, staring up at her blank ceiling, pondering about what the other side of the coin looks like: a life full of Chili’s mozzarella sticks.
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Unfortunately, as this conversation between my dearest friend and I began to end, I shifted the topic into a much darker tone. I asked her wholeheartedly if she ever feels like an outcast/monster whenever she tells people about her cheese distaste. In essence, yes. To quote, “everytime someone figures me out, they seem to have this look in their eyes, as if they’re seeing beyond me—through me.” Friends and family often hide cheese in her food in an attempt to add some diversity in her sustenance intake, however, every time, they fail to trick her. She claims this act of betrayal is similar to “telling a person with an allergy to bees to stick their hand in a bee hive.” Though I strongly disagree with this comparison, I understand the emotional outcome when constantly critiqued for an uncanny trait.
My last inquiry for Volinsky: whether or not she would undertake a “cheese quest” in order to regain a love for it. Although she tends to resent the slight mention of feta, she strives to exist as someone confident in their choices of food, someone who indulges in cheesy delight. Even though this proposition makes her queasy, she confesses one day, she wishes to mature, and “adapt to that sweet sweet queso.” Unfortunately, she remarks that although she aspires to build a life based on the consumption of cheese, her hatred runs so deep, she’s not even sure she could take a nibble out of a cheddar stick. In her head, the remembered taste and mouth-feel would be too much to handle
Undoubtedly, questioning my dear friend about such a sensitive subject really widened my perspective. Gladness fills me for shedding light on such a controversial topic in her life, and I hope in the future, we will look back and laugh at her previous cheese abhorrence, and bond over the cheesiest of all pizza pies.