Sugar Sugar….Or Not
For a blog site with a name like ours, and being people who go out of our way to enjoy local delicacies and specialities, there is a glaring gap in our commitment to eating our way around the world. It hardly ever occurs to us to eat anything sweet.
Neither of us has much of a sweet tooth, and, whether travelling the world or back here in England, we barely ever even look at what desserts are on offer, both of us being of the opinion that anything sweet would just spoil the flavours of the great tasting meal we’ve just eaten. Sometimes though, we can’t help but think we’re probably missing out on a whole part of the foodie experience.
In Thailand for instance, all travellers rave about mango sticky rice and you will often read that comparing that dish in different locations is part of being in South East Asia. For us there was only one word to describe eating mango sticky rice…..unpleasant. The mix of the sickly sweetened mango with a rice made with condensed milk was something we did only once and have little desire to repeat.
We’ve managed to tour Italy without ever tasting their ice cream, Turkey without sampling sutlac, and Austria without eating cake. None of these things tempt us in the way that savoury dishes do.
It’s not so much that we have a real dislike – indeed we don’t – but more that a lack of a sweet tooth means that it hardly ever occurs to us to snack on anything sweet, and, when we do think of it, it’s never at the right time of day. I mean, you don’t want cake with your beer, do you!
But the more we read other blog posts, the more we think we may just be missing something. Sweet dishes are of course often just as authentically “local” as any other kind of food, and equally varied as you find new destinations, yet we will often be on the flight home before we say, “hey, we didn’t get round to trying so-and-so”.
We can’t help thinking that we need to try harder. But then, if it’s not your thing…
31 Comments
Andrew Petcher
I don’t have a sweet tooth but can always find space for a creme brulee.
Phil & Michaela
Well that’s not a bad shout!
wetanddustyroads
We normally try an authentic sweet dish when in another country … sometimes it’s great and other times not so much 🙂. But we always make sure we taste their coffee (and wine and beer) …
Phil & Michaela
Perhaps we should try them all in the future. Phil is a coffee monster but I always join in with the beer and the wine 😁
Toonsarah
I don’t have an especially sweet tooth but as I believe I’ve mentioned previously, gelato in Italy is an absolute must. I make it a rule whenever I’m there to eat gelato every afternoon! And not all flavours are super sweet – pistachio, for instance, or a sharp lemon sorbet 🙂 It’s not in the slightest bit like our ice cream! So do, if your travels this summer take you to Italy, give it a try. Who knows, you could become as addicted as I am!!
Phil & Michaela
Yes, perhaps we should try these sweet things more in the future, my choice in ice cream is rather boring, a good old fashioned 99 with a flake 😆 Michaela
Toonsarah
That can be a nice treat from time to time but I’m not a big fan of milk chocolate – it’s too sweet. Give me an intense dark chocolate every time!
Toonsarah
By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask – I’m thinking of changing my theme as I’ve had some issues with it and your pages are very clear and clean. Do you mind me asking what theme you use please?
Phil & Michaela
Hi Sarah, many thanks for you lovely comment about our pages being clean and clear, Thats great to hear as we are not big on technology. I, (Michaela, Phil is not good at all with technology) started the blog then went on a course in London to improve. Anyway, we used to have a wordpress.com account and they convinced me to get a wordpress.org account. Complicated to swap over, so couldn’t begin to tell you about that, anyway the the theme we now use is Ashe. Hope this helps. If you want to know where I learnt about it let me know 😊
Toonsarah
Ah, Ashe is one of the ones on my shortlist so I’ll investigate it further. I’m on wordpress.org already and have been from the start as I was advised it was more flexible and some other friends had taken the plunge and were using it. I’m largely self-taught, turning to friends for help when needed, but have been stumped by an issue that’s arisen of not getting pingbacks. My theme (Nisarg Pro) developers assure me it can’t be the theme but I’ve run out of things to try so I’m going to take the plunge and experiment with a change 🙂
Phil & Michaela
Hope it works for you Sarah, keep me posted. I actually don’t know about pingbacks so can’t say if they work or not on Ashe 🙂
Phil & Michaela
Give me Cadburys milk chocolate any day 😆 But Phil is a dark chocolate person 😁
grandmisadventures
I wish I didn’t have such a sweet tooth, but I would definitely fall under the Sugar sugar group. Your pictures look so tempting and delicious. I would probably make myself sick on all the sweet treats 🙂
Phil & Michaela
🤣🤣, perhaps we should try these sweet delights on our future trips 😁
Suzanne@PictureRetirement
I don’t eat a lot of sweets when at home, but I always sample local delicacies when we travel – Custard Tarts in Portugal, Baklava in Greece, gelato in Italy, dessert waffles in Belgium, chocolate crepes in France; it’s all good. Even that sticky rice with mango sounds wonderful to me!
Phil & Michaela
Perhaps we should make more of an effort in future and see what we are missng 😁
WanderingCanadians
I have such a huge sweet tooth!! I was literally salivating while scrolling through your pictures of all those yummy looking treats and sweets!
Phil & Michaela
Perhaps we will get to enjoy them too one day 😊
Nemorino
As a long-time resident of Germany, I do enjoy a good piece of cake with my coffee. But I tend to go for the kinds with more fruit and less sugar.
Heyjude
No gelato in Italy? Oh, my. I’m not an ice-cream person, but gelato is delicious. You can keep baklava though, far too sweet.
Phil & Michaela
Wee promise to do Gelato next time we are in Italy 😁
Lookoom
Unlike you I have a sweet tooth and for example during my stay in Istanbul I almost only ate baklava, fortunately I did not stay long. Out of curiosity I try the typical cuisine on most of my trips but it doesn’t interest me enough to make it a blog topic. It’s part of the culture of the countries, but I consider that you have to be sincere about your own interests and not force yourself.
Phil & Michaela
Yes, absolutely. Food is a big thing with us when travelling and we love sampling local dishes and learning the history and evolution of the local cuisine. But we keep forgetting the sweet stuff!
leightontravels
Well… I am at the other end of the spectrum. I have an incurable sweet tooth and would happily devour just about everything you mentioned (and indeed pictured) in this article. Mango sticky rice rocks! Actually, I wish I could be just a bit more disciplined in this area. But hey, we all have our vices.
Phil & Michaela
“…….”
Lingo in Transit
I try to fit in sweet treats although am not a big sweet tooth. It’s just harder! Savoury dishes are generally bigger that fill you up, ready for more sightseeing. Time has to be made to fit sweet treats into the day.
Phil & Michaela
We must try harder!
Annie Berger
Smiled while reading about your almost aversion to sweet things as I have enough of a sweet tooth for both of you! But I have very simple sweet preferences – Cadbury Milk Chocolate or Caramello is right up my alley. Steven and I are liquid anything but foodies much to our children’s frustration as three of the four like to hop from restaurant to restaurant with a liquid refueling stop in between!
Phil & Michaela
Great choice, if I was to eat any chocolate it would be Cadburys by choice but them I am biased, my Nan was an original Cadbury girl and worked there from the age of 14 and my Great great Grandfather was George Cadburys first Foreman. I was brought up on the Cadbury estate in Bournville so for me Cadburys is the best chocolate in the world 😋
Steven and Annie Berger
I hope one of your great, great grandfather’s benefits was free Cadbury’s chocolate bars!
Phil & Michaela
Well my Nan and all the other girls were allowed to eat as much chocolate as they liked off the conveyor belt as they packed the chocolate, I guess the theory that they would get sick of it. Most did, except my Nan, she was a chocoholic for all her 96 years 😆 Michaela