[dustyn]

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Forget the vegetarian debate.

If I went to someone's house and they served me something (a) that I couldn't identify and (b) tasted horrible, I'd smile politely, eat as little of it as possible without being rude, and never accept another invitation to dinner.

I think it's a little rude to invite people over to your house and serve them some bizarre food that you like without even bothering to consider that they don't like it.

What if, instead of bizarre vegetable meal, the people served an Indiana Jones-type meal with eels and chilled monkey brains?

If you're going to cook for someone, cook something accessible and mainstream-ish.

I tend to side with the OP on this one.

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I completely agree with this as well, especially if it's the first time you invite someone over for dinner. As a host, you should be cooking things your audience will enjoy, and deliberately cooking obscure food when you have no idea what your audience will think about it is pretty rude, imo. Whether you are cooking meals with meat in them or not, it's poor taste to serve obscure meals for people you barely know and have no idea what their taste in food is, especially without giving your guests a heads up beforehand.

To use another analogy, say you are inviting another couple over for a movie for the first time, without any idea of their taste. Would you seriously put on something like La Dolce Vita or The Battle of Algiers? Putting a foreign film from the 60s to an unknown audience is a freakin terrible idea. A better approach would be a recent, well reviewed movie that attracts a wide variety of audiences. From there, you can inquire about the couples specific tastes and choose something more targetted for the next occasion. Same deal with food.