Until 3 or 4 years ago, I had an aversion to lamb. My father hated lamb, so we never ate it at home. My first experience with lamb (that I can remember) was at a Greek restaurant in Boston when I was a teenager; I ate a decidedly unfresh hunk of meat that left a horrible aftertaste for hours. After that, I swore off lamb. And Greek food.

Fortunately, after college, I decided I needed to expand my culinary horizons. In The Man Who Ate Everything, Jeffrey Steingarten writes about how moderate exposure to hated foods is the key to getting ride of aversions. He creates a 6-step program to dealing with a bunch of his own food phobias, including kimchi, Indian desserts, and yes, Greek food, by trying everything 8 to 10 times. I can't say my own culinary enlightenment was this organized, or steadfastly recorded for publication. But I do know that over the years of going out of my comfort zone I have come to love anything Greek I used to loathe, including olives and feta. And especially lamb.