Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

Mine weren't too crazy, since my brothers were fairly picky eaters, but:

My parents put diced hard-boiled egg in mashed potatoes. I have no idea why, but we all completely took it for granted until someone would have a friend over for dinner. Apparently no one else does this, and its perceived degree of weirdness is highly variable.

My mom also pan fries chicken tacos. They are delicious, but none of my friends had ever seen a taco like that.

Borsch, and cabbage rolls. Even the concept of these foods weirded my friends out.

The Minnesota Iron Range, when I grew up, was still a hodge-podge of first and second generation Amercians of various European ethnic backgrounds, so "different" foods were common. (Mexican, Asian or "Soul" food were unheard of though)

However, my parents were considered quite exotic in that they drank cocktails, (Daquiris for Mom, Manhattens for Dad), rather than the usual beer or homemade vino.

All of us (20-25 people) would alternate having house parties each weekend when we were in high school. Alcohol and food were supplied and a band or someone would DJ. Most of our families felt if we were drinking, it was better at homes where everyone was safe versus out on the street. This was in the early to mid-1980s, when people weren't quite as uptight as they are these days.

This incident stands out and isn't so much weirding people out but something my mother and I found amusing. My mom couldn't stand preachy vegetarians (actually anyone pushy, including religion, politics, etc.) who carried themselves around telling people they are wrong and should be more like them. A sect of our group were preachy types, who also wore leather jackets (it is a by-product so they were ok to wear), and often told us that we should all be ashamed of ourselves because we were eating meat.

My mother often served roast beef sandwiches or smoked turkey sandwiches with lettuce, tomato, cucumber, alfalfa sprouts, with mayonnaise. The roast beef sandwiches would have a little dijon mustard in addition. Crusts were cut off, like I've always had them.

They told my mother they wanted different sandwiches made w/o any meat. So she made a special batch for them using the veggies above...spread thinly with mayonnaise. I guess mayonnaise was ok for them since they ate the entire batch. /roll eyes

All of my friends loved my mother. My father always kept to his room when we had our parties since he wasn't into punk, goth, and industrial music like my mother was. lol

My friends loved my mother's homemade mochi, which she sometimes threw dye in to make them different colors. I thought it was funky myself, but they loved it. The rum cake was extremely popular - I wonder why...

My Parents (the lovely lady whose comment is before me is in fact my mother) never weirded out my friends. Actually friends would often argue about who got to come and eat Sunday dinner at my house. And my Mom is famous at the high school I and my two sisters attended for her "Murray cookies". They are the best.

I don't remember my parents ever weirding out my friends. But now I'm the parent and we live in a very conservative (in every way) part of the country. We've had my high school age daughter's boyfriend over for supper a few times. Every time he eats with us, it is a new experience for him. He had never had chili, enchiladas, or stew before. I can never tell if he actually likes his food because he's so incredibly polite! He always eats what he's served but never goes back for seconds.

My parents became vegetarians for ethical reasons when I was about two and a a half, and then proceeded down the health-food road. When we went back to the US for several years, and did not end up back in NYC as originally planned (and where it would have gone relatively unnoticed), but in a small town in one of the more conservative counties of western New York, they'd really hit their stride in this endeavour.

The whole-grain bread sandwiches in my lunch box really stand out in my mind as getting plenty of negative attention at school (the separating oil in the home-made peanut butter was rapidly absorbed by the bread, causing my sandwiches to stiffen as if with rigor mortis, so they weren't much fun to eat, either).
My mother served a lot of vegetables and pasta, while prepared and fast foods were strictly proscribed, which was also perceived as 'weird'. And, my brother was the last word in picky and demanding eaters, so for dinner every evening my mother would make my brother a stack of soy-flour crepes, each of which he would spread with orange marmalade, and roll up. I avoided inviting anyone over around meal times, it was just too much work to explain and defend things (e.g. 'no, we didn't not eat eat meat because we were on welfare...') :D