We all have heard of many weird cravings our mothers, grandmothers and friends have experienced when pregnant. Girlfriends will compare the things they just have to eat when pregnant. Husband’s truly are sent out to the store late at night to fulfill that overbearing need his pregnant wife is dying for.
Do pregnant women really have strong cravings? Do they really crave odd things?
Yes! Not only do we crave them, but we can’t think of anything else until we satisfy them! I recently asked on our BWF Facebook page what were our mama’s most common and/or strange cravings. We had well over a 100 responses. I will share the most popular ones with you here.
The most common food and drink cravings were:
- Mexican Food
- Anything lemon: sliced lemons, lemonade, lemon sherert, and even one woman who craved smelling lemon scented Pledge!
- Fruit, especially citrus.
- Red meat, even by women who were vegetarian for years
- Tuna
- Chocolate
- Ice…lots and lots of ice
- Ice cold water
- Coca Cola
Oddest cravings, which usually were a mix of sweet and salty:
- You guessed it…pickles and ice cream
- Mac n Cheese with honey
- Corn dogs and cheese sticks dipped in jelly, jam, and syrup
- Tator tots dipped in applesauce
- Tropical Starbursts with pretzels
- Roasted marrow bone
Non Food Cravings, also known as Pica (which luckily they talked themselves out of consuming):
- Dirt (one mama ate pasta to satisfy this craving)
- Chalk (a mama chews on ice to keep from chewing on chalk)
- Vic’s Vapor Rub
- Bleach (lemon)
- The smell of gasoline
So, the next time a pregnant mama you know has a (food related) craving, indulge her! What were your cravings?
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104 Comments
Amy
Just as an aside to this, pica is generally a sign of a severe nutrient deficiency, like in the case of craving eating dirt the body is usually deficient in iron.
Mrs. BWF
Yes, I know. 🙂 I linked to an article about it.
K
Yes you did but you didn’t mention anything else about it. Links are often missed and it seems the responsible thing would have been to draw attention to the potential hazards of having pica rather than just put a passing note there. Just a thought.
Mrs. BWF
If this article was about pica, then maybe, but I do not feel me mentioning pica and adding a link to get more info about it is irresponsible. This article is about all kinds of cravings, not just pica. If you would like to add any more info about pica in your comments, please feel free. If I ever do a blog post on pica, I assure you there would be more information. You have offered no more information on the matter than I have (less actually).
Holly Wilson
I craved sweet pickles my first trimester and oranges just for 1 weekend during the second. I ate an entire (5 lb) bag of oranges in less than 24 hours!
Meagan
Well I am only 8 weeks right now but so far all I have wanted is turkey sandwiches. Which is a no-no with the cold deli meat. But I got to Quizno’s and make them put the meat through the over before they put the sandwich though. Tastes so good.
But with my son(he is 4 now), I craved pepperoni and nuts!!!! Yum!
Mrs. BWF
I eat lunch meat when pregnant. *ducks and hides*. 😉
Stephanie
Me too. So have most of the pregnant women I’ve known. LOL
Katy
I’m pretty sure in the UK we aren’t told not to. I don’t think I ever was.
Shannon
The EU has stronger food safety rules. There are lots of things I don’t eat here in the US, pregnant or not, that I would totally eat in other places.
Serena Abdelaziz
I live on lunch meat while pregnant….it’s a great way for me to get enough protein.
Raeanne
I eat it too and also tons of sushi! What can I say, I’m a great rebel! In fact I cannot currently get enough sushi or miso soup! It’s incredibly frustrating since the closest sushi place is 1 hour away! 🙁
Mollie
I was told that’s because of the nitrites in it. I found that “Hormel” lunch meats are preservative/nitrate/nitrite free. Enjoy!! 🙂
Marissa
I frequently craved fresh vegetables, and managed to get that satisfied by eating at a local Mexican restaurant that had them trucked in daily.
I also haven’t eaten red meat for years, and I find it difficult to maintain that lifestyle when I’m pregnant. All the chicken in the world can’t satisfy the craving for steak. Fortunately, I can always get turkey burgers and sausage and chicken hotdogs.
Elizabeth Hoskins
i craved ranch a lot..especially with broccoli. I also craved fried chicken from KFC a few times. And went through a period when i REALLY craved cold macaroni noodles mixed with ranch, peas, bacon bits, and pepper.
Tabitha
The ranch and bacon pasta salad thingy that they make… It’s a betty crocker one I think… It’s one that has most of the stuff in it already… I ate sooo much of that stuff last time!
E Ferrel
fresh tomatos when its the middle of winter with first pregnancy. And Taco Bell with both previous to this one this time i can only keep down lemonlime soda sometimes pepsi
Kayla
I craved Mexican (the spicier the better) during my pregnancy, along with lemons.
Kaia M
LOL. All of my cravings are on the common crave list. XD
Kaia M
Minus the chocolate and citrus. LOVED Lemonade when I first got pregnant.
Katy
I was so gutted that I missed out completely on this side of pregnancy due my severe hyperemesis 🙁
Bekah
ditto lol
Christy
I think it’s ridiculous to avoid deli meats when pregnant – I feel it’s going way overboard; same with soft cheeses, etc. Was that started by “What to Expect…”? I can imagine it would be a HUGE deal all over the news if listeria were found to be in Subway or Quizno’s deli meat. If you want it, eat it. If it turns you off, don’t. Avoiding a food for fear of a very rare but serious consequence is kind of like, well, choosing the hospital to have your baby because “what if..” at home. But I digress; some risks are more worth it to some and not to others. I PERSONALLY prefer to enjoy my pregnancies by eating the occasional sushi, melted brie cheese, feta, plenty of deli meat and birthing at home 🙂
Mama-2-Nine
Neat site! Not sure if ladies here know how unhealthy processed luncheon meats are or not, but you may want to look into what is put in them. I’m not a “health nut” (nothing against them though), but I personally consider luncheon meats basically not fit for eatting… Please find out what is put in these “meats”.
Anyway, this is my ninth pg and what I am craving is salad topped with chicken. I can eat it for every meal… Including breakfast!
Mrs. BWF
To each their own! 😉
4xmomma
I craved bean burritos from taco bell with my first, chinese with my second and nothing out of the ordinary with the last two but I also, loosened the rigid diet plan I had follwed with the first two so I think that helped plus I had such horrible heartburn from everything I ate, I think my “craver” was broken, lol!
Kiani Waters
I craved yellow, anything yellow.
Also they said I had low iron and tried to stick me with an iv, I wasn’t having it so I told them to give me two weeks. I drank beet and spinage juice every day, ate strait spinage salads and took floadix! Iron levels prefect by two weeks.
Daphne
I craved chicken crimpy shapes (a type of savoury biscuit) with my first and roast dinners with my second. I thunk the roast meats was because my iorn levels were really low. I also had a bit of a thing for oranges. in general though I just had massive cravings for food all the time. I would eat breakfast and then be thinking what am I going to eat for lunch and dinner lol.
Sarah Jo
Coke Icees! That craving lasted throughout my whole pregnancy. In fact, I craved it so badly that at 3am, I had my husband take me around town until we found a gas station that was both open and had an Icee machine. We got pulled over and the car was even searched because our shocks were shot and the officer said it looked like we had someone in the trunk. -_- I don’t care if you are a police officer, you do NOT get between a pregnant woman and her craving. By the time they were through, they were apologizing repeatedly and I finally got my icee, but I was not happy about having to wait.
Jodi
Me too! But I was craving mine parfait with soft-serve ice-cream, so I ended up having to go to McDonald’s and stand over the poor girl shouting intructions lol. I’m not a big woman, but I’ve got an intimidating voice when I *really* want something.
Amanda M
I could Not stand the smell of Lemons or anything Lemon (cleaning products!) … And I couldn’t eat meat very often.. I ate a lot of soup! and at one point I LOVED brick cheese (I’m not usually much of a cheese eater) and I once ate it with herb chip dip (I cringe now when I think of it)
Nicole
Soup is a definate! I’m always craving liquids, keeping my belly full of water, juice, or broth makes me feel better so soup is on my go-to list for snacks!
Brittany Joiner
Yay! Several of mine made the list! lol.
Lately I have been craving peanut butter a lot and eating bowl after bowl of Reese’s Puffs cereal 🙂 I craved it during the second half of my last pregnancy also and now Abby loves peanut butter as well.
Heather
I had stopped drinking pop for 13 years, then when I got preggo with my first, I wanted it so badly! Slurpees from 7/11 were always on my hit list. I also wanted salads ALL of the time, like every day a large dinner salad (forget any other kind of dinner!) . For my second, I had this HUGE hankering for Pizza Hut Pizza at like 11pm and just had to have it! I also craved the Slurpees., With my third (who I miscarried 🙁 in October) I really really wanted stir fried veggies with rice, like all of the time. I had some really crazy food aversions too with each child, like with my first I couldn’t eat mushrooms or sour stuff, especially sour popsicles! With my second, I couldn’t eat sausage! It was crazy 🙂
Carissa
ICE!! With all three pregnancies from about 25 weeks I could not get enough! The moment they were born, the craving dissapeared!
Mary Bennefield
I ate Saurkraut and Hershey’s syrup. Oh, and lots of crushed ice, watemelon and jalapenos!!
Mrs. BWF
Wait, saurkraut with hershey’s…together???!!!!
Shelly
Yes, so I’m not the only one! I craved saurkraut too! I actually stopped by a corner store to buy a hotdog just to get my quick fix of saurkraut on-the-go. I might have even threw the hotdog out, I just wanted it for a disguise to satisfy my craving 😉
Ashley Schmid
Asstrange as it is, I couldn’t get enough Spam. I ate it atleast once a day… lol YUCK! I haven’t eaten it since. I never had a problem with it before but I got burned out on it I guess. Also fried okra with brown gravy… Those were my true craving weaknesses!
Jessica Plautz
My first pregnancy all I craved was lemons dipped in sugar… my 2nd pregnancy I craved nothing but pineapple. My 3rd I craved mostly peanut butter, anything that had to do with peanut butter, but at the end of that pregnancy I dealt with pica not only did I want to eat things such as cat litter, dust, chalk, paper but I also craved smellings these things. Im glad I had enough control NOT to eat those things but it was hard. My 3rd pregnancy was odd, I didnt have 1 craving I had 100… every week it was something new it seemed from loaded chicago style hot dogs to steak and baked potatoes. Also had pica but this time my entire pregnancy, though it seemed a little easier to bare through… I also craved scents, the worse one was tires… I craved the smell of rubber! I would find reasons to go to fleet farm (a local store) because all you can smell there is TIRES.
Jessica Plautz
Oh man I almost forgot! Along with craving lemons with my first I also found myself dipping pickles in orange soda… weird
Katherine
I craved bacon like crazy with the first one! I once ate a whole package of it while making it to go into potatoes.
I ate all the watermelon I could get with my second and third, and with this one I went through a brief period where I had to have pineapple and blueberries every night.
Katherine
Also with the first one I smelled bacon everywhere we went. Even driving down the freeway I was certain that someone had bacon. It was bad!
Rae
Smores with bananas in them which I NEVER actually got to have! Grr! Also, Arby’s Plain Roast Beef sandwiches.
Rae
Oh yeah! I forgot, I had a wierd craving for peanut butter. I say wierd because I am deathly allergic to pb. Also, I could not stand even THINKING about chicken. It made me want to hurl (which I did, quite frequently). I could not look at it, smell it, taste it, think of it without wanting to or actually barfing. Also, red hots stopped my morning sickness. Having something in my mouth like a cough drop or a peppermint also helped, but red hots were the best 🙂
Cindy B
The only things I wanted ~ though it wasn’t a “dying” for craving ~ were Grape juice and ice cream (which I only had once/twice during the entire 10 months). Interesting that so many of us crave things high in Vit C.
Cindy B
O and I didn’t want them together… just wanted grape juice at least every other day. :O)
Jessica
If it wasn’t sour, ramen, or tomatoes, I almost wouldn’t eat! That was about all I craved during both my pregnancies so if I start craving that stuff, I freak out thinking I’m pregnant again! Oops! Haha.
Beth
I craved peanut butter and LOTS of it with both pregnancies 🙂 With my first I also craved chocolate covered pickles. But with my second I craved pineapple, but it had to be fresh and cut up just perfectly. 🙂 My sweet husband obliged to all of it.
Amy
This is my 3rd pregnancy. With my first I wanted nothing but sweets like ice cream and hohos and ding dongs… then dill pickles wrapped in flour tortillas with milkshakes… and during the last week when I was in labor (for almost 4 straight days) all I wanted was milk and carrots – which was a good thing, cleaned out my bowels so well I didn’t require any interference in that department. lol
With my second all I wanted was citrus fruit and sugared cereal. Oranges, lemons, grapefruit, the more sour the better.
With this one – naval oranges, granny smith apples, polish pickles, tomatoes… and you would not believe how hard it is to find polish pickles!
April
My first pregnancy, my craving was green olives. I went through a jar that I had picked up at the store in a matter of an hour or so, and then sent my husband back to the store to get more! I don’t remember any huge cravings with the next 3 pregnancies, but now THIS one, I have eaten a sandwich made with peanut butter, diced apple, raisins and mayonnaise. Hmmm… now that I mention it, I think I’ll go make myself another!
Raeanne
That’s hilarious… with my first that was my first signal that I was pregnant, on Friday I bought a huge jar of garlic stuffed green olives from Sam’s Club as a Christmas indulgence and by Monday I couldn’t even open the fridge without feeling sick because I knew they were in there! It lasted the entire pregnancy… I couldn’t even think about them!
RoseE
I’m childless as of yet (loving this blog though), but when my mother was pregnant with my baby brother, she craved Taco Bell. I made out like a BANDIT. Every time we drove through town, I’d see the Taco Bell sign coming up and think, “I wonder if she’s gonna . . . nah, probably not this time,” and then the turn signal was on and the words “Let’s get Taco Bell!” were issuing from the front seat. SCORE. I, as a little kid, loved Taco Bell and generally hardly ever got to eat fast food. I couldn’t believe my luck.
Then my brother showed up and my glorious nine-month splurge was over . . . 🙁
Present for that, by the way. Natural, no-intervention birth with all us other kids present for the whole thing. I got out of school. My mom rocks.
Mrs. BWF
Haha! Ya she definitely rocks!
Raeanne
I’d sure say that she does! What an awesome experience!
Rachel
With my first child, I craved hot chips and wedges. Anything REALLY salty. And right at the end I went through phases of craving ridiculous amounts of milk and even more ridiculous amounts of ice!
My second, I craved grapes until I threw them up then I stopped eating for 3 months (yay HG!) and after that it was mostly frozen coke and more ice.
This pregnancy, I don’t give a damn what I eat as long as I’m eating all the time! 🙂
Serena Abdelaziz
I crave Mexican often….this is my 9th pregnancy. (5 are with me). I really think it’s the SALT in the foods I like, not always the food. FRESH foods are always my favorite.
Elizabeth
With my son, I craved hot wings, hot sauce (went through a bottle of Crystal’s a week), tangarine juice, and sea food (mostly salmon and crab legs). Thankfully, we live in Florida. If we lived in, say, Nebraska, I would have been in trouble. 🙂
Elizabeth
I have very LOW blood pressure when I’m pregnant, so I’m sure my body was tying to raise it with all the salt.
Mrs. BWF
Oh my gosh, I crave Frank’s hot sauce like nobody’s business!!!! LOL.
Anna
At the beginning of this pregnancy I craved Bagel bites, grape koolaid, and cotton candy. 🙂 I’ll have cravings for a few days now but typically they go away. One that hasn’t (and I still haven’t gotten any) is chinese food. I could eat so much beef and broccoli right now! 🙂
The only thing my mom craved was ice. She would stop at certain gas stations and make us run in and buy her a cup of their ice. haha
Charlotte
I have a friend who, during her first pregnancy, said she craved CIGARETTES ALL THE TIME. (She didn’t imbibe, of course.) But the funniest part is, she’s NEVER been a smoker and normally can’t stand anything having to do with cigarettes or the smell. How weird is that??
chrys
With my first, I craved strawberry ice cream ontop of sharp cheddar cheese….and my “weird” craving, was chlorinated water…not to DRINK it, but to just submerge myself into it (never got that )
With my second, I wanted anything and everything chicken related. Chicken chicken chicken…mmmm….and I also craved the smell of Irish Spring soap.
We are TTC our third, and my husband keeps wondering what my eating craving will be, and what my smell craving will be, hahaha
PromiseJubilee
So far I always crave orange juice and red meat in the first trimester, and then hate red meat the rest of the time! I crave bean burritos a LOT.
Shanna
In my pregnancy I didn’t crave the normal crazy things in fact I have a list of stuff to stay away from because they made me sick like pickles, eggs, some kinds of fish and what not. I’ve craved fruits and veggies mostly along with some peanut butter cravings like lately I’ve been eating peanut butter on rice crispy treats, apples, banana’s and toast. Oh and I’m always in the mood for lobster!
Shanna
Oh man I forgot to put Meso Soup also, I’ve never been a tofu lover but I could eat Meso soup for days!!!
Tonia
With my daughter, I craved MILK MILK MILK. Nearly a gallon a day. And I had to have pepperoni pizza, with lemon juice and thinly sliced avocado put on fresh out of the oven. Im about 7 weeks with a new baby and the milk thing is definitely coming back and I’m craving french fries. I actually have more food aversions (sp?) than cravings. Peanut butter, pork, sesame, and any strong herb smells make me want to hurl.
Nicole
Besides the hotsauce on EVERYTHING, I was making tomato soup with about 4 tablespoons of hot sauce and dippin my fish sticks in it. I still can’t eat fish sticks to this day!
This time around my cravings seem to cycle from red meat to veggies and when I’m craving one, just the thought of the other disgusts me!
rachel loth
As bad as I know it is, I have wild cravings for Taco Bell this time. and cheeseburgers. I dont remember any strong cravings with my first – but I ate like crap so I had whatever i wanted anyways. With #2 I craved salad with Ranch, with #3 I suddenly LOVED mushrooms even though Id hated them my whole life. I put mushrooms on everything – eggs, baked potatoes, etc. It was so bizarre (I still love them today).
Elisabeth
When I started to come out of the 1st tri “I don’t want to eat anything” period, the first thing I wanted was french toast. Weeks later, I had to have enchiladas at least once a week for about a month. Then the enchilada craving went away. Now I just eat ice cream, a lot. So my cravings are not really weird, except that like you said in your blog I can’t stop thinking about it until I eat the food I want, and sometimes it even feels like the baby is ordering them, that it has nothing to do with me (esp with the enchiladas, I have never cared one way or the other for them before, I usually get a mexican salad).
Marcy
I remember craving watermelon with my first two pregnancies. And I sipped on a Coke in my 2nd pregnancy for a couple of days (I never drink pop otherwise). I am currently 15 weeks along with my 3rd pregnancy and have had chicken soft tacos from Taco Bell a few times already, and I have craved sea salt and vinegar potato chips this time around too. Gotta love it! LOL!
Raeanne
I’m 20 weeks and sea salt and vinegar chips are the bomb! Especially when they’re kettle style! 🙂
Kimberly
Anything pumpkin spice related, especially if it’s cold is on tap this pregnancy. So Starbucks and Jamba Juice have been getting a ton of my business lately.
Last pregnancy it was bananas. Yum!
Rae
I craved Arby’s Roast Beef sandwiches. Not homemade, not storebought, not ANY other food joint. I ate anywhere from 1 to 3 a week, which I didnt think was TERRIBLE..I only bought the sandwiches, I didnt buy the meal at all. I didnt want it. I only wanted the sandwiches.
I also craved smores with bananas on them. However, I didn’t actually get to try that until a couple months ago…my daughter just turned 2. By the way, it was actually yummy!
Also, I craved beer – didn’t actually drink any, beyond a small sip or two of my husbands, but it was almost painful not to drink one, to ignore my craving. One way I got around it was by eating the orange slice out of my hubs Blue Moon – you serve Blue Moon with an orange slice in it, by the time you get to the bottom, the slice is WELL marinated in beer…oooo it was so YUMMY!
On the other side, I couldnt eat were chicken. If I even THOUGHT about the word chicken, I would barf. About 12 weeks into my pregnnacy, I was eating chicken fajitas while at work (special needs facility, we cooked for residents and ourselves) and I chewed right into a peice of fat and griscle (sp?). I survived but my meal or stomach did not, and then like a week later I did the SAME THING with a chicken (lunchmeat, heh) sandwich. Needless to say, no more chicken! The day I gave birth, my mom made me chicken and rice (hers is AMAZING.) and it didnt bother me at all.
Raeanne
Oh yeah, beer! Found out I was pregnant with our second the night before my 21st birthday… can’t wait to have a Sam Adams after baby is born! That’ll be a a great celebratory sip after the good, hard, meaningful work of labor!
Rae
Another thought!!!!!!!!
My mother could not eat peanut butter when she was prego with me. Every time she would eat it, she would barf.
Guess who is allergic to peanuts? ME! So I think – not proved or anything, but definitely something to look into – that perhaps the foods that make us sick during pregnancy could be possible allergens to the babys.
Of course, that is from my personal experience, heh. But it might be an easy way to figure out future food allergies in an easier fashion than watching your kid have an actual reaction.
So by paying attention to your reaction to what you eat, and noticing an ‘off’ reaction to something, you might be able to tell if your baby will be allergic to a certain food in the future.
Tabitha
Okay. With my LO… I wanted ICE. CONSTANTLY. And sweet tea and lemonade (not mixed) because those were the only drinks I could keep down… Hmmm… I went through boneless buffalo wings like nobody’s business, I CONSTANTLY wanted Subway. Specifically a BLT. BUT mine had more on it… Sure, it had JUST enough bacon to give it flavor… but it had spinach, lettuce, cucumber, tomato, avocado, pickles, black olives, and a little bit of cheese. Those suckers were LOADED and I LOVED them 🙂 Then I also wanted some wraps that my mom and I make all the time. Tortilla, romaine lettuce, tomato, pickle, cheese (yay muenster[sp?] cheese!) and sliced deli honey ham 🙂 Sometimes I really really really wanted the popcorn chicken (and sweet tea!) from sonic… the tots too 🙂 But yeah. I think that wraps up my prego cravings 🙂 Oh. And once I got past the morning sickness (all day sickness) I went through so much milk that even my WIC stuff couldn’t keep up with me 🙂