Max, one of our Wise Guys, has a confession to make:

Ladies, face it: After a blow job, your average man would like you to swallow his seed, plain and simple. Whether that’s because of pride, practicality or a penchant for raunchiness may vary from guy to guy, but a lover’s choice of spitting over swallowing is something that almost all men take quite personally. Do we taste that bad? Do we disgust you? Aren’t you into us?

I was not surprised then when I recently heard a chef at my restaurant bemoaning the fact that his lady, despite her willingness to perform certain acts, would not ingest the spoils of her apparent victory. The cook simply could not understand why she wouldn’t swallow it after it had already been in her mouth.

Now, most men who work in a kitchen have a high tolerance for all that is salacious, perverted, even gross — much higher than your average citizen. So it was natural then for me to wonder whether my disgruntled chef had himself tasted his own “love juice.” After all, if he objected to a woman not devouring something that he produced (a touchy subject for any chef), he himself must have been brave enough to taste test all that came out of his kitchen.

“Have you ever tasted your own?” I asked.

For the first time in any kitchen that I’ve ever worked, everyone went silent. They stared at me, their faces contorted in disgust. I saw then that, even if any of them had, their homophobic instincts would not allow them to admit that they had tasted any man’s semen, even if it was just their own.

I, on the other hand, had to come clean. I told them that not only had I tasted my own, but that it was not, in fact, all that bad. I suggested that maybe they should do the same before they started preaching the virtues of swallowing over the sins of spitting. (I also briefly considered highlighting the fact that the taste of one’s semen is dictated by one’s diet and that, in light of the sheer amount of junk food and booze the majority of them consumed daily, their sexual partners might have had good reason to spit; but I decided this blow was literally below the belt). They, in turn, have decided that I am far stranger than they had originally thought and, since I beat them at their own game of sexual one-upmanship, treat me with a bit more respect than before.

Still, the fact that most men are uncomfortable even discussing the idea of tasting their own ejaculate amuses and confuses me. I’ve heard those same cooks obsess over the joys of anal sex, “doing” women on their periods, and having their girlfriends slip a finger in their bums during a blow job, and yet something so standard as their own come is too much for them? Isn’t the idea of feces and menstrual blood a bit more concerning?

Gentlemen, face it: we are being ignorant. We can’t handle the heat and yet we practically live in the kitchen. It’s time to try new things. I know this might be hard to swallow, but every woman who has gone down on you has gotten a taste, and I think that it is now up to us to share the load.