QotD: I Can’t Believe I Ate This – weirdest things I’ve ever eaten
Okay, without going into the rant both my parents subjected me to when I used the word “weird” for anything other than the preternatural, I will respond to the essence of the question:
What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever eaten?
Submitted by Megan.
The weirdest things I’ve ever eaten are:
By name: Monkeygland Burger from a street vendor at Sam Levy’s Village in Harare Zimbawbe.
By texture: Uni sushi or perhaps the sensation of those bubble tea bubbles hitting the back of my throat.
By taste: Bear Chili. It’s the first meat I’ve ever eaten that I really disliked… and I really disliked it. If you think lamb is gamey, just don’t bother with bear.
By freak-out-half-the-population-just-by-saying-it: Pork Balls. (Yes, testicles)
By what- the- hell- is- that- thing- we- just- hauled- out- of- the- ocean- &- dad- still- found- a- way- to- cook:
a large creature who was never-seen-the-sun white, had the shape of a barnacle but no external or internal bone, cartilage or shell, and was brought up from the bottom of the ocean with a squid jig stuck suction-cup-like onto a rock. Once dad cut the rock off, he sliced it into thin chunks and cooked it like squid in a garlicky olive oil.
Now, you may say “hey, none of that is especially weird”, but having reviewed many of the recent QotD postings on this topic, I have to say that the only ones I would consider “weird” are the peanut butter combo sandwiches – w/ pickles (ack), w/ anchovies (eggh), w/ jam (puke). IMHO there are only 3 non-weird ways to eat peanut butter: off the index finger, in a cookie, in a satay sauce when you can’t get fresh peanuts to grind yourself.
But given my obvious failure as a weird-benchmarker, here’s my question for you:
In a culturally diverse society like ours who defines the benchmark for “weird” food?
[this is good]
Yeah, I gotta agree that eating mystery sea creature… well, that’s legitimately weird. O_o I’m not a picky eater and will try nearly anything, but I’d prefer to know what it is.
Have you had sea cucumber? I think that’s got a much stranger texture than uni or boba. Or maybe cartilege or any kind… That stuff really freaks me out! But somehow I’m totally okay with pig’s ears.
What I think is really interesting is balut. I’m sure you must know what it is, but I’ll explain for anyone else reading this who might not. It’s a fertilized duck egg with mostly developed embryo inside. You boil it like a regular egg and eat it fresh from the shell. Yes, you eat ALL of it. Partially developed beak, feathers, and all. I’m really scared to eat this because I didn’t grow up with it, but my family (the filipino ones) used to eat it all the time. It’s really quite common to eat and no one thinks it’s weird.
But it was featured on Fear Factor as a gross and disgusting thing to eat. I think most people choked when they ate it. So interesting….