Travel Poll: Unusual Food

[GilliC]

What is the weirdest food you've ever tried? How was it?

What was the best thing that you've tried that you weren't sure you'd like?

[thebulldog]

On our honeymoon in Anguilla we ate stingray. It was much lighter and flakier than i thought.

I am not into eating bugs or anything like that and haven't really traveled anywhere with truly crazy food but the sting ray, beef cheeks in Spain, camel milk chocolate in Dubai are on that list for us.


Sent from my SM-G900P using proboards

[Brit]

Weirdest food, definitely silk worm in China.

The best food that I thought I wouldn't like was takoyaki aka octopus balls. I'm just not usually a huge fan of octopus, but they were super good!

[Brit]

thebulldog - My DD always asks for camel milk in the grocery store because they have single serve ones with pictures of camels, super kid friendly.

[anna7602]

Beef cheeks (France), chicken hearts (Brazil) and blood sausage (Spain) are all yummy. I've tried them, but could do without haggis (Scotland) and plain old, cubed, congealed pork--or was it chicken?-- blood (Spain).

[dana2006]

Raw horse meat in Japan. My friend, who'd lived in Japan for years, persuaded me to try it. Tasted just like tuna.

[just]

Raw chicken with a raw egg on top - a Japanese local provincial delicacy.

It didn't really taste of anything except slime.

[just]

Sept 1, 2015 10:09:10 GMT -5 Brit said:

Weirdest food, definitely silk worm in China.

The best food that I thought I wouldn't like was takoyaki aka octopus balls. I'm just not usually a huge fan of octopus, but they were super good!

I had takoyaki my first day in Japan and it took me far too long to realize that Octopus don't have balls. 

We actually bought a takoyaki maker for our kitchen. We've only used it a handful of times and made a whole range of yaki, not just tako. It made the cut for the move though so now I want to dig it out.

[mdgirl]

When we were in Vietnam we did a food tour that involved eating frog (which really does taste like chicken) and balut, which are embryonic chickens in their eggs. In Japan we did a sushi breakfast at the Tokyo fish market that involved a few unidentifiable things, including this giant pink slimy one I almost gagged on.

[gardengal]

I had fried crickets & pig eat & snout tacos in Oaxaca. The tacos were ok, a big nope to the crickets as the reminded me of shrimp & I don't like shrimp

I didn't have it traveling but I really like huitlachoche (so?)/corn fungus. It's black & looks gross but is quite good. And, I didn't think I'd like gazpacho until I had it in Grenada. I guess the thought of cold soup turned me off but now I made it every tomato season!

It's kind of strange that gazpacho was weird to me but rando pig pieces in a taco is normal

[alleinesein]

Gulas/Angulas when I was in Spain. Its baby eels and they are served whole. They were disgusting  

[cheezer]

Larvae in Ecuador. Guinea pig off the side of the road in Peru. I also drank Chicha in Ecuador. You can just ferment it like regular beer or this from Wikipedia: Other ways of making chicha was by having women chew the corn then spit it out in water and left to brew for a few weeks

So we drank fermented spit milk booze essentially because the kind we drank was definitely the spit out kind.

I've eaten pretty much every kind of organ but mostly at higher end menus. The above was my street food adventures.

[origami]

I haven't eaten anything weird that I remember, but DH has eaten dog meat, silkworms, and the octopus dish where the legs are moving on the plate.

[Alyssa]

I have no idea what I ate when I was in Vietnam. I ordered pasta bolognese at a upscale restaurant in Hanoi and the sauce was...off. The meat was different in texture....more rubbery than ground beef or pork.

[rupertpenny]

I haven't eaten anything that weird, mostly just some of the tamer types of organ mean. We had tripe in Rome, and I've had sweetbreads and chicken hearts several times but I actually don't think those were while traveling. My H tried whale and puffin in Iceland but I didn't eat any because I was too busy side-eyeing him about the whale. I am more open to trying things while traveling though. I think I tried squid, octopus, and several types of shellfish for the first time while on vacation and I love squid and octopus now.

I may have eaten some other weird stuff in SE Asia, but I try not to ask too many questions about what I'm eating when I order street food, haha.

[marytini]

Cuy, aka guinea pig in Ecuador. Texture of chicken but tasted like fresh water fish to me. Pretty greasy too.

Sent from my SM-G900V using proboards

[sunshinedaydreams]

We like to do as the locals do when we travel, and my H is an adventurous eater. So usually he orders the crazy stuff and I nibble off of his plate.

We've had mopani worms in Zimbabwe, which were pretty well charred, so it wasn't really like eating a worm. We also had kudu, ostrich and warthog in Africa. Warthog bacon is amaaaaaazing! In Peru we had guinea pig and alpaca. In Iceland we ate puffin. It was really fatty and greasy and gross.

The thing I tried and was surprised I liked were whole, fried squids on a boat in Stone Town, Zanzibar. I don't really like seafood, but we were the only ones on the boat and I didn't want to offend the captain, whose wife had made them.

[GilliC]

I don't know what the weirdest thing I've eaten is, since I rarely shy away from much. I had a policy when we lived in China that I would try anything once, since pretty much most dishes were a bit odd.

Among the stranger things I've tried... Jellyfish, fried meal worms, fried bumblebess (dipped in honey - the irony), whale (both cooked and raw), "thousand-year-old" eggs, sheep brain.

My favorite weird dish is probably smalahove. I actually think it tastes pretty good, and the appearance doesn't really put me off.

On the flipside, mooncakes were the most surprisingly awful! I hate them! You're eating an incredibly dense but otherwise drab sweet cake, and then all of a sudden you bite into a salted egg yolk! Blech! They look so pretty and harmless!

[rupertpenny]

GilliC yes moon cakes are foul! They are all over the place right now and I know my coworkers are going to try and force some on me soon.

[GilliC]

Sept 2, 2015 5:36:00 GMT -5 rupertpenny said:

GilliC yes moon cakes are foul! They are all over the place right now and I know my coworkers are going to try and force some on me soon.

[anna7602]

Sept 1, 2015 19:29:33 GMT -5 marytini said:

Cuy, aka guinea pig in Ecuador. Texture of chicken but tasted like fresh water fish to me. Pretty greasy too.

Sent from my SM-G900V using proboards

I couldn't deal with the fact that they bring the whole thing out to you, skinned and grilled, so I skipped even trying it. Fish with the head on it doesn't bother me, neither does whole, roast pig with an apple in the mouth and everything, but for some reason, the thought of whole cuy grossed me out. Perhaps because it is so rodent like in its appearance? 

[Susie]

Foal, whale, and puffin in Iceland.

[Wanderista]

The one that I didn't care for was tripe in a can kind of "Chef Boyardee-style". I can do tripe as an accompaniment in pho or something, but canned "tripe spaghetti" was something that I ate once to be polite in Croatia because it was someone's favorite food. 

I actually am ok with haggis. It just tastes like an oatmealy burger to me. I've liked most unusual things that I've tried. I would say that I'm reasonably adventurous but I may not seek out things that seem totally unappetizing. I'm generally a good sport about trying local cuisines though. I am also someone who will step out of my comfort zone and try things that I don't normally like "when in Rome". I just draw the line at food allergies, or well, probably most bugs or completely unappealing offal.

[Wanderista]

Oh, as to the second question, I've gotten progressively less picky as an eater as I've gotten older aside from my unavoidable food allergies. I acquire a new appreciation for foods that I didn't previously like fairly regularly. For example, I used to dislike pickles and now I can appreciate them in moderation. 

I will say that probably the biggest mental transition for me around food was when I went to Bulgaria in grad school. I went in kind of apprehensively with concern about the quality of the food there and my eyes were totally opened. I discovered that the food was fresh and made with excellent-tasting ingredients. In some ways, it was better than the processed foods of the US and UK. (This was before farm-to-table got popular in either of those countries). It was a great example of getting past my comfort zone and seeing the world with new eyes. So, Bulgarian cuisine generally was probably the most life-changing for me. 

[scout8]

I am not an adventurous eater at all, so I have nothing to contribute to this poll. You are all so brave. Just reading through this thread is giving me anxiety. Bugs, raw meats, worms??? ::Shudders::

[majesty318]

Sept 2, 2015 22:35:46 GMT -5 scout8 said:

I am not an adventurous eater at all, so I have nothing to contribute to this poll. You are all so brave. Just reading through this thread is giving me anxiety. Bugs, raw meats, worms??? ::Shudders::

This exactly! I wouldn't say I'm picky, but I just can't do offal/ unusual animals

[alleinesein]

Another weird food- I had duck tongue in Chinatown, SF, CA. They were fried with a salt and pepper seasoning and they melted in your mouth. YUM!

[Wanderista]

Sept 2, 2015 19:23:56 GMT -5 @mx said:

Wanderista H and I are thinking about taking a quick holiday to Bulgaria in late October (we found a great deal on flights). Thoughts?

Bulgaria is wonderful!

[toutsuite]

Sheep's brain. It was disgusting. In my defense I didn't know what it was and it was apparently a delicacy. Subsequently, I caught a parasite and am convinced that it was a result of eating that. I eat very little meat now as a result. Lol.

[wise_rita]

Beverages count, right?

Lewak coffee in Bali. Coffee beans are fed to this cat looking animal called a civet. The civet poops out the coffee beans, and then coffee is made from the digested/pooped out beans.

Poop coffee!