Snake snack and other such (China)

The other day someone asked me if I have ever eaten a snake.

 “Yes”, I replied. “What did it taste like?”.

“It did not have any taste or rather it tasted of the spices it was cooked in. The meat was grainy.”

Here is the “Dragon(snake) and Phoenix(chicken)” dish that I tried at a snake farm in Guangdong, South China.

Updates: On the topic of queasy food

2002: Khao San road, Bangkok

2003: Brains in Chengdu, recommended by a brilliant math professor.

2004: We got some friends to try this Korean street food called Bondegi.

It is made from silkworm pupa. Their reactions:

Friend 1: crunchy

Friend 2: like tempeh

Friend 3: The taste? I couldn’t tell you, but apparently as bad as it smells, that is, bitter and pungent. The texture, crunchy on the outside and just ever so slightly gooey on the inside…

You can buy a can of bondegi at Korean convenience stores.

2005: Ika Shiokara

A snack that accompanies alcohol made from fermented squid. The squid is fermented in its own viscera. Sometimes I walk into Japanese bars in random cities. First they are shocked to see a non-Japanese person. It is like in a western movie, everyone pauses the activity they are in and stands still. I walk to the counter and order some beer and ika shiokara. The moment they hear my second order, the are relaxed and the activities resume.

2008: Shirako, sperm sacs of male cod fish. Another pub food. This time from a small restaurant near our Tokyo home.

2009: Spiders and crickets at Khmer Delight. There is a new Cambodian restaurant in Singapore’s East Coast region that serves some delights from Cambodia.

2016: Locusts in Kofu, Yamanashi, Japan

2017: More pupae at Vietnamese author Nguyen Nhan Ahn’s restaurant in Saigon