What "exotic" food do you crave?

[oftheherd1]

I had skunk as a kid (tastes a lot like veal). These days, I crave seafood, but you cannot get good seafood in Colorado, so I load up on it when we travel.
Before Xue asks... I don't eat shark. We have an agreement. I don't eat them, they don't eat me.

I have never heard of anyone eating skunk before. Where do you grab it to kill it? :uhyeah:

Fried chicken feet, I bring it for lunch sometimes. A coworker asked me if I was eating vodoo shrunken human hands
Traditional dishes where I grew up includes salted sheep`s head, seasoned ox testicles and boiled pig`s foot. Not to mention tørrfisk, a "fish flavored baseball bat" according to John Cleese.
A friend served up fried raven and bisam rat (a ratlike beaver creature with a long tail), not bad at all.
My girlfriend made me balut some time ago, delicious! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balut_(egg)

Note to self: Cancel that trip to Norway.

Being married to a Korean wife who cooks mostly Korean food at home, and living in Northern Virginia with access to all the big oriental grocery marts and restaurants, there isn't much I would crave that I could not get. But I do miss Ham Hung Neng Myon. That is a North Korean style Neng Myon, or cold noodle soup. My wife gets very close however, so I don't miss it that much. There was a restaurant in Seoul that served that in the summer time, and in the winter, they served a wonderful Sun Dae Gook, or blood sausage soup. They probably closed after we left, due to lack of business. Again, in Annandale, VA, there is the Seoul Sun Dae House, which serves among other things, a reasonable Sun Dae. (sigh)

For those who live where there are Korean populations, look for oriental supermarkets, or combined oriental/latin/african supermarkets. Some here have pigs feet, frozen blood (cooked it tastes like liver to me), beef heart, beef tongue, beef testicles, and other delicacies. Even smaller mom and pop stores might have some things, or be able to get them for you (One outside Ft Knox used to sell uncooked fish entrails. But that's another story). Some Chinese buffets have eel sushi and different types of sashimi, as well as a choose what you want in it Pho soup. I need to quit. Pho as I used to get it in Quang Tri was so good. I haven't yet found that here, but I haven't been to "Little Saigon" in Northern VA either.

I do consider Vietnamese coffee to be a delicacy. It is hard to get here. My favorite for a long time was Cao Nguyen. Sadly, it is no longer made. I found Tay Nguyen good, as well as Cafe Demonte. But they are also hard to get. I have the local supermarket manager trying to get me a case of Cafe Demonte. My fingers are crossed.

Thanks for the trip down memory lane.

 

[Dirty Dog]

I have never heard of anyone eating skunk before. Where do you grab it to kill it? :uhyeah:

I was told that the secret is to shoot them in the head so they don't spray, and that when you clean them, you absolutely must do so without causing any leaking from the scent gland.

 

[DennisBreene]

I have never heard of anyone eating skunk before. Where do you grab it to kill it? :uhyeah:



Note to self: Cancel that trip to Norway.

Being married to a Korean wife who cooks mostly Korean food at home, and living in Northern Virginia with access to all the big oriental grocery marts and restaurants, there isn't much I would crave that I could not get. But I do miss Ham Hung Neng Myon. That is a North Korean style Neng Myon, or cold noodle soup. My wife gets very close however, so I don't miss it that much. There was a restaurant in Seoul that served that in the summer time, and in the winter, they served a wonderful Sun Dae Gook, or blood sausage soup. They probably closed after we left, due to lack of business. Again, in Annandale, VA, there is the Seoul Sun Dae House, which serves among other things, a reasonable Sun Dae. (sigh)

For those who live where there are Korean populations, look for oriental supermarkets, or combined oriental/latin/african supermarkets. Some here have pigs feet, frozen blood (cooked it tastes like liver to me), beef heart, beef tongue, beef testicles, and other delicacies. Even smaller mom and pop stores might have some things, or be able to get them for you (One outside Ft Knox used to sell uncooked fish entrails. But that's another story). Some Chinese buffets have eel sushi and different types of sashimi, as well as a choose what you want in it Pho soup. I need to quit. Pho as I used to get it in Quang Tri was so good. I haven't yet found that here, but I haven't been to "Little Saigon" in Northern VA either.

I do consider Vietnamese coffee to be a delicacy. It is hard to get here. My favorite for a long time was Cao Nguyen. Sadly, it is no longer made. I found Tay Nguyen good, as well as Cafe Demonte. But they are also hard to get. I have the local supermarket manager trying to get me a case of Cafe Demonte. My fingers are crossed.

Thanks for the trip down memory lane.

That brought back memories of Pul Kogi. I also used to make spring rolls with home made Kim Chee from a friend wife at the school. There is a store named Uagimia (sp?) in Seattle that is like a small Japanese dept. store/grocery. It is wonderful.

 

[oftheherd1]

@ DennisBreene - As you probably know, Pulgogi is one of about 3 or 4 Korean foods most all Americans can eat. Chop chae pap (noodle and rice with meat) is another, as is Yaki-mandu (fried mandu which is a wrapped combination of noodles and meat, sometimes kimchi). Of course, fried rice is usually palatable to most Americans anywhere as well.

 

[granfire]

we have a lovely Korean restaurant here in town...(she spells it Bulgogi tho)
I love her Kimchee with plain rice. Might have to tell dear Husband we need to go to the buffet tomorrow! Her kimbop is good, too.

 

[elder999]

Not sure why this popped into my head. Maybe I'm hungry. With as diverse a group as we have, I thought it would be interesting so hear what unusual foods (in the mind of the individual posting) people find to be special treats. I'll confess I have a fondness for beef tongue.

What we'd call "exotic," as you've said, eventually becomes something less than exotic.With that said, this time of year, my thoughts turn to Sundance, and stewed puppy.Come autumn, we'll probably make some rabbit and rattlesnake sausage-but I actually was wishing for some for breakfast this morning!

 

[DennisBreene]

What we'd call "exotic," as you've said, eventually becomes something less than exotic.With that said, this time of year, my thoughts turn to Sundance, and stewed puppy.Come autumn, we'll probably make some rabbit and rattlesnake sausage-but I actually was wishing for some for breakfast this morning!

I would think that puppy would be too tender to stew. But then I've only recently started looking at my dog as a possible entre/ if she doesn't stop peeing on the carpet.

 

[Dirty Dog]

As you can see from this menu entry at the Honolulu Airport, that damned dog didn't "run for the border" fast enough...

 

[oftheherd1]

View attachment 18099

As you can see from this menu entry at the Honolulu Airport, that damned dog didn't "run for the border" fast enough...

That's funny. I had dog in Da Nang several times. I can eat it, but wouldn't go out of my way to get it. Funny, with 7 1/2 years in Korea, I never had it there. Used to see it it the markets though.

 

[Aiki Lee]

If you haven't already, try lutefisk. It's probably what they serve in hell.

 

[DennisBreene]

If you haven't already, try lutefisk. It's probably what they serve in hell.

After hearing it described, I'm not sure I could manage it.

 

[Cirdan]

After hearing it described, I'm not sure I could manage it.

You either love it or hate it.

Lutefisk is the Norwegians' attempt at conquering the world. When they discovered that Viking raids didn't give world supremacy, they invented a meal so terrifying, so cruel, that they could scare people to become one's subordinates.

 

[DennisBreene]

You either love it or hate it.

Lutefisk is the Norwegians' attempt at conquering the world. When they discovered that Viking raids didn't give world supremacy, they invented a meal so terrifying, so cruel, that they could scare people to become one's subordinates.

Apparently my wife's grandmother would make it in the bathtub for her husband. Doesn't it have something to do with soaking the fish with Lye?

 

[Cirdan]

Apparently my wife's grandmother would make it in the bathtub for her husband. Doesn't it have something to do with soaking the fish with Lye?

Yep I don`t recall the details but the dried fish is first soaked several days in water, then lye, then water again before finally cooking it. The process can take up to two weeks or more.
Btw never use silver utensils when eating this dish (or weapon of mass destruction as some call it), lutefisk will ruin silver permanently.

 

[oftheherd1]

After hearing it described, I'm not sure I could manage it.

Agreed. Although if you had told me when I was a child, that I would not only eat some of the things I do today, but enjoy them, I would probably have gagged at the thought. When my brother returned from Japan and told me of seeing returning fishermen downing small fish, I couldn't think of anything worse.

But after reading http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl...36&hl=en&tbm=isch&itbs=1&sa=X&ved=0CCwQrQMwAA I am convinced I would not be likely to want it. But the article had a couple of humorous bits in it anyway.

 

[Carol]

Some buddies and I flew out to Minnesota shortly after graduating from college to attend a friend's wedding. Arriving there was like walking in to the Scandinavian version of My Big Fat Greek Wedding. On our day of arrival we meet up with some of the folks and they ask us where we want to go for dinner, or what we want to eat. "Something local" was the overall response, and somewhere it came up in conversation that I like sushi.

So, a bunch of people start laughing and say that I should try Lutefisk...telling me it means "lake fish" in Norwegian....and I believed it. After all we were in the land of 10 gazillion lakes. So after deadpanning that lake fish doesn't make good sushi, they assured me that lutefisk was cooked and served with butter. Well alrighty then. I'm thinking that trying out a new kind of seafood served with butter sounds dandy to me, so we all go out to a restaurant and I order the lutefisk.

Only.....they're out of it. And the other folks around me are seriously disappointed! I order a steak instead, and for the rest of the trip they are urging me to try lutefisk. I never had the chance to do so.

It wasn't until well after that I returned home to Boston that I learned lutefisk doesn't mean lake fish...... :lol:

 

[Sukerkin]

I have to ask ... having read up on what it is, why go through so much trouble to prepare a fish that tastes absolutely wonderful cooked without the use of hazardous chemicals?

 

[aedrasteia]

It wasn't until well after that I returned home to Boston that I learned lutefisk doesn't mean lake fish...... :lol:

Carol, shhhh... don't tell da Norveegins. Dey don't know.

OK - somebody has to do it - post the Ole and Lena joke

Ole and Lena had Mr. and Mrs. Thorvald over for lutefisk. Lena knew that Mr. Thorvald liked his lutefisk with lots of melted butter and black pepper. After the company had gone home, Lena made a terrible discovery. She had served Mr. Thorvald gunpowder instead of black pepper! Vell, it vas too late to call or go over, so Lena lay awake all night worrying. Early the next morning she called da Thorvalds. "Oh Mr. Thorvald" said Lena, "I've done a turrible ting. Last night I served you gunpowder instead of black pepper in the lutefisk." "Oh tank Gud" said Mr. Thorvald. "Dot explains it all!." "Explains what?" asks Lena. Mr. Torvald said "Vell, vhen ve got home last night, I bent over to tie my shoe and shot da cat."

umm. Its OK, I'm bi-cultural and scandehoovian. And I have lots more Ole and Lena... be afraid. Be very afraid.

 

[granfire]

I have to ask ... having read up on what it is, why go through so much trouble to prepare a fish that tastes absolutely wonderful cooked without the use of hazardous chemicals?

to make it last for the voyage from Danmark to Greenland?
:lol:

or kill the bad stuff when it was not as fresh anymore?

 

[DennisBreene]

to make it last for the voyage from Danmark to Greenland?
:lol:

or kill the bad stuff when it was not as fresh anymore?

And to repair leaks in the hull.