A Six Pack And A Bag Of Worm Pretzels
I do not expect this trend will catch on anytime real soon in the US. The eating of worms, scorpions, ants and grasshoppers, that is.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A discerning guest at a Manhattan cocktail party removed a scorpion from its bed of cheese on an endive leaf and popped it in his mouth, determined to savour the taste unadulterated.
"Nutty, sweet," was the verdict of Gourmet magazine food editor Ian Knauer at the recent soiree.
"That's an antenna," he added, pointing to a morsel of cricket left poking through lips of his companion at the Explorers Club in New York, which likes to entertain its well-traveled members with exotic culinary adventures.
Founded in 1904, the exclusive international club has some 3,000 members around the world including Edmund Hillary, the first man to climb Mount Everest, astronaut John Glenn and paleontologist Richard Leakey.
On the menu at a reception for some lesser mortals in June were worms, crickets, scorpions, ants and pigeon pate.
"We're so fast to make fun or make comments about the way someone talks or the way someone walks, and food is like the last bastion," said Gene Rurka, the Explorers Club's exotic foods expert. "But someone today is living off this."
Nutty describes more than the taste. But the ants, worms and maggots must be handled in a special way to prepare them for the table.
Large ants from Texas are served with blackcurrants in a sweet mini-tart, while he likes to serve the maggots stuffed in mushrooms. "They're delicious," Rurka said. "I was going to say like a tasty rice grain, but soft. It's not chewy like that."
He has experimented with worms and decided the best option is to disguise them as a pretzel, tying them in a knot like the salty dough snack, and to serve them with mustard. First they have to be fed on oatmeal for 10 days to cleanse the system, and he does not recommend taking worms from just anywhere.
"You don't want them raised in a dump site, you don't want them raised in manure," he said.
Sounds yummy. Maybe my palate isn't sophisticated enough to appreciate the delicate flavor of insect. Or maybe I just have never been that drunk or crazy. Probably the latter.
Weird Stuff | Gaius Thursday, 6 July , 2006
By Roland Hesz, Thursday, 6 July , 2006 @ 7:53 am
We were arguing which food is worse: taking the larvae of a big insect, and cooking it, or killing a pig, and stuffing it back into his own intestines…
By Gaius, Thursday, 6 July , 2006 @ 8:00 am
Good point. One definition of courage I heard once: The first man to eat a raw oyster!
By Black Jack, Thursday, 6 July , 2006 @ 12:42 pm
Don’t look now big fella, but Blue Crabs ain’t so easy to approach either. Old Jimmy packs more than his share of attitude. And, ounce for ounce, he’s tougher than a boiled rooster.
Now, them what knows and loves him, gives him the respect he earns. And, remember the very first colonist killed on Roanoke Island was out crabbin’ when the red Indians took their revenge. Why, if it wasn’t for the Blue Crab there wouldn’t be no US of A.
PS: Oyster is pronounced in Chesapeake speak as though the “oy” was an “ar.” Like you might say “How much for a boosh of them arsters?”
By Gaius, Thursday, 6 July , 2006 @ 12:49 pm
Regional dialects are a lot of fun. Like earl down south. As in change the earl in the car.