When I travel, I try to taste the local cuisine and love to try things that I’ve never had before. Recently I tried haggis, which was outstanding. I’ve also had hakarl (fermented shark - not really my cup of tea, but glad I tried it) and balut (surprisingly tasty).
What have you tried? Anything that caught you off guard by how tasty (or not) it was?
Haggis is delicious, and when I first had it, I assumed I wouldn’t like it, but had to try, only to really love it.
A lot of stinky cheeses taste really good, but if you’ve never given then a chance, it’s hard to make yourself eat. Humboldt Fog is a favorite of mine, but basically none of my peers will try it.
I had that cheese a long time ago and remember enjoying it. Strong but delicious.
Grilled fruit bat in Indonesia. They “hunted” them by flying kites with hooks. Wouldn’t recommend. Cruel and disgusting.
Same country: on a trip to a volcano we ate some sort of fried rice brick with rendang or beef dip at a small road stall. It was the most simple, yet delicious meal I ever had. I still dream of that tasty brick of rice…
Edit: I forgot sausage made of pigs brain. Sounds horrible, tastes awesome. But it’s an aquired taste. And you need a really good butcher who can make this kind of sausage in good quality.
Damn, poor bats. What did it taste like?
The rendang rice brick dish sounds amazing. I love rendang.
Burnt, gamy chicken…it is seen as a delicacy in some countries, but I was so appaled that I couldn’t enjoy the taste.
I guess it’s one of those things you have to grow up eating.
There’s a restaurant in Florida that serves fruit bat. Not sure if it’s still around but it can be googled.
Sky fishing
I have no idea where it comes from but here I go : A long time ago, we were invited at some German friends place (I am french) for dinner and they served us a weird unidentifiable “mud” that we did not thought much of.
Well I like to try new food so I dug in and wouldn’t you know it I still eat it today and everyone I made some for told me that it was amazingly good for what it is.
The recipe is simple : For a can of tune, you add a box of creamy cheese (I don’t know if there is a word in English, if you look for “Philadelphia” on the internet, you will find it) and some finely cut dried tomatoes. Be careful to strain everything (remove the water from the tuna, from the cheese and remove most of the oil of the tomatoes) and mix everything together. Salt, pepper and you are good to go. I recommend eating it with plain crackers as the preparation is already salty.
Unfortunately I don’t have the name as we did not understood what our friends told us and simply named it “carabistouille”
That box of creamy cheese is literally called “cream cheese”, at least in American English. Philadelphia is the most popular brand name.
I call mine “rillettes de thon” or “rillettes de sardines” depending on which canned fish I put in them. Also, I love to twist them with chopped cilantro, chopped shallots and lime juice or smoked paprika (pimientón de la Vera).
Tuna, cream cheese, and chopped tomatoes. That sounds like tuna spread. I like to make mine with tuna, cream cheese, freshly chopped chives and chopped pickles. Great thing to spread on crackers.
That actually sounds quite tasty! One of those foods that tastes the opposite of how it looks. (Balut is very much like that)
Deep fried cicadas seasoned with Old Bay. Co-worker gathered a bunch a few years ago when they were around and fried them up. They were fine, and if you had not told me they were an insect I wouldn’t even have known. Nothing I wanted to eat again afterwards though.
The Corsican version of Casu Marzu, sheeps milk cheese with fly larvae. It’s delicious.
Maple sap, direct from the bucket. The flavor is quite complex compared to syrup since the volatiles haven’t been boiled off.
Prahok, fermented fish paste. Used as an ingredient, condiment, and main. It isn’t terrible, it’s just not very good. I expected I would love it, but meh.
Chapulines (Crickets/small grashopper type things) in Mexico - Grilled as street food with a little lime just and chili - Very tasty indeed.
I had them recently ground up on something, and I thought it was just tajin. With chili and zime zest, it basically ends up just a more savory tajin. Not sure I would have given them the chance if I knew what I was eating, lol
Ooo, yes! Been wanting to try these in a taco, or just by themselves.
Deep fried haggis is much nicer than it sounds. I tried it a few years ago in Edinburgh on a rugby weekend.
I had what I thought was fried squid in Spain once. I’d tried squid a few years before, and it was flavourless and rubbery, but I later learned that it had been overcooked. When I saw Calamari on the menu in a seaside restaurant, I thought I’d try it again.
It had a longer name, but a badly translated conversation with the waiter convinced me that it was the same dish.
The same waiter brought out a plate of what looked a lot like deep fried baby squid or octopus.
It was very nice, but I got filthy looks from my young niece for ‘eating all the babies’, so I haven’t had it since.
I’ve had baby octopus before at a Japanese restaurant. Delicious, but I feel bad about eating octopus now.
Haggis is great! I just tried it for the first time last week. So good.
Had deep fried brain in Spain. Also snout which was not palatable really, i could see nose hairs in it. Crocodile in Cambodia. Are chicken feet interesting?
Sure, chicken feet are interesting. I don’t think most people outside of Asian cultures have tried them.
Edit: never had deep fried brain, but I’m had it sauted. Pretty good!
Chocolate covered crickets. What made them interesting is they tasted nothing like chocolate and I kinda suspect the person who gave them to me of having sucked the coating off them first.
And the legs were scratchy on the way down.
Scratchy 😖
Some sort of venomous snake in snake alley Taiwan. I also did a shooter of snake venom and whiskey
The snake wasn’t very good, was very oily and kind of rubbery
Edit: added link
I got tricked into trying stinky tofu in Taiwan before the smell was able to hit me and I admit I liked it, but not enough to make up for the smell once it did hit me.
Also tried horse nigiri in Japan. Definitely the gamiest thing I’ve ever tasted
Stinky tofu is delicious. Lives up to its name tho
