I will never eat that again.

Here is another beer snack for you, Ali. They are apparently very salty and chewy. 😉

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We would enter the head man's hut, followed by as many kids as could squeeze in, and sit around a small table. A bottle of Lao Lao would then be produced to welcome us into the village. The custom with Lao Lao is that only an even number of shots can be drunk so when your host's pour you a fifth, you know a sixth is coming and when, especially at lunch time and with a long walk ahead, a ninth is put in front of you well, you know its trouble! If however it was evening then, after ablutions in the stream, dinner would be served. We ate many interesting dishes on our trek, some delicious some - not so! Bamboo shoot stew, wild cabbage and mountain veg, flying squirrel, wild cat, chicken claws, dried Buffalo skin and fresh, still warm bowls of chicken blood were just some of the delicacies on offer! Thank God for Lao Lao!

And


One evening Myself, Anny, Sebastian and Eva walked the two Kilometres from Tad Lo to the market: our mission to pick up some supplies for Mamma pap. One item was a little unusual - we were instructed to purchase a snake and were given very strict instructions not to pay over 60,000 Kip! We found the snake lady pretty quickly, her writhing mesh bag and collection of live Monitor Lizards gave her away somewhat! She was pretty surprised to be approached by four Falang wanting to buy a snake but that did not stop her from driving a very tough bargain. In the end we paid 70,000 Kip for the two meter long snake which she extracted from a large bag of these creatures with absolute nonchalance, placed it in another and gave it to us to carry home. The lady was very careful to always hold the snake by its head so we were a little worried that it was poisoness, and more worried that the thin, frayed bag would be insufficient to suitably contain the continuously writhing beast.

Back at "Mamma Pap's" (who thought the price decent due to the snake's size) the job of removing said snake from said bag fell to one of Mamma Pap's daughters. This pretty young girl must only have been about twelve but she seemed to know exactly what to do. We all looked on in amazement as she blindly reached into the bag and, casual as you like, removed the snake, coiled it up and bound it! The snake was then handed to an older lady who went inside to prepare it. We all felt a little bad about actively helping to proliferate the trade in wild animals and this feeling was only compounded when we saw how the snake was prepared. It was placed live, section by section, over a burning charcoal stove, so as to be able to singe the skin and remove the scales. None of us knew why this could not have been done once the snake was dead and none of us felt brave enough, or not guilty enough, to ask. This done and the snake was boiled, then chopped, and finally turned into snake Laap; a typical Lao spicy meat salad that just happens to be one of my favourites. Anny does not like Laap so she had hers in a noodle soup. We all loved it I'm sorry to say. Reply to this

Rat and Broccoli in China in the 80s - tasted very similar to er..three day old unrefrigerated chicken, Developed a real love for Fruit Bat in HK, Some disgusting stew thing with mares milk and unidentified meat of some sort in Ulaan Bator in the 80s, Snails in Vietnam (never again), Scorpions frogs and beetles in Cambodia(I quite like them except the crunchy beetle legs get stuck in your teeth), Turtle soup in PNG where I also discovered I have a real love for Taro and Cassava - wouldnt have eaten the turtle if I couldve known ahead of time what the local word for turtle was, just hoped it wasnt the turtle I had been diving with a few hours before..

Wierdest meal...in Darwin in the Northern Territory I worked at a pub (1980s again) who had a earth, surf and turf special....giant platter with Crocodile steaks, Snake, Monitor Lizard, Witchetty grubs, Quandogs (bush fruit), Roo tail, Emu steak and .....buffallo testicles. Reply to this

It has to be brains (of what I've no idea, I just tried them). The consistency was not for me. Blood milk is a second. Reply to this

Cow brains. Reply to this

Wow - some of these photos look absolutely DISGUSTING! Being vegetarian I'm usually quite lucky as, providing the locals understand the concept, there isn't really anything I've had that I wouldn't eat again. The most digusting vegetarian option I've ever been given was on a Virgin flight where I was given a mushroom paste sandwich! I'd eat it again if I were hungry but honestly who looks at mushrooms and thinks I'll mush these into a fine paste and stick it between two pieces of white bread?
More interesting was in Mexico where cactus is served a lot but again, while not something I'd buy in the supermarket myself, it's not something I'd really try to avoid in future, I actually rather liked it with melted cheese! Reply to this

We were in Datong in Nth Central China...the only place where I have had to teach the chefs how to fry an egg...ordered Farmer's Home Style Soup...a dark brown concoction...that when the liquid was eaten...very spicy...revealed a mess of giant centipedes & worms...quite off-putting!

And in Guilin in Sthn China...ordered Chicken soup...a massive bowl for two with numerous fresh hatchlings curled up...tiny heads with eyes, beaks, claws...I returned it as I recall...

"I ordered Chicken soup...this is Canary soup!" Reply to this

...the thought of eating a rodent! (it is all psychological)

I feel that way, about eating eggs. Congealed embriotic fluid. Yuck! Reply to this