– An Easy Spread –

Tired of Barnes & Noble cookbooks?
Can’t stand Chef Emeril’s face anymore?
Want a little extra ‘something-something’ in your diet?

It happened when I was eleven. I found an abandoned bird nest in a palm tree. Three white eggs fit perfectly in my palms. I cupped the unborn and with one hand flung them on the jagged tarmac: sunny-side up. I bent down to stare at the splattered fusion of colors: yellow, pink, white, slimey-clear. One lick and thereafter grew my love of the bizarre and mysterious tastes: beach sand, peeling lithium-containing wall paint, and raw eggs with yogurt and sugar as a hangover cure. The following is a compilation of exotic and rare foods around the world from people and for people who share the same flavor-curiosity that arouses more than just your appetite!

Bird’s Nest Soup

Also known as Jin Wo, this Chinese rare indulgence possesses the potential to awaken intense sexual desires, or at best cripple your wallet.

Bird-watcher? – Good news: Your ‘talents’ can finally come to bear some fruit! Try this recipe from ChineseFood-Recipes.com:

Ingredients
8 oz. birds’ nests
1 tbsp. vegetable oil
1 tbsp. fresh ginger root, chopped
4 oz. cooked chicken, cubed
4 oz. button mushrooms, quartered
8 oz. canned quail eggs, drained
7 ½ cups chicken stock

Directions:

1. Soak the birds’ nest in water for 5 minutes, then drain.
2. Heat the oil in a saucepan.
3. Add the ginger and fry for 1 minute, stirring constantly.
4. Stir in the chicken, mushrooms, eggs and stock and bring to boil.
5. Reduce the heat to low and add birds’ nests/ Simmer for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
6. Serve at once in bowls.

Not a bird-watcher? – Good news: Make your own nest!

1. Gather twigs, leaves, and assorted sticks of your choice
2. Using saliva as your main ingredient you can re-create the exquisite flavoring
3. Boil in a pot with chicken stock
4. Add bird droppings and feathers for that extra pizzazz

Shark Fin Soup

It could make you sterile. It could bleach your mouth. It could poison you. It could bankrupt you.

A delicacy in China, shark fin soup is made of a variety of shark fins:

1. Catch (use large bait – preferably ex-boyfriends)
2. Cut (use that always handy butcher knife)
3. Discard (use ocean where it will sink to the bottom and be eaten alive or die slowly)
3. Skin (use your taxidermy skills)
4. Dry or Freeze
5. Dye (use hydrogen peroxide – try some streaks while you’re at it)
6. Boil (use fire – try some streaks this way too while you’re at it)

Tiger Penis

“Is that a penis in my soup or are you just happy to see me?”

It is rumored to snowball your sex-drive.

“I’ll have some penis, medium-rare, you know, just a little pink in the middle.”

Women are discouraged from eating the testicles because it might make them more masculine. Forget that sex-op you had planned, this might work better.

“Looking to fill your appetite, size matters in this case.”

1. Soak in hot water for 24 hours
2. Pickle or Boil
3. Eat
4. F***
5. Grow a ‘stache.

Blowfish

Fu∙gu- ‘to blow’

‘happiness’

Some of you might consider the two definitions to be interchangeable.

A Japanese delight, the puffer/blow/globe/swell fish is a toxic but cute predator. The poison is circulated in the skin, organs, and ovaries. Some Japanese chefs are licensed by the government in order to legally, and accurately prepare the fish. There is no remedy for the poison once it is administered.

1. Stir-fry
2. Sashimi-style
3. Pickled-preserves
4. Asphyxiate-to-death: the way the blowfish meant it

The Japanese poet Yosa Buson (1716–1783) expressed some of this feeling in a famous senryū:

I cannot see her tonight.
I have to give her up
So I will eat fugu.

Monkey Brains

Remember Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom?

Fact: Live monkey brains are a treat in China and India.

Fiction: The new Indiana Jones movie was good.

1. Collar and cuff the monkey through a hole in the table-top
2. Make sure the head sticks out through the opening
3. Pour boiling water on head to kill lice
4. Slice scalp open with sharp knife
5. Spoon brains
6. OR: none of the above.

Bats

A Halloween sure-scare, try this winter soup as a warm, tingly appetizer.

Batman had his own bat cave for this sort holiday treat.

Below is a recipe from “The New York Times Natural Foods Cookbook” by Jean Hewitt:
3 Fruit bats, well washed but either skinned nor eviscerated,
Water
1 tb Finely sliced fresh ginger,
1 lg Onion, quartered,

1. Place the bats in a large kettle and add water to cover, the ginger, onion, and salt. Bring to the boil and cook for 40 minutes. Strain broth into a second kettle.
2. Take the bats, skin them and discard the skin. Remove meat from the bones and return meat, and any of the viscera you fancy, to the broth. Heat.
3. Serve liberally sprinkled with scallions and further seasoned with soy sauce and/or coconut cream.

Yield: 4 servings

Scorpions

Lifespan: 4-25 years (existed 430 million years ago)

Exoskeleton: Glows in the dark if exposed to ultraviolet light

Poison: Used to treat certain cancers

In China you can catch a quick snack off a street vendor selling scorpion kebabs. Try this tasty treat at your next cookout or bar-b-que:

1. Deep fry to defuse venom
2. Grill until extra crispy or cockroach crunchy
3. De-claw to avoid cheek incisions
4. Floss. Floss. Floss.

Cow Tongue

Salivating yet?

Time for some make out take out.

Traditional American cuisine celebrates beef:

Burgers, pot roasts, steaks, ribs, hotdogs

So what’s wrong with a little tongue? We all like a little tongue, sometimes. No?

1. Go to local butcher shop and buy some cow tongue
2. Soak in sea-salt for 7 days
3. Cook in stew with assorted vegetables
4. Test on family, friends, and loved ones before trying yourself

Silk Worms

A popular Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese dish, this multi-purpose ingredient is used in cultivating cloth, medicinal remedies, and protein supplements.

The miniscule delicacy can be eaten as a snack, served as hors d’oeuvres, or packed astronaut provisions. Cocoon looking, this animal is boiled, baked, braised, or fried to suit your taste.

See for yourself:

1. Reference: Silence of the Lambs
2. Bag a bunch from your local silkworm farm
3. Eat spicy or sickly sweet
4. Keep a container close for vomiting

Cicadas

Hatching after 17 years of hibernating in their cocoons underground, this rare breed of cicadas known as Magicicada, are roasted, fried, or braised to perfection. They are versatile kitchen favorites and can be served as snacks, entrees, or desserts.

Forget Godiva! Make your own chocolate-dipped cicada for next Valentine’s Day date.

1. Follow the cicada’s song like that of Homer’s Sirens
2. De-shell and bake or roast
3. Melt a pot of chocolate
4. Dip and cover cicadas in chocolate
5. Cool for an hour
6. Place in heart-shaped box, and surprise your date with this sweet present

Kopi Luwak

Like coffee? Like monkeys? Well, you’re going to love this!

In the Philippines and Indonesia, an extraordinary cultivation of monkey-pooped coffee beans is quickly becoming all the new rage.

The process:

1. Asian Palm Civet monkey eats red coffee beans
2. Enzymes in monkey’s body break down coffee beans
3. Monkey poops
4. People collect poop and search for coffee ‘extracts’
5. Cup O’ Joe anyone?

The cost:
$100-$600/lb

Buy some.

Bull Testicles

Time to play ball(s).

From the acclaimed Serbian chef Ljubomir Erovic, I bring you snipet of his brilliant collection Cooking with Balls: “Goulash with stallion or bull testicles”

Ingredients:

2-3 tablespoons lard
4kg stallion of bull testicles
2-3 onions
1 clove garlic
peppercorn and ground pepper
thyme
mint herb
milfoil (plant)
red ground seasoning pepper or tomato puree
hot chilli pepper to taste
salt
mix seasoning
1 tbsp plain flour
200ml white wine
1 tablespoon honey
2 squares cooking chocolate

Method:

1. Cut testicles into thin slices.
2. Fry briefly, adding finely chopped onion, garlic, black ground pepper and chilli.
3. Cook while gradually adding water.
4. When nearly finished, add white wine.
5. When wine evaporates a bit, add mix seasoning, pepper, thyme, milfoil, red pepper powder, mint herb and a tablespoon of flour.
6. Mix all well until wine completely evaporates and at the very end add honey and chocolate.
7. Instead of red ground seasoning pepper you can use tomato puree. Tomato puree is used to get red colour, so don’t use ketchup.

In conclusion…

Idolizing my older sister with her magnetism to house plants, street-chalk, and cat food, I’ve grown to experiment on my taste buds. Following my father’s footsteps and making home-made wine in the bathtub, I like to use a pressure cooker to melt and stew all my favorite ingredients for the winter. Big into chasers – I’ll try anything once, as long as it’s followed by a swig of Jack, Jameson, or Johnnie – my palate cleaners.

If you’re excited by naughty parts in your food, or just enjoy eating naughty parts, then this international gathering of recipes can serve to affirm a universal bond with your fellow man. If you possess a wild palate and enjoyed the extravagant and peculiar platters presented herein, then your tongue can not be tamed. If you’re sensitive to meaty, naked animal parts in your plate, try a more humble, yet exotic alternative: sushi!

Story Credits

Bird Nest Soup — Photo credit
Shark Fin Soup — Photo credit
Tiger Penis: by Pete Malaysia from PeteFormation Foodie Adventure — Photo credit
Blow Fish: posted by LostPigeon — Photo credit
Monkey Brains: Original article provided by K.C. Chan. Original translation by Lucy Yeh and D.E. Franks, 1998. Revised by D.E. Franks and Y.P. Kuo, 2001 — Photo credit
Bat: U.S. Forest Service — Photo credit
Scorpions – Photo credit
Cow Tongue — Photo credit
Silkworms: from IndyStar — Photo credit
Cicada: Wikipedia — Photo credit
Kopi-Coffee: Wikipedia — Photo credit
Bulls Balls: from The Hungry Cyclist — Photo credit

* All Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons image are used freely available at Wikipedia under the creative commons cc-by-sa 2.5 license.

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