Extreme Cuisine & Strange Ingredients

[Darb]

Waiter !

A round of pig stomach stew, and 4 steaming mugs of Kopi Luwak for my friends please !

[RecluceMage]

Hey no problem Wolfie, but I'd be driving up, so why don't I just pick you up? Cheaper to share the cost of fuel than to have you ride a train. PA is on the way... and I've only been there once. Quadruple date it is! But hold the Luak.... not because of what it is, just because its so expensive! Besides, I've already had the best coffee there is... I had to drive 3 hours up a winding mountain pass to a small Honduran villiage, but it was worth it. Fresh from the fields, it was a black coffee that tasted like it already had cream and sugar in it. If I had had any money on me I'd have bought a bag of it right then and there.

[Paladin]

4 steaming mugs of Kopi Luwak

That's gross!

[Darb]

I suppose we should pair the Kopi Luak with an order of tuna melts, rather than the pork stomach stew.

After all ... 'sh*t on a shingle' goes better with 'sh*t in a cup'.



Sorry ... couldn't help it.

[RecluceMage]

[violetblue]

You guys are all "nuts"! No Rocky Mountain Oysters for me! Or anything to do with major organs or digestive systems.

My grandmother used to make ground calves brains scrambled with eggs. Yum!

[Darb]

My grandmother used to make ground calves brains scrambled with eggs. Yum!

Now THAT is an example of a dish that can only be served on a farm, because brains and blood are highly perishable, must be used same-day as the day it's slaughtered, and are thus not available in supermarkets or even most restaurants. You'll occasionally see things like that in a high end restaurant, if they have a hardcore foodie for a chef who has a personal relationship with an area farm.

Case in point - one of my chef friends specializes in haggis ... and getting the necessary ingredients requires some phone calls and driving around.

[violetblue]

Now THAT is an example of a dish that can only be served on a farm, because brains and blood are highly perishable, must be used same-day as the day it's slaughtered, and are thus not available in supermarkets or even most restaurants. You'll occasionally see things like that in a high end restaurant, if they have a hardcore foodie for a chef who has a personal relationship with an area farm.

You called it, Brad. My mother wouldn't touch chicken (or a lot of meats, she was basically a vegetarian), because it was her job growing up--on the farm--to kill the chickens. Apparently, you start by chopping off their heads, and then they run around, headless, for a spell, before their bodies get the message.

[laurie]

My mother wouldn't touch chicken (or a lot of meats, she was basically a vegetarian), because it was her job growing up--on the farm--to kill the chickens. Apparently, you start by chopping off their heads, and then they run around, headless, for a spell, before their bodies get the message.

I asked my Mom once why she never bought whole chickens, just the parts packages. Growing up, she didn't live on a farm, but they kept hens in the backyard, mostly for the eggs, but also for occasional meals. When Mom was 12, her mother got sick, and Mom had to kill, pluck, clean and cook a chicken for Sunday dinner. The experience stayed with her. It also explained why my Dad was always in charge of the Thanksgiving turkey.

[tollbaby]

hehe I grew up on a farm as well... Have to admit, I've killed one chicken, and have successfully managed to block the incident from my mind. I can't get past gutting fish though, which is why I'll only eat pieces, and not touch anything presented to me as a whole fish.

[Darb]

Ok, quick digression into food philosophy ...

I've dressed more than a few fish ... and to be perfectly honest, you're missing out if you've never cooked fish on the bone. Fish cooked on the bone are a lot like land-based meat cooked on the bone - it just tastes better, and jucier, and richer ... mostly because the collagen in the tissues surrounding the bone (not to mention the intangible goodness inside the bones themselves) impart extra flavor and gelatin to the finished dish.

Normally you only get the full quota of goodness from bones and connective tissue (and especially the head) by boiling them to make stock, but you also get some just by cooking meat on the bone. For certain types of fish with thin bones, you can actually dust the frame with cornstarch, fry the frame once or twice until crispy, and then eat it (bones and all) like a cracker. It's great. Two of my favorite dishes are whole broiled pike mackerel (innards and all), and twice fried flounder with hot chilies (fry the frame twice, then fry the diced meat once, and serve it in the curled up crispy frame).

Cooking and eating food on the bone not only tastes better, but it also makes for a more visceral experience ... you're closer to the food you eat, you're more appreciative/aware of where that food comes from, and more reverential/respectful of it. The difference is similar between riding in a hermetically sealed bus, with the scenery rolling by outside like a TV program, and riding a motorcycle with your hair & shirt flapping in the wind, fully immersed in the essential experience.

Personally, I feel sorry for anyone who can't tell the difference between a slow-roasted rack of spare ribs, and a quick-broiled chunk of boneless rib meat that's dry, tough, and lifeless. Same cut, 2 different preps, differing only by the presence of bone and long-slow-worshipful and unhurried cooking.

[tollbaby]

Oh you'll get no argument from me, Brad... I'm just saying I might get a tad squeamish if you serve me something that stares back (but I'd still *try* it) The only thing I've ever tried that I couldn't swallow was escargot... but then I'm slightly phobic with slugs ever since I watched Chamber of Secrets (I'm way emetophobic, so watching someone puke up slugs has soured me on them completely).

[Darb]

Oh, man ... escargot poached in garlic butter are among my favorite of favorites. *DROOL*

In deference to those who are squeamish (or simply inexperienced with tongs), some restaurants will de-shell them for you before serving ... that way they arrive in a small dish with indentations, each indentation holding a shell-less snail in hot garlic butter.

Add a few drops of truffle oil, and slide a basket of freshly baked crusty bread (for dipping) in front of me, and I'm a happy camper.

[Echus Cthulhu Mythos]

In a supermarket in New Caledonia when I was there, I was disturbed by the large packets of snail shells stuffed with green stuff in the freezer section.

*shudders*

[tollbaby]

In a supermarket in New Caledonia when I was there, I was disturbed by the large packets of snail shells stuffed with green stuff in the freezer section.

*shudders*

You think that's disturbing.... my aunt used to RAISE the bloody things. *GAG*

I tried to eat it. HOnestly I did..... I chewed it for a little while until it began to taste faintly earthy, and then I had to spit it out.

[Echus Cthulhu Mythos]

Urg.


Well, I'd probably try it if I didn't know what it was.

[laurie]

I absolutely LOVE escargot in garlic butter!

Just wish they didn't cost so much...like salmon...and red snapper...and filet mignon...and all my other favorites...

[RecluceMage]

I didn't like escargot when I was a kid, but I tried it again on the cruise I went on this past October and I loved it. Guess tastes change.

I've had fish on the bone, and the best time was when we caught it straight from the stream to the frying pan. Yum yum. I have no problem gutting fish, I had to do several of them cause the guy I was fishing with got sick trying to do it. Men....

[Darb]

the guy I was fishing with got sick trying to do it. Men....

Wimp alert !

[StefanY]

I don't know what the big deal is, cleaning fish (and birds for that matter) is pretty easy

[Darb]

Agreed.

Eating a whole braised fish is no different than deboning, say, a smoked whitefish, to make your own whiefish salad. It's easy to learn, and no big deal.

[violetblue]

**violetblue waves to the motorcyclists flapping in the wind (bad for the hair, anyway) as she rides by in her hermetically sealed bus***

I thought meat came in a wrapper at the store. That's the only place I get it!

People in the area I grew up used to catch the big turtles out of ponds. The way they used to dress them involved sticking an air pump down their throats. I'll let you use your imagination for the rest of the process.

I can also remember a friend's dad frying frog legs in a skillet. They would jump around! I think he used to wait until I was over to make them just to see me turn as green as the frogs.

[nzilla]

Eating a whole fish is extreme? Sheesh, I've done it with chopsticks.

[KeE]

From what comes this dislike of killing and gutting fish, killing&plucking chickens, slaughtering pigs or calfs? The real issue should be if those animals had a, for them, good life before they were killed, and that they were killed as painless as possible (not as humane as possible- seing what humans can do to each other...)
If you feel queasy about this part of meat production- and fine about bying already fileted/cut ware... hmm, to get your ideals closer to your acts you may well have to contemplate vegetarianism.

KEE

(Sorry, this rant rather belongs in the soapbox fora, but being a farmer myself I've come to dislike this urban 'distance making' to what the food really is, and how it is produced. It deteriorates the quality of the food, and it makes people rather insensitive to what is basically required to bring forth food of good quality (off all origin, vegetarian, oceanic and animal)

[violetblue]

You may be surprised to know that my family's business was **drum roll please** meat processing. No, we didn't actually kill the animals, but we cut the meat for grocery chains, etc. That's why I knew where to find a website listing cuts of meat when KeE was looking for translations (although I realized after I posted it that it that it may not have been as much help to KeE as he would have liked because American cuts are different than those overseas). I have actually visited a lot of kill facilities. There are many regulations in place, at least in America, to make sure animals are killed humanely.

I would agree with KeE in the fact that the closer we can eat the food to the source, the better off it is for us. I actually do a lot of shopping at the farmer's market, because by the time food reaches us in the store, it's usually pretty old. I just read in the paper today that meat packers are being allowed to use carbon monoxide on case ready meats to keep them looking red and fresh (by the way, if you see meat that's dark in the case and marked down, buy it because there's nothing wrong with it, it's just been exposed to air, and it's usually more tender because it's aged a bit). And vegetables and fruits are irradicated, waxed and who knows what else to keep them fresh.

But growing up with a picky mom made me picky too. And I hadn't even gotten to squirrels yet! (the meat's stringy, I think) Oh, well. I guess I just have the face the fact that I'm not as adventuresome with my eating as I thought I was. It is interesting to read about other's culinary adventures, and I was not aware until Brad's post that it was possible to eat fish bones. (my sig, by the way, is for Kvetch )