| Scorpions |
[Apr. 2nd, 2008|10:46 pm] |
Food - Deep-fried scorpions
Location - Wangfujing night market, Beijing
I've just spent six months in Beijing and trying the weird food at the night market seems to be the done thing, for tourists at least. Locals and resident foreigners avoid the place, as it's fair to say that it's an inauthentic, overexpensive tourist trap. Still, as a fan of unusual food you can't help but like the place. Whatever government official set the place up knew what he was doing. About thirty identical stalls stretch down one side of the road toward the forbidden city, each with it's own selection of snacks. Many are variations on the fried noodles and roujiamo themes, but a fair few also have the kind of thing I'm more interested in.
One stall in particular had a nice selection of not-usually-considered-edible wildlife on skewers, some of it still alive.
There were a few that didn't seem particularly special, and a few things I'd tried before, but the scorpions looked interesting.
This friendly chap made a good performnce out of skewering and deep-frying poisonous insects. I wonder how you get a job like that.Do you have to have some kind of certificate? Is there a training course?
After the frying it looked much the same - that is, not something you'd be particularly keen on puttng in your mouth. Scorpions are poisonous aren't they? And I'm afraid of them aren't I?
Ah well, I've put worse in there.
First impressions were not bad at all. A bit like fried chicken, with a thin, insect-y skin. Might as well finish it off.
It didn't even have a bad aftertaste. The tail didn't look like it was supposed to be eaten, so I left that out.
All-in-all fried scorpion is just a fairly pleasant oily street snack, if a bit of a expensive one. I'm assured that Chinese people don't really eat scorpions, they're just for tourists, but I don't see why not. If you can stomach the silkworms then why not these?
Finally today we have a first for foodtube, a youtube video.
As you can see, nothing wrong with eating scorpions.
I'm off to Vietnam this month, so expect a few more unusual eats to come. |
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| Foodtube Christmas dinner (sort of) - Bamboo Rat |
[Dec. 19th, 2007|01:08 am] |
Colourful Chinese name: Bamboo rat
What it really is: Stir-fried dried rat bits with vegetables
Location: Yangshuo, Guangxi, China
( Continued under the link ) |
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| Menu |
[Jun. 29th, 2007|08:12 pm] |
I'm in the uk right now, so this blog has been on hold for a while. Back in September. In the meantime here are some photos of a restaurant menu in Beijing. I don't think any comments are really needed.
( many more pages ) |
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| Living fungus milk |
[Dec. 21st, 2006|10:58 pm] |
Product name - Living Fungus Milk
Real contents - Unknown
Found at - Supermarket
( click for review ) |
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| Tasty Crispy Silkworm |
[Nov. 30th, 2006|09:53 pm] |
Appealing Chinese name - "tasty crispy silkworm"
What it really is - deep fried silkworm pupae
Location - posh Beijing restaurant.
( Read more... ) |
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| Picture hosting and questions. |
[Nov. 20th, 2006|04:21 pm] |
No entry this week as I'm a bit busy. Back in business next week. In the meantime a couple of things if anyone can be bothered answering.
First I'd like to ask if anyone has any questions for me about this project in general, as I'm making my user-info page a bit better and am not sure what to write about. I'll credit questions I put up, if they're good.
Secondly I'm getting a bit concerned about my picture hosting - the last entry got a lot more hits than I ever expected and all I have is a free photobucket account. I'm not sure what the maximum amount of times a picture can be linked before it gets replaced by a marker is but I may well be about to hit it. Anyone have any advice on this? Bear in mind I have operate from an internet cafe and have no money on my British debit card. |
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| Good Doggy |
[Nov. 8th, 2006|03:31 pm] |
Unusually straightforward Chinese name - "dog meat hotpot"
What it really is - a dog meat hotpot
Location - Backstreet restaurant
( Read more... ) |
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[Oct. 27th, 2006|05:30 pm] |
Slightly misleading Chinese name - "three duck parts"
What it really is - duck tongues, feet and shoulders in hot sauce
Location - Hunan restaurant
( Read more... ) |
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| Balut |
[Oct. 17th, 2006|05:31 pm] |
Name - "balut"
What it really is - boiled duck foetus
Location - Samantha's house, Manila, Philippines
( Read more... ) |
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| Field Chicken |
[Oct. 7th, 2006|05:37 pm] |
Misleading Chinese name - "field chicken"
What they really are - frogs. Lots of frogs.
Location - Cheers restaurant
( full review here ) |
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| Phoenix Claws |
[Sep. 26th, 2006|04:29 pm] |
Misleading Chinese name - "phoenix claws"
What they really are - chicken feet boiled in vinegar
Location - Sichuan restaurant
( Read more... ) |
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