Weird thing's I've eaten so far

What is weird or unusual varies greatly from one culture to the other. What would be considered a very ordinary food item in one place might be considered a delicacy in another place or even a taboo. The place pork occupies in Western and Far-Eastern cuisine as oppose to its proscribed status for practicing Jews and Muslims exemplify this very well.

Now, at the risk of disgusting some and irritating others, here’s a list of what one would consider unusual food items I have tried (note, some of these items are now quite common on my plate while others will never touch my lips again):


Fruits and Vegetables:

First of all, every time I see a new vegetable or fruit I would buy it and try it at home. It would be hard to mention every fruits and vegetables I’ve tried but here are some of them:

- Durian
- Water lilies (yep, the slimy stuff too)
- Wheat grass
- Chirimoya
- Dandelions (flowers, buds and leaves)
- Different kind of seaweeds, fresh and dried (including dulse)
- Different edible flowers
- Sea asparagus
- Cedar leaves (infusion and jelly)
- Fiddleheads (fresh and dried)
- Lotus roots and lotus seeds


Mushrooms:

Being an avid mushroom hunter and eater, I’ve tried quite a few mushrooms. The weirdest I’ve tried is called the jelly tooth (pseudohydnum gelatinosum) which is a relatively bland gelatinous mushroom which grows on well decayed wood. As if this mushroom wasn’t weird enough, I cooked them in tea flavoured simple syrup and served them over ice-cream. I’ve also tried most of the cultivated varieties available in North America and:

- Lobster mushroom
- Abortive Entoloma
- Chicken Mushroom
- Comb tooth
- Sweet tooth (hedgehog)
- Puffballs
- Morels
- Fairy ring mushroom
- Many kinds of chanterelles (black trumpets, golden chanterelles, tube chanterelle, yellow-footed chanterelle, grayling…)
- Many kinds of bolet, including some very slimy ones from the suilus family
- Common Lacaria
- Shaggy mane
- Blewit
- Orange milkies
- Gypsy
- Matsutake


Meat, seafood and other animal products

- Crocodile
- Snake skin
- Frogs (not only the legs)
- Jelly fish
- Sea urchin
- Squid and octopus
- Snail (escargot)
- Scorpion (tastes like shrimp)
- Crickets
- Silk worms’ cocoons
- Cicadas
- Horse meat
- Guinea pig (as in big hamster)
- Dog’s meat (yep, even that!)
- Bear
- Moose
- Deer
- Rabbit
- Tons of different game birds
- Ostrich and Emu
- Many different kinds of fishes (including small non-gutted dried and fresh fishes, sharks, carp, eel...)
- Goat
- Spam
- Testies (mutton, pork and beef)
- Chicken and duck feet
- Tripes
- Tendons (stewed for hours)
- Blood (blood pudding, jellied blood and boudin noir)
- Brain (veal and pig)
- Sweet bread (veal)
- Bone marrow (veal, pork and beef)
- Heart (beef)
- Kidneys (pork, veal and beef)
- Pig foot



Others

- All kind of stinky cheeses
- Stinky tofu
- Fish food
- Tofu ‘skin’
- Chicha
- Poutine
- Kvass
- Chinese thousand years egg
- 'Oreilles de christ' (fried pork rind)
- Natto (fermented stinky soy beans)
- Vegemite

I probably miss a lot of things here... I'm sorry if you found it disgusting at times (I actually hope you found it appetizing too).

A last note: I never ate voluntarily any animal in danger or disparition; that is plainly wrong! On the other hand, I do not want my life to be directed by other people's taboos and like to keep an open mind when faced with the unknown. I feel I am lucky to have had the chance to try all of these things.