The most unconventional thing you've eaten?

caseydog said:
EB, I don't think of crawfish as "unusual" anymore, although I did when I first moved to Port Arthur. Boudin is not all that unusual anymore. It is made with pretty ordinary cuts of pork these days. I love when people from up North try gator tail for the first time. Their first words are almost always, "tastes like chicken."

I have had escargot twice. The first time, it was wonderful. The second time, not so much. I guess it takes a good cook.

CD
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It's like whitebait here, at the turn of the century they reckon they used to bury it in the garden as fertiliser. Now it sells for around $120 kg. Crazy.!!

Russ
 
caseydog said:
EB, I don't think of crawfish as "unusual" anymore, although I did when I first moved to Port Arthur. Boudin is not all that unusual anymore. It is made with pretty ordinary cuts of pork these days. I love when people from up North try gator tail for the first time. Their first words are almost always, "tastes like chicken."

I have had escargot twice. The first time, it was wonderful. The second time, not so much. I guess it takes a good cook.

CD
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Alligator - tasted like sausage to me. But that was because how they cooked it. I really want to try gator in a more natural presentation.

Yes, escargot depends on the cook.
 
ElizabethB said:
What is the definition of unusual?

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So the question remains - what defines unusual? I think unusual is the opposite of familiar.
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Yes, if you grow up with something, it never seems unusual. Take tongue and sweetbreads - we had them often when I was growing up. At that point both items were pretty cheap to purchase. Not unusual at all, at least in context. In fact, these became "comfort food" in a way something like mac and cheese never could and never did.
 
rascal said:
It's like whitebait here, at the turn of the century they reckon they used to bury it in the garden as fertiliser. Now it sells for around $120 kg. Crazy.!!

Russ
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And in the Colonial era, lobster was raked out of the New England waters, and also used as fertilizer. Or fed day after day to prisoners. No one wanted to eat this item back then.
 
I am fascinated by out conception of food. What was once trash is now a delicacy. What one would never dream of eating is common fare or a delicacy to another. A very interesting topic. I am very open to trying almost anything. I draw the line at cheese with maggots jumping out. Can not wrap my head around that.
 
morning glory said:
but I wouldn't eat the worms. I don't think you are supposed to eat the worms are you MypinchofItaly?
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I've eaten earth worms. A friend of the family back when I was in primary school used to farm them specifically to eat, so we ate them when visiting.

I've also eaten squirrel (grey) that I've caught. Rabbit was/is normal, as was pigeon and pheasant (wild) and I've had sparrows in France along with the standard escargot and frog's legs. I never ate swallows though because even back as a very young kid, I knew that their numbers were declining and my Grannie was very partial to their preservation (alive preservation that is).

A less common one is ants eggs. I've eaten those minus the adult ants! They are easy to collect if you find a nest. Done correctly the ants actually move the eggs for you, all into one place making collection and extraction easy.

I've also got this feeling that I've eaten wood lice as well whilst a kid...

I turned vegetarian when I was 11 yrs old, so can only say that it all occurred before then or on survival courses where catching, killing, skinning and preparing was expected of all participants and given my outdoor life even as a teenager, I appreciated the need to be able to hunt, catch and prepare such foods. I did as a rule concentrate on plants etc, but understood that some areas I ventured to have little else available especially at my favourite time of year, Winter.
 
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I didn't try them, but my husband ate fried crickets (or maybe they were grasshoppers) when we were in Cancun once. Yeah, we had a lot to drink first. But not enough to drink for me to try them. He said that they were very crunchy.
 
I lived in Florida for the first 35 years of my life, and some of the seafood restaurants used to pass off stingray or shark as scallops (round cookie cutter did the trick). I could always tell when it wasn't really scallops, but I thought they still tasted quite good. I also ate alligator tail several times. Pounded out, breaded, and fried, it's pretty tasty. Oh, and I like eel quite a bit, too. That's about the most adventurous I have ever gotten.
 
JASOH1 said:
I lived in Florida for the first 35 years of my life, and some of the seafood restaurants used to pass off stingray or shark as scallops (round cookie cutter did the trick). I could always tell when it wasn't really scallops, but I thought they still tasted quite good. I also ate alligator tail several times. Pounded out, breaded, and fried, it's pretty tasty. Oh, and I like eel quite a bit, too. That's about the most adventurous I have ever gotten.
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I was born in Florida, assuming you were as well. I'm an avid underwater hunter and a seafood snob. I have come to the conclusion that the best seafood restaurant is my home. Sharks and rays urinate through their flesh, so I don't partake, even if soaked in milk to neutralize the uric acid. Beside bay scallops, we only buy dry packed sea scallops. Something unusual we like is Uni, sea urchin gonads which aren't cooked. I used gator tail in a gumbo for a competition we had here. I find, like other seafood, people tend to over cook gator tail. That is a pet peeve for me, over cooked seafood.
 
I also was certified scuba (NAUI) and enjoyed spearfishing. I wouldn't go out of my way to eat shark or rays, but it was fried, so...

I too am a big fan of diver scallops and I get those at our local market fresh (of course never frozen). I like sushi but not a fan of uni. Too mushy. I agree on the gator (though I would never call it seafood)! And people that overcook seafood should be tarred and feathered, LOL!
 
JASOH1 said:
I also was certified scuba (NAUI) and enjoyed spearfishing. I wouldn't go out of my way to eat shark or rays, but it was fried, so...

I too am a big fan of diver scallops and I get those at our local market fresh (of course never frozen). I like sushi but not a fan of uni. Too mushy. I agree on the gator (though I would never call it seafood)! And people that overcook seafood should be tarred and feathered, LOL!
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Most of my career has been in commercial and recreational diving. If interested you should check out this thread.

Sea Stories

Tomorrow, I'll be boiling 30 pounds of Louisiana crawfish.
 
What time should I be over? I'll bring beer. I guess Abita would be appropriate?
 
I have a friend who smokes eel and we do swaps, it's one of my faves, I don't like sharing much. He uses Manuka wood, very popular here.
Served up croc here as a seafood cocktail. It was nice. Prolly mentioned before huhu grubs whole ans live. Tastes like peanut butter.

Russ
 
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