Only a Chinese would eat it

[Gifted Gourmet]

penis restaurant article in the Telegraph UK

I read this last week but wasn't sure where to put it (no double entendre here! ):

Situated in an elegantly restored house beside Beijing's West Lake, it is China's first speciality penis restaurant. Some dishes appear unexceptional, such as the simple goat penis, sliced, dipped in flour, fried, and served skewered with soy sauce. For beginners, Miss Zhu recommended the hotpot, which offers a sampling of what the restaurant has to offer - six types of penis, and four of testicle, boiled in chicken stock by the waitress, Liu Yunyang, 22... both came sliced lengthwise, and looked like bacon, the horse was light and fatty, while the donkey had a firm colour and taste. The testicles were slightly crumbly, and tasted better with lashings of the sesame, soy and chilli dips thoughtfully provided.

This is a really interesting article so you may wish to read the entire thing ...

[Kent Wang]

Fish skin? Japanese fry up salmon skin.

Pig blood and chicken blood! There is blood pie and blood sausage from England and Germany. Vietnamese also make blood soup like the Chinese.

[jo-mel]

And then there is the sadistic food -- Monkey's Brain and Goose Feet.

I've had Bamboo Rat. Tasted like chicken.

Is it the French who eat unborn lamb?

DOCKHL -- About the sea cucumber in Haiti ------ LOLOLOL!

[eje]

Pig blood and chicken blood! There is blood pie and blood sausage from England and Germany. Vietnamese also make blood soup like the Chinese.

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In the Norwegian immigrant community I grew up in, one version of the traditional potato dumplings (blood klub) was made with meat from pig trotters and pigs blood.

I keep trying to think of some politic way to put this; but, I think in any culture a little closer to the bone than modern America, out of necessity, you will find less squeamishness about what animals or parts of animals food comes from.

Certainly, in America, you don't have to look too hard to find recipes for squirrel, rabbit, possum, raccoon, deer, etcetera.

[Busboy]

How about pig's ears?  I don't know of any culture that eats them.  In the U.S., they're sold as dog chow.

I love them, by the way.

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Traditional "Soul Food," the cuisine of the African American slaves, would use the castoff pieces like pig ears, trotters, and tripe.

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As do the Greeks and the French.

I do see a lot of pigs ears and other less popular parts in shops that have a large African American clientel.

[Busboy]

I once read a piece by a caucaso-American who had moved to Shanghai and was warned by friends to pack all the Cheerios and "American" foodstuffs he could carry. She, of course, laughed them off, "I was adventurous, open-minded, versatile, fearless." Apparently it was the deep-fried scoprpion that pushed her over the edge, but that was far from the only challenge. (unfortunately, you have to pay for the article so I can't link to it.)

[sassybat]

what about chicken feet or duck feet? i'm so used to them as dim sum foods, but i can't think of any other culture that uses them.

[Busboy]

what about chicken feet or duck feet? i'm so used to them as dim sum foods, but i can't think of any other culture that uses them.

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You can buy chicken feet in the Latino markets in my neighborhood, but I don't know how their being prepared (I suse them for stocks). And I seem to recall Bleudauvergne making and photographing a French versionfor eGullet.

[Gifted Gourmet]

And I seem to recall Bleudauvergne making and photographing a French versionfor eGullet.

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and so she did ...

[SuzySushi]

what about chicken feet or duck feet? i'm so used to them as dim sum foods, but i can't think of any other culture that uses them.

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My maternal grandmother (German-Austrian-Jewish) used to cook chicken feet. She didn't use duck feet, but then, she had no access to them.

[Pan]

I think that anywhere where the way you eat a chicken is to pick up one of the chickens in your yard and have it slaughtered (or slaughter it yourself), you will eat the feet. Why throw away any edible part of a creature you owned? It's valuable stuff. Needless to say, when I was living in rural Malaysia (among Malays, not Chinese Malaysians), I had plenty of chances to eat chicken feet in soups, etc. Ditto in regard to the brains, et al. Many, many places serve brains; in fact, the last place I had a dish of them was in Hungary. I think eje basically nailed it in his post upthread.

[MissAmy]

How about things that the Chinese DON'T eat? While living in China, some Chinese friends of our family really wanted to give pizza a whirl - this was before the days of Pizza Hut and the like infiltrating the Chinese market. Guess what? It turns out that cheese is (or was) completely repulsive to the Chinese palate. We were told that it tasted like, and I quote, "rotten water buffalo milk." Luckily, my mother had a cheeseless pizza waiting in the wings, as it was anticipated this would be a problem.

As for the food in China being "weird," after about two months I was completely used to jellyfish (I love the texture!), duck tongues, tripe, all sorts of things I would never have considered previously. However, I never quite got past the fried scorpions, which I luckily only encountered once.

[sheetz]

How about things that the Chinese DON'T eat?

The first thing that I thought of were raw vegetables. Traditionally, Chinese don't appear to have been real big on salads.

[Leo Cheng]

How about things that the Chinese DON'T eat?

The first thing that I thought of were raw vegetables. Traditionally, Chinese don't appear to have been real big on salads.

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I agree with sheetz on that one. Raw vegetables have a major "yuk" factor for traditional Chinese. I was quite bewildered when I first came across Chinese Chicken salad.

[hzrt8w]

How about things that the Chinese DON'T eat? [...]

It turns out that cheese is (or was) completely repulsive to the Chinese palate. We were told that it tasted like, and I quote, "rotten water buffalo milk."

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I can eat Foo Yu, Nam Yu all day long. But when it comes to Blue Cheese, I go

It's a matter of what one is used to I guess.

[Ben Hong]

The aversion for raw veggies comes from the tradition of using rich "nightsoil" for fertilizer.

I am one of those Chinese that will eat cheese and love it. Camembert, Danish Blue, Stilton, Limburger, the "richer" and stronger the better. The taste of a good Brie in the mouth at the same time with a sweet grape or a piece of honeydew melon is one of life's greatest sensual experiences.

A favourite lunch of mine is a heel of crusty bread, a hunk of Feta cheese, a bowl of Kalamata olives, a couple of scallions and a small bowl of good EVOO to dip the bread in. God those Greeks knew what they were doing .

[Dejah]

A favourite lunch of mine is a heel of crusty bread, a hunk of Feta cheese, a bowl of Kalamata olives, a couple of scallions and a small bowl of good EVOO to dip the bread in. God those Greeks knew what they were doing .

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Warning! Warning! Off topic!

Use sesame oil instead, then you are saved.

[miladyinsanity]

Hmm.... Does anybody else eat peanut root?

Well, I call it peanut root. In Cantonese it's "fa sang gan." It's a peanut plant, with the nuts halfway ready to being harvested.

It's supposed to help one grow taller if you start taking it at the start of puberty.

Just boil it in chicken stock.

[Ben Hong]

It's supposed to help one grow taller if you start taking it at the start of puberty.

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Sonofagun, so that's what my problem stems from lack of root, of the peanut kind.

[Philanthrophobe]

I saw pigs' uteruses (uteri?) earlier this week at one of the Asian markets, sorted by size. I assumed these would be stuffed--anyone have an idea?

And the herbalist had a number of dried animal bits...seahorses and scorpions among the various teas.

[stephenc]

Thousand-year-old eggs.

And Chinese people these days generally like cheese.

[jo-mel]

The aversion for raw veggies comes from the tradition of using rich "nightsoil" for fertilizer.

Xiao Ben -- I am not going to ask what 'rich' means in 'nightsoil ---- but I wonder if there will be a change in salad acceptance as China uses more and more chemical farming. It probably wouldn't affect traditional behavior, tho.

About cheeses - In one of the footnotes in a Chinese food culture cookbook, it mentions that "---- The Mongols could not persuade us to eat cheese, and the Europeans do not have a greater chance of doing so."

It also speaks of smelly cheese , which is regarded by some as "a putrified mucous discharge of an animal's guts."

Wellllllll -- what is the title of this thread? Hmmmmmmm------

[Ben Hong]

I saw pigs' uteruses (uteri?) earlier this week at one of the Asian markets, sorted by size. I assumed these would be stuffed--anyone have an idea?

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They are not usually stuffed, but "loo'ed". If you look into the window of a Chinese BBQ place and see all the roasted meats hanging there, invariably, the will be an orangy coloured skein or two of what looks like intestines. Most time these are the uteri or oviducts of the pig, not intestines . Delicious.

[SobaAddict70]

I don't know too many people who eat fish eyes.

I'm sure somewhere out there that there are non-Chinese who consider them a delicacy. I've never met any though.

For the record, I love them.

[hzrt8w]

And Chinese people these days generally like cheese.

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May I inquire how this statement is derived? I would like to know what one can base on to characterize Chinese these days generally like cheese. No doubt that some do, but I don't think it's the majority.

From my perspective, there are 1.3 billion people in China (per US CIA website). Most of the population live in rural areas and may not have heard of the western cheese, let alone have tasted it.

If this observation is based on Chinese living oversea or those living in more modern cities such as Shanghai (9 million, <1%), Beijing (10 million, again <1%) and Hong Kong (7 million, <1%), still it is a small percentage even if every resident in Shanghai and Beijing and Hong Kong likes Cheese (which I doubt).

Edited March 18, 2006 by hzrt8w (log)