What strange foods have you tried?

HealthyAndSober2018
HealthyAndSober2018 Posts: 25 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Here's what I've tried:

Basashi (raw horse meat) - Love it
Fugu (deadly fish sushi) - Good. More for the experience and not the taste.
Organ meats - Love them
Shirako (fish jizz) - Ick
Durian - It's OK
Abalone - Restricted in the USA. It's OK
Balut - Tasty but scary looking
Rocky Mountain Oysters - Good
Crocodile - Not unusual in the south. Good
Frog - Good
Kangaroo - Good
Ostrich - Good
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Replies

  • mikaila96
    mikaila96 Posts: 29 Member
    Crickets- surprisingly good (at least with some Cajun seasoning as I tried then). You just have to overcome the feeling of the legs in your mouth.
  • seltzermint555
    seltzermint555 Posts: 10,742 Member
    Mine are really tame compared to most listed here but I have tried frog legs, haggis, squirrel, durian & blood pudding.

    And I regularly enjoy eel, squid, ahi tuna & calamari.

    To a lot of my friends/family this is crazy though...and one friend thinks Sriracha and matcha tea are too exotic, so there's that.
  • VUA21
    VUA21 Posts: 2,072 Member
    Friend tarantula. Actually, very good! Like one giant potato chip on a stick with more flavor.
  • Cbean08
    Cbean08 Posts: 1,092 Member
    Mine list is pretty normal too. I think anyone who enjoys fine dining will eventually run across stuff like this.

    foie gras - delicious (thanks Michael Mina)
    caviar - salty, added a slight textural appeal
    most raw fish - so far, I've only disliked squid nigiri
    truffles - it's just an overpriced mushroom, tastes like one too
    escargot - essentially butter and garlic on a little chewy piece of meat

    And then the array of meats -
    shark, gator, rabbit, oxtail
  • bioklutz
    bioklutz Posts: 1,365 Member
    Frog legs - did not like
    Young Jackfruit - I had it as a veggie bbq. It was pretty tasty.
    Turtle - liked
    Ostrich - liked
    Alligator tail - meh, it was OK
    Lychee - love! I am not sure if that qualifies as an oddity but I don't see it very often.

    Not that odd but I recently tried persimmon for the first time. OMG - why have I not been eating this regularly!
  • vallary14
    vallary14 Posts: 215 Member
    Shark and conch which aren’t that unusual, chicken of the wood which is basically a mushroom that grows from certain types of trees This is a pretty mellow list but if you haven’t tried any of these they’re all delicious.
  • Annalee82_
    Annalee82_ Posts: 320 Member
    Cow Tongue
    Meal Worms
    Crickets
    Ostrich
    Alligator
    Shark
  • deannalfisher
    deannalfisher Posts: 5,600 Member
    i had horse from a street vendor while in spain....if you had just handed it to me without telling me - i never would have known

    had kangaroo - that's a thing in australia
  • nooshi713
    nooshi713 Posts: 4,877 Member
    I have tried horse (common in Sweden) and alligator when I visited New Orleans. I didnt like either.
  • Lounmoun
    Lounmoun Posts: 8,426 Member
    Garlic ice cream- better than expected
    Alligator- okay
  • missperfectpitch
    missperfectpitch Posts: 579 Member
    I've tried:
    Smoked puffin in Iceland - it just tasted like a gamey bird, not bad.

    Danish wood ants on steak tartare at noma in Copenhagen - the point was that they use all local ingredients, and these ants imparted a citrus/lemony taste since they don't really have citrus there. I'm afraid of bugs, so it took me a couple of minutes to overcome the fear of seeing the ants just sprinkled on top and actually eating them, but they did have a very lemony flavor. Not something I would necessarily try again though.

    Horse sausage in Estonia - since it was a sausage, it just tasted like a sausage and I couldn't tell the difference.

    Durian - it tasted and smelled like sweet onions (in a bad, rotten way). Definitely didn't like it.

    All sorts of wild animals including deer-type varieties like impala/kudu, warthog, crocodile - tasted pretty good.

    Offal/organ meats etc. like sweetbreads, hearts, kidneys, livers, tongues, brains - I'm a fan of most of them.

    Not necessarily strange, but I've had a variety of savory sorbets and ice creams. The most noteworthy was a Caesar salad ice cream and it was surprisingly delicious.
  • kam26001
    kam26001 Posts: 2,799 Member
    Vegetarian duck pate

  • Lyrica7
    Lyrica7 Posts: 88 Member
    Gator
    Frog legs
    Shark
    Foie gras
    Turkey testicles at the local Turkey Testicle Festival
  • AndyPeed
    AndyPeed Posts: 8 Member
    Manhattan clam chowder pizza. No, I can't recommend it.
  • New_Heavens_Earth
    New_Heavens_Earth Posts: 610 Member
    Quenepas- like chewing stale gum
    Cherimoya- custardy tropical fruit
    Baby octopus soup- love grossing out my kids with it
    Lychee
    Jackfruit
    Breadfruit
    Bacalao- dried and heavily salted cod fish. Smells ungodly. Delicious after soaking and cooked in stew with rice and beans.
  • rj0150684
    rj0150684 Posts: 227 Member
    I had a head taco in Guadalajara. Basically just boiled cows head, random stuff scooped out (tongue, eyes, brain, cheek), grilled and then put on a taco. Actually really good.
  • mrendon80
    mrendon80 Posts: 80 Member
    Calf brain
    Cow tongue
    Chicken hearts
    Gator tail
    Ostrich
    Pig ears & cheek
    Chicken feet
    Pig feet
    Bull testicles
    Tripe
    Crickets
    And whatever else my mother made me eat without telling me what it was until after I finished :|
  • vegmebuff
    vegmebuff Posts: 31,389 Member
    omg! I'm surprised that some of you are still alive...

    I won't even try a Twinkie! ha
  • WickAndArtoo
    WickAndArtoo Posts: 773 Member
    Okay I cannot believe people are saying gator tail is only “good/okay” fried gator tail is AMAZING!! But you know, that’s just my opinion lol.

    I however didn’t like frog legs, they tasted like a frog, literally like a pond and froggy!

    I’ve tried crickets and meal worms, but they were in candy so that doesn’t seem to count, just tasted like the lollipops.

    Squid I thought was gross when my mom cooked it but fried is good, octopus was delicious.

    And crawfish = delicious

    It’s very interesting, someone else mentioned it a little but many of these things are much more common in the south! For example being from MT I would think that eating pork cracklins was absolutely crazy (the pig skins fried with the thick layer of fat attached- they are hard and crack when you bite them not soft and crunchy like pork rinds)... but fairly common in the south... same with boiled peanuts (which by the way are delicious!!!)
  • Crafty_camper123
    Crafty_camper123 Posts: 1,440 Member
    Some of the things I've eaten are normal to me, but may be unusual to other people. I come from an area where hunting is common practice, so I've had a variety of meat that may not be available in larger cities, or other areas of the country where hunting isn't as common.

    Crawfish- like a cross between crab and lobster if prepared right. If not prepared right, they taste like mud.
    Domestic Rabbit- more tender and less gamey then wild rabbit. My family used to raise them along with chickens.
    Wild Rabbit- Does not taste like chicken. Tastes like rabbit.
    Elk- Sweeter flavor then beef. Very very lean.
    Deer- A little stronger game flavor in comparison to beef.
    Bear- Sweet, fatty tender. Very good.
    Moose- Rich, heavy flavor.
    Pronghorn Antelope- If they eat sage brush, they taste like sage brush. If they eat alfalfa they are very sweet and tender in flavor. I dare say better then beef.
    Buffalo- Very similar to 90/10 beef.
    Rocky Mountain Oysters- Nothing to write home about. Chewy.
    Sage Grouse- Kind of like lean chicken
    Chucker-Same
    Wild Turkey-Richer flavor them domestic turkey, a little tougher texture.
    Liver Mush- Some kind of depression era thing. Fried and slathered in maple syrup. Grandparents used to make it, I have no idea how to prepare it. The only way I have found I can eat liver.
    Frog Legs- good if fresh, but kind of fishy tasting.
    Pickled Pigs feet- Not sure if I should claim this, but it was good the lst time I had some...when I was 10, lol.

    With the exception of the last couple of years, hunting was our main source of red meat. With beef at $3.00 a lb for cheap stuff and 7.00+ a lb for steaks, it is so much cheaper. We ate so much deer and antelope that when I ate beef, it actually tasted gamey. Or, rather there was a discernable beef flavor I never noticed before.




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