What is the weirdest food you ever had?

lol, I know Deb! My friend says if all this stuff tastes like chicken, why don't I just go ahead and eat chicken? 

Miss S

OK Deb, have you tried grits with cheese?  Really good.  About the fish in Germany, was it steckel fish (roasted whole on spits at the carnivals)?  It was delish!  Ate it every chance I got.

The yuckiest thing I ever tried... it's a tie between calf fries (aka rocky mountain oysters) or a seafood pizza that we got in Bavaria (complete with fish heads and an unidentifible creature of some kind!) Oh yeah, and poi which really does taste like paste like we used as kids.  EEECH!

Fava beans!

The first time I had them, they were prepared as an appetizer in a Portuguese restaurant (I mean Massachusetts-Portuguese, Cape Cod or Boston vicinity) and they were good -- but ever since, anywhere I've dared to try them - they're HORRIBLE!

Raw quail eggs once at a real Sushi Bar where we took our visiting Japanese doctorate friend. Ewwww, I hated them: slippery, slirrpy, slimmy and yuk! Still don't like Sushi.



Also octopus, snake meat, both of which weren't so bad on travels in years past.



Tender

I grew up in Southeastern Kentucky, and we had hickory chickens (a wild mushroom), squirrel, possem, poke salet (a wild weed you can only pick in the early spring, we even have a festival for it) and also dandelion weed.  And then when i moved to Georgia i tried ostrich meat (very tasty), and aligator meat (tastes just like chicken!  LOL ) and bison burgers.   i can honestly say I never had any of Alaskadeb's treats, tho.   

Deb, methinks you are probably the most adventurous.  I have a pretty broad palate.  By looking at my broad hips, one would agree!  I like grits with butter and a little syrup or grape jelly.

Being from Philly, we have scrapple which is made from the ends of what they don't use from a pig.  Never really looked at the actual ingredients.  Another acquired taste but I grew up with it.  Pepper Pot Soup is another traditional fare made with tripe but I never tried it.

I have also tried frog's legs (like chicken again).  I thought Ostrich would be like chicken too but it was really like steak!  Alligator was OK...alll depends on how its cooked.  I always liked tongue but it has to be fresh tongue, not pickled and cooked in a pressure cooker like my mom used to.  Liver and onions, love it!  Leftover got made into chopped liver.

Celia, how about Gefilte Fish?  It is best eaten at Passover with red beet horseradish on top.  I had no idea when I was little it was made from different fishes.  In the old days, my grandmother used to buy live fish and let them swim in the tub before she made it.  As a kid, my mom and grandmom used to render the chicken fat along with onions.  Afterwards, we ate it on pumpernickel or rye bread with salt.  It was called gribness in Yiddish.  The memory makes my mouth water.  I think the alternate name is "cholesterol on the hoof!"

My dh tells me about a Polish tradition that is duck blood soup.  It sounded better in Polish but I can't remember the word.  He used to be served it at his neighbor's.

This one always stumped me....when my brother was little, he used to eat ketchup and onion sandwiches on white bread. 

We invited some friends to share Thanksgiving dinner with us a few years ago, and they decided to bring some wine and cheese to share with us.  The wine was superb, but the cheese.....it was called "Stinking Bishop" so you can just imagine......  When they opened it, they said that it had to breathe and come to room temp before eating, and it just oooooozed out of the rind, and as it warmed it developed a (ahem) "bouquet" that was rather like rotten garbage.  I did taste it, and it tasted like licking the inside of a garbage can lid (not that I have ever done this....).  They offered to leave the leftovers with us, but DH and I politely declined.

Deb old family recipes are the best.  I just wish I had some that my grandmother used while I was growing up.  Then again, would it taste the same? 

ok I guess I am weird but I really like lima beans and brussel sprouts.  Growing up I hated brussel sprouts but now they are good.  Just like little cabbage.  I really cant eat liver though, chicken or beef either one.  My dad loved liver and onions.

Deb-in the south we have shrimp and grits which is actually very good.  I do think grits are an acquired taste though or maybe along the acquired texture line. 

Amy

Oh Sally, I have a suspicion what those hairs were.  Did this pasta dish have any seafood in by chance?  See, there is a sort of "beard" that grows on what are those things...some kind of shellfish like a mollusk but I can't remember.  Anyway, I have a sneakin suspicion those hairs were the beard from the shell put on your plate to "decorate" it.  They also eat the ink from octopus and squid there along with the suction cups on the octopus.  ew. 

LOL........Rebbeca...stinking bishop cheese......

Deb.....I could never match all that weird stuff! My parents were Dutch, not to much weird stuff there except maybe pickled herring....loved it as a kid but can't get past the texture now! One thing I still love is salted black licorice......we call them "Droppies", in fact the double salted are best! A few other things.....chocolate sprinkle sandwiches, cookie sandwiches but they had to be speculaas cookies, smoked horse meat sandwiches and chicken livers(eww)

My palate has become rather reserved since childhood, not to adventuresome.

SLH yes I have had succotash and you are right.  It is best made when you are out in your garden picking your own veggies and then right inside to fix it.  Cant get any more fresh than that.  Gosh, I have not had that in a long time.

Amy

see Deb, i am not the only one who lost her appetite reading this thread...SLH did too and she is NOT a vegetarian....lol

someone mentioned hating brussel sprouts...i like them.  a long time ago i had a six month long binge of having to eat brussel sprouts everyday either raw or steamed.  When the binge was over i did not eat brussel sprouts again for at least 8 years.  I eat them occasionally now but i no longer crave them.

note to beth1225---gefilte fish was food that only parents ate, along with things like tongue.  gefilte fish looks and smells like toxic sludge to me!!! 

hanna i think that mussels are the mollusks that have beards.  I would not like to see that part on my plate tho.

Deb girl, i think you get the trophy for having eaten the weirdest foods!! 

hmmm sally, too funny!!!......i had my brussel sprouts 6 month long binge in northern California too.  I lived there.  Do you think it is the atmosphere or the climate there that leads to over-consumption of brussel sprouts?? 

I have seen pics of them on the stem, but never bought them that way. 

celia 

yikes....gross!!...... i just opened a diet Snapple and the "Real Fact" printed in the cap says,

"THE AVERAGE HUMAN EATS 8 SPIDERS IN HIS/HER LIFETIME WHILE SLEEPING"

ugh..