A Brief Essay on Food Every delicacy in every culture was borne of hardship, propagated through peer pressure and codified through interchange with other cultures. And, just as every culture has an intoxicant that is revered such that all other intoxicants are reviled, every culture has a fermented food that is revered while all other fermented foods are "exotic" or "disgusting." Rachel Herz wrote an interesting book called "That's Disgusting" that delves into this phenomenon more than you are likely to want to spend time on so lemme point you to the New York Times article that distills her work down to bite-sized. And, as this is my essay, here are the spoilers: 1) There are no foods, other than toxic ones, that are reviled by all peoples on the planet 2) That which is "disgusting" is cultural and used as a touchstone to separate your people from other people. Those who eat kimchee smell like those who eat kimchee; those who eat limburger smell like those who eat limburger. 3) Cultural affinity has, since the dawn of history, been about assimilating someone else's customs. That invariably starts with food, as we eat multiple times a day. The quickest way to be less of a barbarian is to eat "civilized" food in the eyes of the civilized. 4) Cultural identity has, since the dawn of history, been about eschewing someone else's customs. We are Vasque because we cook our sausage like this not like that. As with Tom Swift, the side of the egg you crack matters. Figuring out what's good to eat isn't that tough. Point to the medicine women. There are very few things in the world that will straight up KILL you, rather than make you sick (particularly if you eat tiny amounts of them). So when you find something new and unusual, you get your apprentice to eat a tiny bit of it. Then you wait a day, check stool, and eat a little more. Wait a day, check stool, eat a little more. Continue until you've found the lethal dose or psychotropic effects or until you've determined that this handy root is great in soup. This simple procedure is actually in army field manuals and has been for pushing 100 years. As far as cheese, allow me to link to one of my favorite articles in the late, lamented Gourmet Magazine, in which three of the top chefs in China visit Thomas Keller's French Laundry and hate on it. This article, and those like it, are why I view Bizarre Foods as a missed opportunity; the language of food is the language of international understanding yet Bizarre Foods is all about laughing and pointing at foreigners through the eyes of the funny fat man who will eat anything. It isn't the first _________ to have gone down that matters. It's the first party assembled to celebrate ______. TL; DR - Lobster fests, not lobsters
I too miss Gourmet and I think that Ruth Reichl was a terrific editor. I think that Zimmern tries to put the food experiences he has into a context that his target audience can learn from, but unfortunately his target audience seems to be . . . less worldly or open to other experiences than one might hope. I hadn't read that Gourmet article. It made me laugh, since I've seen some of that myself. I had a friend who majored in culinary anthropology, which at the time I thought of as a complete waste, but after many miles and stays in many places I admit it's something I find fascinating. There are some foods I refuse to try though. One of them is something made by members of my family who are duck farmers. One of their biggest sellers is fertilized duck eggs, which are a fairly typical snack in SE Asia. However, in the process of creating and sorting these fertilized eggs, they run into different issues, which are sorted out. For example, there is a special name for fertilized eggs where the fetus has died. That gets sorted into a bin and prepared another way. There is also a category of eggs that have begun to rot and various stages of rotten eggs are used for different things. One of them is a giant (3 ft diameter traditionally) torta, or spanish style omelette. I understand how the food arose, but absolutely refuse to eat it. The smell makes my eyes burn. That said, I agree with your views on cultural affinity. I think when people hold prejudices against others, some people criticizing them are quick to leap to racism without considering the cultural aspect.
I wish Zimmern's show was less Fear Factor and more No Reservations. My parents watch his show and I'll catch snippets when I visit them. It's hard for me to watch, I just don't enjoy even looking at the guy. I've not run in to anything yet that has been too drastic for me to at least "try" but I would definitely think twice about Chicha if it's made by using peoples saliva. That's just gross. But if Dogfish Head makes it.... maybe.
Against all logic that says its fine, I don't think I could eat insects. My cousin has told me about eating ants in Mexico and Cicadas in Peru (apparently they are a lot like shrimp), and he says its fine. I can't get past it. So many cultures around the world revere different types of bugs, but they aren't for me.
Logic doesn't play a strong role in most of our food-fear. When I was in Peru I ate Guinea Pig and Alpaca. I didn't enjoy the guinea pig though because I had one as a pet as a kid. Just didn't seem right. No logic there, all emotion. We used to dare each other as kids to eat ants. I don't recall what they taste like.
Quoted at dinner tonight. Laughs ensued. Then came everyones stories of ant eating; it is more common than I thought.If they tasted good more people would eat them.
"Culinary anthropology" sounds like a cool thing to study. Not a degree's worth, but to round out my humanities credits? hell yeah! I'm not that experimental food-wise. I like what I like and what I like is predicated on what smells good. My best friend loves all things Korean but I just can't get behind the food. Ethiopian? Not a fan. Anything from the middle east? All over it. Thing is, if someone wants me to try it, I'll try it. They're usually happy just to see me try it - I don't have to like it. Which is good, because lutefisk is disgusting, yo. You can eat that shit four times and it doesn't get any better. I don't need to be a part of every culture. I just need to be able to interact with it. Gamely trying something you know to be vile and then making a show of trying to enjoy it is pretty much the culinary handshake. If cultural foods weren't reviled by other cultures, they'd be staples, not delicacies. Pretty much every culture subsists off of proteins, vegetables and starches that are universal. It's only when you get into the "delicacies" that the barriers come up. I don't have to like durian and they don't have to like roquefort. Lychees are delicious and almost anybody can get behind mozarella.
Delicacies borne of hardship is what started a lot of haute cuisine. The french had terrible famines during the revolution and I guess that's why they started to eat frogs and snails, the chinese dogs and rats, the scandinavians rotten shark, the scots haggis and I gues in the future the North Koreans tree bark and grass.
I can't generalize my views, but I definitely feel revulsion towards incredibly unhealthy foods that are destructive to one's body, such as chicken wrapped in bacon, drizzled in gravy. In my eyes, these foods almost crafted to drive a negative reaction. Perhaps I'm being close-minded, but I would definitely eat live bugs before food so closely stigmatized with obesity, gluttony, and heart disease.1) There are no foods, other than toxic ones, that are reviled by all peoples on the planet
Did someone say "failure pile in a sadness bowl?" I heard "failure pile in a sadness bowl." SOmething to keep in mind - bacon-wrapped chicken is more nutritionally accessible than live bugs simply because the proteins have been broken down by cooking. So while it definitely has more cholesterol, it also has better nutritional value.