Weird things I've eaten in Yunnan

7 years of living in Asia has slowly rid me of my food phobias. When I was a kid and didn't know better, I loved to eat the steamed chicken feet served during Saturday morning yumcha. Now I find the wrinkly skin and little knuckles disgusting. Yet over the years, I've slowly forced myself to become a more adventurous eater, adding live drunken shrimp, chicken cartilage, duck intestine, solidified pig's blood, snake soup, and other exotic delicacies to my list.

I reasoned with myself, if I can eat raw oysters, why not snails? If I've eaten sardines & anchovies, haven't I eaten fish eyes already? And aren't prawns just a giant insect that lives in the sea?

During my last trip to Japan, I ate raw baby squid, raw chicken heart and raw horse meat (the squid was by far the hardest thing to swallow, because it was the fishiest taste imaginable, multiplied by a thousand). Needless to say, when insects were served for lunch during the Dai "open door festival", I did not shy away.

Only a generation ago, few families could afford to eat meat every day. Insects are an abundant source of protein and are surprisingly tasty, once you get past your cultural taboos.

Bamboo Grubs

These deep fried bamboo grubs are crispy and not disimilar to french fries. Most of the taste comes from the grease they're cooked in, rather than insect juices. They're much more disgusting alive, when you cut open the bamboo segment, you'll see hundreds of the fat grubs squirming around, covering the entire surface of the bamboo walls.

Wasp larvae ... with cute little eyes!

These raw wasp larvae are surprisingly dry, waxy and squishy, like a super sized booger. Biting into them for the first time, one is surprised by the explosion of bug juice. It's mild tasting and kind of buttery but there's something about raw bug juice that just makes you want to retch. Just pretend you're Bear Grylls and smile perversely instead of grimacing.

Adult wasps & pupae

By comparison, the pupae & adult wasps are chewier, and more seafood like. I guess the hardened carapace makes all the difference.

Wild rat meat

I'd eaten a few spoonfulls of this greasy, gamey meat, before it occured to me that the tiny crunchy bones sticking out of the meat chunks, were too small to be anything I was familar with.

"What is this?" I asked my host, noting the mysterious meat was too red to be a bird. "Eat first, I'll tell you later" he replied. That's never a good sign. My mind went from "quail" to "rodent" in an instant. "Is it a squirrel?" I asked hopefully, noting you'd have to kill a lot of squirrels to get this much meat.

"No, it's rat" my host offered helpfully. "Big forest rat."

"Ooh!" I breathed a sigh of relief. "Wild rat." That makes it all better.

As my host had shot this wild rat himself, I had to eat a whole lot more, to show my appreciation. "I wonder which tea I should pair with this rat?"

The Tea Eater