The most disgusting foods in the world

When planning long journeys, we want to experience something extraordinary… something that will remain in our memory forever. Taming the waves of the capricious ocean with only a surfboard under our feet, swimming in the company of sharks, looking into the craters of awe-inspiring volcanoes, traversing the dense mysterious jungle, bungee jumping, safari, rafting. Moments that certainly allow you to feel a rush of adrenaline. However, those who do not feel up to taking on such challenges can feel a slight thrill of excitement (to put it mildly) for a completely different reason.

An inseparable element of travel is tasting local specialties. We want to discover new flavors, aromas, as well as the creativity of chefs from other parts of the world. You probably wonder more than once what to expect on your plate when you go to an exotic journey with Planet Escape. After all, the specialties served in our native Europe can make your head spin... literally and to say the least. For example, the so-called surströmming, or fermented Baltic herring, which the Swedes have been fond of since the 16th century, has been considered by Japanese scientists to be one of the most disgusting fragrant delicacies in the world. Opening a can of such pickle can be easily compared to opening Pandora's box. Those looking for strong olfactory sensations will certainly not be disappointed.

It is also impossible to ignore rotten sharks from Iceland, the so-called hakarl. Such a freshly caught Greenland shark absolutely cannot be consumed straight away, the meat contains dangerous toxins, or more precisely, poisonous trimethylamine oxide. Icelanders, who still have a craving for its meat, have found a solution. The culprit is buried, its resting place is covered with heavy stones... then it rests quietly for a few weeks or months, depending on the season, and finally it is subjected to the process of "airing". The fermented meat, before it appears on Icelandic tables, is hung in wooden sheds for a few months to dry. The sensations when eating it are probably very different, but for those who are hesitant, a comparison of one of the British poets may be a clue, who stated that hakarl  tastes like shoe polish.

Before we set off on a culinary journey to distant lands, let me mention Sardinian time for marzu.  The digestibility of this sheep cheese is enhanced by the agile fly larvae that live in it, with a charming name Piophila casei. The insects can jump up to 15 centimeters high, so eating them should be done with your eyes closed... for aesthetes, for another reason. Yes, there must be live larvae "on board", dead ones mean the cheese has gone bad.

If in Europe we can be treated to delicacies that we are simply not used to, it is scary to think what we may encounter across the ocean? What extraordinary dishes will “pamper” our taste buds outside of Europe? Let’s check it out 🙂

Here's a subjective list of the strangest foods in the world, divided by continent

Asia

In the race for the title of leader in extreme meal preparation, I would personally mark equally Japanese and Chinese. Journey to Japan or a trip to China pose quite unique culinary challenges. Nevertheless, the entire Asian cuisine is famous for quite unusual dishes, to which, I will repeat once again, we are simply not accustomed.

At the beginning it is worth mentioning the Japanese shiraq. Of course, not wanting to disgust anyone right from the start, it must be admitted that this peculiar dish looks a bit like small brain convolutions, but to warm up the "image" - it can supposedly increase libido (perhaps on the placebo principle). Shirako, literally meaning "white children", is prepared from the sperm sacs of certain male fish, primarily cod, and is often an addition to other dishes. Depending on preferences, it is served raw or cooked, and the Japanese go wild for it. Surprised? After all, caviar, nothing more than fish egg cells, is considered a delicacy on European tables. So why not give fish sperm a chance? Try it and decide whether you would include shirako among the delicacies on your menu.

Another Japanese invention is the so-called shiokara. The name sounds similar to Shirako, but it's a completely different dish. Some of us frown on native Polish tripe or liver. But what about fish and seafood fermented in their own entrails? The Japanese They are enjoying this delicacy, swallowing the gooey goo in one gulp and quickly washing down the whiskey.

The land of the rising sun also has a proposition for true adrenaline and life lovers. on the edge. You probably remember Rozdyma from the adorable animation Where is Nemo? When frightened, it would puff up and take the shape of a ball. It was generally liked by the aquarium inhabitants and was considered somewhat clumsy. However, it could become extremely dangerous to humans, assuming that it ended up at a banquet table. The blowfish belonged to the family of pufferfish, known in Japan as the fish fugu. Japanese law strictly regulates their preparation in restaurants, and the Emperor has an official ban on eating them. A special knife for cutting fish, called fugu hiki, is kept in isolation from the others used to prepare dishes. Chefs undergo rigorous training for several years before they receive an official license to prepare fugu, and statistics show that only 35% of candidates pass the final exam. Why? In the internal organs fugu, especially the liver, ovaries, testicles and eyes, as well as the skin, contains the deadly poisonous tetrodotoxin, a thousand times more toxic than cyanide, for which no antidote has been found to this day. Its ingestion causes paralysis of all muscles. The victim is still conscious, but cannot move or breathe. They die from suffocation. Terrifying, yet incredibly appealing to some. For this reason fugu has become a real precious delicacy in Japan. When preparing the fish, the cook has to be extremely careful to separate the edible parts from the highly poisonous ones. Incidentally, serving liver in restaurants fugu is strictly forbidden. Some virtuosos can maintain such proportions of poison in the parts of fish they eat that the customer will feel a slight paralysis of the tongue or a slight tingling. Traditionally, the cook is the first to try the prepared dish in the presence of the guests. Gourmets are fond of Sashimi, that is, extremely thin slices of raw meat served with spices. The aphrodisiac is the testicles fugu, but only a few specialists undertake their preparation. The awareness that fugu often became the last meal of its fans, it is the main argument for adrenaline addicts to try to taste it. If you are ready for such a challenge, we invite you to travel to Japan. In Europe, importing fugu for culinary purposes is still banned.

There is a lot of controversy ikizukuri, preparation technique sashimi from still living organisms. The restaurant guest chooses from fish, lobsters, shrimps or octopuses, from which then, according to the accepted tradition, the chef prepares the dish with three cuts of the knife. Most often, the head of the animal remains intact, and the slices of meat obtained by cutting are presented on the remains of the body. Those who decide to try ikizukuri, they can still observe the movement of the animal's gills. Due to the brutal way of preparing the dish, this technique is banned in Australia and Germany.

Before we leave the Land of the Rising Sun, let me mention kusaya. While fugu it can kill you just by tasting it, kusaya he's killing a victim by the smell itself. The smell is compared to the Swedish one mentioned at the beginning surströmming. Shallow is made from flying fish, the so-called 'birds', among other things. After being caught, they are washed several times in clean water, then soaked for twenty hours in a brine called Kusaya eki and finally dried in the sun for several days. Shallow from the village of Niijima is famous for its most repulsive odor, and its jar can be easily compared to the already mentioned Pandora's box.

After the extreme challenges in Japan, you are probably wondering if anything else can surprise you during your vacation in China? You will definitely have no shortage of unusual culinary experiments. For example, you may come across a real delicacy – the so-called hundred year old eggs Chinese. Don't be put off right away, despite the name, this delicacy is usually not stored for a hundred years before it is consumed. Hard-boiled eggs are usually soaked for a period of plus or minus a hundred days in a mixture made of water, quicklime, clay, rice husks, tea and salt. During this time, the white and yolk take on an unusual appearance, that is, unusual for us, accustomed to the fact that the white should be white and the yolk yellow. However, the Chinese prove that it can be different. Under the influence of the solution, the white becomes gelatinous and takes on a brownish-black color. The yolk, well, the fact that it turns a rotten green may sound a bit brutal, but that's how it really is. Subjectively speaking - the view is a bit repulsive. And the taste? There's no accounting for taste - also in terms of the preferences of our taste buds. In China hundred year old eggs They are served as an appetizer with soy sauce, ginger or wine vinegar, and true connoisseurs do not stop at a 100-day waiting period. They soak eggs for several, a dozen or even several dozen years to obtain, in their opinion, a better taste. Oh my, in Chinese medicine, this delicacy is used as a diet for the sick – for me, a sufficient argument to avoid getting sick there 😉

Like Japan, the Middle Kingdom is also known for consuming living organisms. One of the delicacies is the so-called drunk shrimp, which is immersed in strong alcohol. The still moving dish is served to guests, who usually wait until the main character of the meal is completely paralyzed by the drink flowing over him. However, this is not a rule. Some people start eating it right away. Interestingly, the Japanese have their own equivalent of this specialty. Odori ebi, so for a change dancing shrimp, is another type sashimi. The aforementioned young crustaceans are intoxicated with sake and served with a suitable dip. The execution is carried out by a restaurant guest who puts the animal, which is constantly moving its antennae and legs, into his mouth.

In the Hong Kong market, the price of yet another unusual delicacy may make your head spin. Salangan nests, birds belonging to the swift family, are the main ingredient of the most exquisite dishes in Asia. In Chinese culture, known as swallows' nests are highly valued and used in cooking for over four centuries. The Chinese are convinced that a diet based on them has a very good effect, first of all on the condition of our skin, but also on the overall efficiency of the body. Under the word nest, however, its basic image is not hidden, that is, a shelter made of branches, clay and other building materials found by the animal. Extremely valued white sockets are made exclusively from the secretion of the salivary glands of the salangana. They are slightly cheaper black sockets enriched with bird feathers, moss, grass and other plant material used for their construction. The real pearl is  red sockets originating from limestone caves in Thailand, marked by red discolorations. Their price reaches up to USD 10 per kilogram. About the uniqueness swallows' nests The conditions of their acquisition also determine their quality. Salangans naturally nest in hard-to-reach caves, among others in Borneo, the Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam and Burma. This is made easier by the construction of artificial nesting buildings, popular in Sumatra, where colonies of these birds move. The Chinese, who report the greatest demand for this exclusive product, are particularly fond of soups made from boiled swallows' nests. You can also be tempted by a dessert in the form of jelly.

Staying on the bird theme, we will now take a short trip to the Philippines. There, the culinary hero is balot honored with the title of national dish. This delicacy will certainly not appeal to those who have already wrinkled their foreheads century old chinese eggs. Dressing is made from fertilized mallard eggs, less often from chicken eggs. Fully developed live chicks, shortly before hatching, are boiled in vegetable broth and served as an appetizer for beer. Enthusiasts create a hole in the top of the egg through which they drink the liquid content, and then proceed to eat the rest of the meal – the duckling with its beak, feathers and skeleton. Before you order hard-boiled egg at your local market, consider whether it might be hiding a possibly unwanted surprise.

Although in Japan and China you will come across many dishes that will at least surprise you with the recipe or method of preparation, it does not mean that the rest of Asia lacks culinary curiosities. In Korea, both South and North, it is known san-nakji, which should be eaten with special care. It is a type hoe, Korean equivalent Sashimi, which is prepared from raw small octopus, called by the locals stick. This is definitely not a dish for the delicate and sensitive. Restaurant guests who blindly order this mysterious dish may experience at least a shock when the waiter appears with the finished dish. Oh my, the raw tentacles of an octopus, sprinkled with sesame oil and decorated with roasted sesame seeds, will still be wriggling on the plate. What is worse, the legs will also dance after they are put in the mouth and during swallowing. This creates a serious risk of choking or even suffocation if an unruly tentacle gets stuck to the throat. Most often, although not always, octopuses are killed before they are quartered, however, the complex nervous system of these mollusks triggers unconditional movements even after death, when the brain no longer works. There are also cases when the octopus is served whole and still alive.

Some people may be fed up with these extreme delicacies. But that's not all. It's time for trip to Vietnam, or more precisely, to the small town of Le Mat near Hanoi. What would you say to a fresh snake, especially this one innocent cobra? A specialty of local restaurants, which grant their guests the honor of choosing the writhing beast that will soon end up on their plates from among the other companions in misfortune kept in bags. It is worth knowing that these fearsome reptiles are considered by the Vietnamese to be a real aphrodisiac with an extremely positive effect, especially on male potency. So why not try it? The guest's chosen culprit is stunned, the heart is cut out before his eyes, and the blood is drained into a vessel. This is how an extraordinary delicacy lands on your table - still beating heart of the snake in the company fault from blood of flooded with moonshine or rice water, something for those who are already bored with Bloody Mary 😉 Of course, it is, you could say, the star of the entire menu, but you know, we probably won't eat it with just a beating heart. Hungry people can breathe a sigh of relief, various delicacies are prepared from the remaining parts of the reptile, such as spring rolls, soup, salad, dumplings, depending on the chef's creative inventiveness. And if you like the bloody drink, it is also worth looking around for the so-called ruou ran, or rice wine with pickled poisonous snake – a Vietnamese specialty, when it comes to the world of drinks. A cobra or a viper looking from a bottle can send shivers down your spine, but the poisonous venom loses its properties as a result of the alcohol. The European Union prohibits the import of such delicacies into its territory, so novice sommeliers should grab a bargain on the spot.

Asian cuisine and its extraordinary delicacies could be written and written about, and culinary adventure hunters will certainly not be disappointed. In addition to the above, definitely exotic dishes, it is definitely worth mentioning the deep-fried, crispy tarantulas, which saved Cambodians from starvation during the cruel oppression of the Khmer Rouge regime. Poverty also forced them to prepare pork blood soups, which we can come across in China. In Japanese cuisine there is also no question of waste, it is extremely popular to cook tuna eye with soy or garlic sauce. The Japanese also like to enjoy quite unusual waffles so senbei. Between two plates of a red-hot press, various seafood such as octopus, shrimp, squid are placed, covered with a suitable batter made of rice flour. The result is a wafer as thin as paper. Probably no one will be surprised by the various worms served at Asian markets. From street food stalls they will look at you juicy larvae all kinds of species, stuck on a stick cockroaches lamb penises, nutritious ants and crickets, dried lizards, frogs or fried scorpions with added peanut butter.

Africa

Before we jump to South America, let's stop for a moment on the Black Continent, where the real delicacy of the South, especially South Africa, is the nutrient-rich Mopane caterpillars, representing traditional Zulu cuisine. They owe their name to the trees whose leaves are the basis of their diet. Dried in the sun, they are put into jars and sold at local markets. In cities, however, they are treated as a special delicacy, and elegant restaurants serve them in various ways. The worms can be eaten boiled, fried, but also raw - a variant for the most courageous. In Central or West Africa, you will also come across fried, plump palm larvae, the whole continent is fond of termites rich in protein, iron, vitamin A and Omega 3 fatty acids. During your trip to Zambia or Malawi, you may be surprised Mbewa, which is a mouse roasted over a fire and then eaten whole, and among the Masai it is popular to drink cow's blood mixed with milk.

South America

What unusual dishes can you expect to find during your trip to South America? Everyone has probably heard of roasted guinea pigs, also known as what can you do. They are particularly popular with Peruvians, but are equally popular in other Andean countries. Guinea pig dishes are prepared on the occasion of various local holidays, including as a form of offering to the dead during All Souls' Day. If during travel to Ecuador, Bolivia or Colombia you come across some local feta, you will probably be able to take the opportunity to roast a guinea pig on a stick. From the Andes also comes chuño, originating from the culinary traditions of the Quechua Indians, in whose language it means frozen potato, and the Aymara people. The preparation process lasts five days and involves alternating between cold and hot temperatures. Traditionally, at night, a variety of frost-resistant potatoes is left on the Altiplano Plateau in the Central Andes, where they freeze. During the day, they are exposed to the sun. Then, entire families from local villages engage in stomping the potatoes with their bare feet to squeeze out the last of the water and remove the skin from the tubers. This creates naturally freeze-dried vegetables that have a very long shelf life. Chuno, also characterized by high nutritional value, it was the basis of the diet of soldiers of the Inca Empire and ordinary people affected by the cataclysm of drought destroying crops or cattle plague. It was also stored for a rainy day. This is how it is used today, in communities living in the harsh Andean conditions. Visitors, not used to this type of diet, sometimes compare the taste chuño for polystyrene or chalk, and the scent for socks that haven't been washed for a long time. Nevertheless, this delicacy would certainly not be scorned by survival enthusiasts, such as mountaineers, whose basic meal in the high parts of the world's mountain giants is laboratory-processed freeze-dried food.     

During culinary escapades in South America, it is of course worth stopping for a longer period in Mexico, whose traditional cuisine is appreciated all over the world. Have you already tried Mole Poblano, or chicken or turkey in chocolate? You certainly won't regret it, and you'll even save money on dessert. For those who would like to leave their culinary comfort zone, the challenge may be escamoles, considered by the locals to be insect caviar and already known as a delicacy to the Aztecs. The finished dish looks like a portion of puffed rice, has the consistency of cottage cheese, and tastes like nuts, but don't be fooled. escamoles are the larvae and pupae of ants that nest in the roots of certain varieties of agave, and are native to Mexico. Don't be surprised if you come across them as an additive to guacamole tacos. It is also considered a special delicacy, even in pre-Columbian times. eightlacoche. This is not a suitable dish for people who do not like mushrooms. Why? huitlacoche is made from a parasite that attacks corn kernels. The fungus is called corn smut and turns healthy kernels into overgrown blue-black tumors, creating a very unpleasant sight. Interestingly, it is more expensive on the Mexican market than healthy cobs. When cooked at high temperatures, the color of the fungus changes to black and an oily paste is created. Mexicans appreciate its earthy, woody flavor and to enrich the dish, they add it to soups, quesadilla, they stuff it with Tamales do they serve in tacos. They can be served as an appetizer to the main course or as a snack during a party. chapulines, i.e. crispy insects roasted in lime juice and chili resembling crickets or, if you prefer, grasshoppers.

We could write and write about unusual dishes. The presented list presents subjectively the strangest of them. We are very different, we come from different cultures and environments. We live in different natural conditions, we have different histories. Hence the differences. That is why cuisines from other corners of the world may surprise or shock us. I hope that the text will help you create your culinary bucket list. Let me know about your unusual experiences with exotic cuisine. Finally, I will mention two old Polish proverbs, man does not live by bread alone, a appetite grows with eating.