Death Kava by Leslie
February 19th, 2009 9:00 PMHow does one eat uncertainty? By walking through a sketchy neighborhood full of shower shows and live nudes to get lunch at a Dim Sum place in which there are no signs in English and the woman behind the counter only screams at you in Chinese. The experience of being in there is frightening enough, but eating mystery food purposely chosen for its lack of appeal. Well, that took some courage.
Behold:
The Shop
It's a shame you can't hear this picture. There would be screaming. The lady closest to the window is the scariest. And of course, she is the one who helped me.
The Food
So the spring rolls (or egg rolls?) look pretty good, but the two items flanking it looked suspicious. I bought one of the ones on the right.
The Menu
Can you read it? Maybe some of you can. But me? Not so much. And thus, I was in ignorance of what I might eat, and I did fear.
A note found in a car window
As we were walking through the sketchy neighborhood back to work, we saw a car with this note in the window, parked amongst the "Gentleman's Clubs." Even the location of this restaurant was mildly scary.
Nothing of Worth
... unless you want a can of Folgers or some Windex.
My doom
The one on the right is what I originally picked to be my scary food. My friend took one bite of the one on the left and promptly spit it out. I felt obligated to try that one too.
DO NOT WANT!
My...thingy... tasted vile. It managed to be at once meaty and sickly sweet. And slightly soggy. I gagged a bit, but I knew that in order to complete this task with honor, I had to swallow my fateful bite.
The Nasty Bite
...I guess the pastry bit on the outside. You know, I was going to try to say it was good, but it really wasn't. I think it had been dipped in High Fructose Corn Syrup or something. And the filling. Just look at it.
Gross.
I do not like this strange and vile concoction. And for those of you wondering about the other one: It had little gristly bits of something and long cold stringy bits of some kind of green. Seaweed maybe? And the wrapper around it was cold and gluey. And something inside was inexplicably crunchy. Like bones.
A Happy Ending
My coworkers took pity on me and got me a cupcake to make up for my lunchtime misadventures. I had already taken a few good licks of the frosting when it occurred to me that this was the happy end of my eating adventure.
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Voted for the integration of Do Not Want into a caption and gratuitously capturing the event on a digital medium.
Whatever those foods were, I hope they came with warning labels.
You know, they mave have. I just couldn't read them!
if you had gone to a Real dim sum restaurant and spat out/gagged on the food I'd have to call you Disrespectful as well as Someone with No Appreciation for probably some of the Best Food on Earth.
However, you clearly found the SHADIEST, MOST HEALTH-CODE DEFYING dim sum restaurant this side of the Pacific. i love dim sum, and i wouldn't touch that dim sum with a ten foot pole. i commend you for both possibly your idiocy and your bravery.
And believe me, as a Chinese person I can tell you there were probably a million more things served there with crazier ingredients that you could have been afraid to eat.
I'm pretty much unable to do this task - when prepared correctly I highly enjoy: frog's legs, jellyfish, chicken feet, fish eyes (they're good luck!), sea urchin, thousand year eggs, and a plethora of other things that and incredible number of people would never agree to eat. and heck, as a Mexican, there are probably a lot more animal parts i could add to that list. however, i've never tried head cheese, and probably wouldn't be too against it anyway.
also, the filling of the pastry you ate was probably sweet red bean, that's its natural color. it is a real joy if you actually find a restaurant that makes it well.
I would just like to point out that I did not spit anything out. I finished the bites I took. No disrespect was intended towards the general category of food. The particular pieces I took were, I think, not exemplary of what dim sum should be. Hence the challenge.
Your list of food makes me feel wimpy! I don't think I could handle chicken feet. And thousand year eggs sound a little scary. Are those the ones you bury for a few months? Eeep! Gah, now there are so many foods I'm mildly afraid of that I think I should do this again.