Hey Everyone, I'm back...
More adventures with the inlaws this year. They live down in Okayama, nestled between a vast expanse of rice fields and the mountains. It's a beautiful place, really.
Each year upon our return, I am reminded of my "drink scale" related to exotic food consumption. My mother-in-law is a wonderful cook and prepares a wide variety of traditional, healthy dishes. That being said, she still manages to slip in a few each year that challeng my pallet, even after 10 years of residence here.
The "drink scale" is the number of alcoholic beverages that are required to be consumed before I am able to consume a food in question. Soem foods may start off as a 2 or 3 beer food, but then move on to become a zero on the scale, requiring no alcoholic promer at all. Other foods, however, are effectively off the scale-meaning no amount of alcohol can get me to eat.
This year, I was reminded of an off the scale item. My father-in-law likes to eat tuna eyes sometimes. I could get by a small fish eye, but thes mondeters are about the size of a golf ball - sorry off the scale. I'd have to be in an unconscious stupor before you could get one of those in my mouth. At least they are cooked...
Sea Cucumber would normally be off the scale, but my father-in-law was so insistent this year that was not able to refuse. Sea Cucumber (namako), in my estimation, is an animal that is clearly not meant to be eaten. there should be no debateon this. It has all the right negative signals, especially when examined raw: lowly reputation on the food chain, unappetizing color scheme, slimy outer surface, and a nasty combination of chewy/crunchiness that defies all gastronomic logic.
I can understand that one culinary adventurerer went for it on first sight; it was bound to happen. Obviously he had to have a bad first experience, so who was the second poor soul, especially after witnessing the first guy's obvious lack of delight?
Anyway, when the plate was unforgivingly thrust in front of me, I began kicking back the sake and tried to let those slimy little pieces slide down while to avoid the unpleasnat feeling of chewing the gummy mass. Despite how unpleasant my face must have looked, I guess I must have eaten it quickly enough to look as if I had enjoyed it, because my emply dish all glistening with slime was eagerly replaced by another heaping plate of the gelatinous mass, father-in-law grinning ear to ear.
By the end of that meal (and all the sake required to finish it), I looked (and felt) worse than the Sea Cucumber...
More adventures with the inlaws this year. They live down in Okayama, nestled between a vast expanse of rice fields and the mountains. It's a beautiful place, really.
Each year upon our return, I am reminded of my "drink scale" related to exotic food consumption. My mother-in-law is a wonderful cook and prepares a wide variety of traditional, healthy dishes. That being said, she still manages to slip in a few each year that challeng my pallet, even after 10 years of residence here.
The "drink scale" is the number of alcoholic beverages that are required to be consumed before I am able to consume a food in question. Soem foods may start off as a 2 or 3 beer food, but then move on to become a zero on the scale, requiring no alcoholic promer at all. Other foods, however, are effectively off the scale-meaning no amount of alcohol can get me to eat.
This year, I was reminded of an off the scale item. My father-in-law likes to eat tuna eyes sometimes. I could get by a small fish eye, but thes mondeters are about the size of a golf ball - sorry off the scale. I'd have to be in an unconscious stupor before you could get one of those in my mouth. At least they are cooked...
Sea Cucumber would normally be off the scale, but my father-in-law was so insistent this year that was not able to refuse. Sea Cucumber (namako), in my estimation, is an animal that is clearly not meant to be eaten. there should be no debateon this. It has all the right negative signals, especially when examined raw: lowly reputation on the food chain, unappetizing color scheme, slimy outer surface, and a nasty combination of chewy/crunchiness that defies all gastronomic logic.
I can understand that one culinary adventurerer went for it on first sight; it was bound to happen. Obviously he had to have a bad first experience, so who was the second poor soul, especially after witnessing the first guy's obvious lack of delight?
Anyway, when the plate was unforgivingly thrust in front of me, I began kicking back the sake and tried to let those slimy little pieces slide down while to avoid the unpleasnat feeling of chewing the gummy mass. Despite how unpleasant my face must have looked, I guess I must have eaten it quickly enough to look as if I had enjoyed it, because my emply dish all glistening with slime was eagerly replaced by another heaping plate of the gelatinous mass, father-in-law grinning ear to ear.
By the end of that meal (and all the sake required to finish it), I looked (and felt) worse than the Sea Cucumber...
