My mother, the special woman that she is, used to save the chicken heart for me, and only me, for helping her with domestic work so much. And I knew it was special because there is only one. She'd eat the liver and then slice up the gizzard to divide amongst the rest of the kids so that we wouldn't fight over it. I rate dimsum restaurants according to how well they prepare their chicken feet. Yep, organ meats are not too strange to me. Though I don't eat them as much anymore, I eaten tripe, stomach, liver, kidney, intestines, tongue you name it. And from various animal's too. I've also had bull's testicles, but they were not cut up into cubes for me. Istead, they were simply grilled with salt and pepper so I had the pleasure of eating it in it's full effect.
The weirdest things I ate:
1. In China, I ate these little black lumps the size of my thumb nail in rice wine. I don't know what they were but they looked like some sort of snail/slug that didn't have a shell. They were swaying so they were still alive, albeit, probably blessedly intoxicated in that pool of rice wine. Their interesting texture had me going back for more.
2. Dragonfruit. I couldn't resist the urge to try it when I was in Vancouver 2 years ago. It was flaming red with green tips. And when you cut into it, you get a semi-translucent white flesh that is speckled with black seeds that look like sesame. Despite its raging beauty, it tasted a little bland to me. Prior to dragonfruit, pomegranate was the only other fruit that has ever stirred so much anticipation in me (I was eight years old at that time).
3. The soup that Jose cooked up for family meal last week. It was like eating the scraps of everything on the menu only wet.
