"Dear Food Thoughtz:" Urgent Query

Dear Food Thoughtz,

Attached is a picture of a leechee nut. I think it looks like a testicle. My g-friend thinks it looks like a fetus. It is delicious. 

Obviously we have a dilemma: should we eat this? 

Sincerely, 

Bewildered in the backyard

Dear BiB,

No, you shouldn't eat it. For a lot of reasons. But for the sake of brevity, here's a scene from We Need to Talk About Kevin, which follows immediately afterwards the psychopathic son Kevin burns out his own sister's eye using household cleaners:

Whether it more closely resembles an eye, a peeled testicle, or a fetus, it definitely resembles something extracted from a human body and should be avoided at all costs. I'm also pretty sure it's spelled lychee.

Midge's Addendum:"Obviously they should eat it. They are not different from grapes. I mean, in terms of looking like a body part. A grape could be a human egg or something. Just because you are more used to grapes -- this is a cultural bias, or whatever. Colonizing the lychees. Especially because they can't even spell the name correctly, just like English people can't spell foreign peoples' names."

The Crabapple

Can someone please confirm for me whether or not crabapples are actually edible? Because I know about the jellies, so don’t even start with me, but is it possible to just pick a crabapple off of a tree and eat it? And if it is possible, is it possible to enjoy it? Crabapples look like apples born in reverse: they are born like rotten, shriveled up little apples and then … well, I guess they also die that way—this isn’t Benjamin Button. 

But really, aside from the jellies, is anyone eating these things? Is anyone even eating the jelly? And if so, why? Do you think it’s the case that anyone who eats the jelly honestly doesn’t know that a whole other host of jellies and jams exist in this world? Like strawberry jam? Raspberry jam? Blueberry jam? Grape jelly? Orange marmalade? Peanut butter? Regular butter? Any of these options would be better than crabapple jelly. Lord knows I’ve never tried it, but my only encounter with crabapple jelly is as something that appears to be recycled through various people as Christmas presents. It doesn’t really seem like anyone is eating it. Its value seems to be as a generic, kind gift to give to someone you’re not very close with but feel obligated to do something for. And then that person passes the same jar onto someone else that they have a similar relationship with. It seems entirely possible to me that there are only about 2,000 jars of crabapple jelly currently in existence in the world today, and that these jars are passed around over and over again until someone finally throws one out and someone else finally makes a new jar. It would probably be a pretty interesting social experiment if everyone wrote their name, the date, and who gave them the jelly on an attached sheet—like that book exercise, where you write your name on the cover or register online, and then when you’ve finished with the book, you leave it in a public space and someone else repeats the process.

It’s weird to me that crabapple trees are even still alive. I think that if I encountered one, I would be terrified that it was a sign of the apocalypse and wonder how I missed the first five seals. This will take some pushing and pulling, but after all, isn’t that what hermeneutics is all about? (It’s worth noting that now that I have read the first three books of the Old Testament I consider myself a bit of a hermeneutics scholar.) The sixth seal of the apocalypse references a fig tree casting off its unripened figs (Rev. 6:13), so if you ever see a fig tree shaking off her little figs, you know that the apocalypse is upon us, that repentance is futile, and that you’re most likely going to Hell. But if you see a crabapple… I don’t know, isn’t it kind of like a slow and resilient reminder that the apocalypse is coming? Its fruits are always untimely—there is no time for them—and they are always falling off the branches. I don’t really have the patience to continue with this train of thought. Honestly, it might be the case that there’s just not much here. 

I will try to end on a somewhat positive note: during my time at the tree farm I had to work closely with different strains of crabapple trees, and some of them are remarkably beautiful before the fruit begins to form. I even brought home a weeping crabapple—the most beautiful of the crabapple trees—and it promptly died. Crabapples are the worst. More like crapapples, am I right? 

(Finally: it’s worth noting that when I google image’d “crabapple,” google suggested I might also want to browse pictures of Lil Wayne. And you know what? I did.)

Why is this apple known as a crab?
Because it’s crinkled and gross and resembles a spherical scab.
And why does such a fruit exist in this world?
Only because the Apocalypse has not yet unfurled.
And does this awful thing have any practical use?
Only to bestow on others as less of a gift and more of an excuse.

Booze Thoughtz: Rosé fröccs with a single frozen strawberry

Hungary has a long list of accomplishments under its leather-satchel-affixed belt: it was a Hungarian who first isolated vitamin C; it was a Hungarian who invented the rubik's cube; and it was a Hungarian who invented the ballpoint pen (fun fact: his name was Bálpont Zoltan, which is where we get the word "ballpoint" from*). But perhaps their greatest achievement of all is fröccs, a delicious wine-soda water hybrid that probably isn't Hungarian in origin at all, but rather Austrian (?), which is why we normally refer to the drink as a spritzer and not a fröccs. Even so, my first encounter with the drink was in Hungary, and even though I also procured a wife from Hungary, by far my greatest takeaway from that proud nation has been fröccs. 

Recently, as I was browsing the fröccs hashtag on instagram, I came across a delicious looking rosé fröccs with a frozen strawberry as an icecube, and I had to have it. A week later I bought one of the cheapest bottles of rosé I could find a proceeded to recreate the drink. The results were anticlimactic. It wasn't bad by any means; just uneventful. A normal food critic might not even bother with a review of such an unimpressive drink, but here we are. The strawberry, despite being a better-than-average organic Ontario strawberry, did nothing to improve the taste of the fröccs. In fact, its addition wasn't even noticeable. The biggest disappointment, though, was that the strawberry actually tasted worse when infused with wine than it did in the first place.

So while the drink wasn't terrible, I definitely wouldn't recommend trying this on your own. Or, I mean, do, but be prepared to be underwhelmed.


*Not true. His name was Bíró József, which is why the English call it a biro.

Falafel

Confession: I've never been exactly sure what a falafel is.  At first I thought it referred to a bunch of stuff in a pita. Then I found out that it actually refers to brown chickpea balls that are sometimes served in a pita. And then I learned that falafel can actually refer to the pita as well as long as the brown chickpea balls are one of the leading ingredients in the pita. And finally I just googled "falafel" and now I'm pretty sure they're actually cartoon bull testicles. I think they first appeared in a Picasso painting but now for the life of me I can't find that painting.

This definitely is not the painting I had in mind. I was thinking of one that
was sort of a rusty-brown colour... The more I try to remember what painting
it was, the more I begin to suspect it might actually just be that
painting of Simba that Rafiki does in the Lion King.

But all of this is beside the pint point because whatever a falafel may be, what I know for certain is that I don't want to eat it. Even outside of the pita and on their own these things just do not appeal to me at all (although admittedly a pita packed with shredded lettuce and an unidentified white sauce is far less appealing to me than the plain falafel itself). It seems like they would be really dry and crumbly and would fall apart in your mouth. Without ever having eaten a falafel, I'm certain that is what would happen--which is weird, because "crumbling apart" isn't really a quality anyone ever looks for in a food and nor is it a quality one might associate with testicles (at least not healthy ones). It seems bizarre, then, that the (imagined -- can someone please confirm whether or not falafels are actually crumbly?) crumbliness is a foremost quality of this food. Maybe it is the pita, full of sauce and vegetables, that is supposed to counterbalance this flaw, but if the only way to make a bad food better is by making it worse, there's a problem. The dryness also makes me suspect that falafel might taste like how B multi-vitamins smell, which is something like being trapped in a small space with a bunch of mostly dried-out manure. I hate those vitamins. Of course I'm also afraid that if I bit into one of those testicle-esque falafels in might explode with semen (perhaps that mystery white sauce in the pita is not such a mystery after all).

All this being said, if you do like falafel that is great news for you because they are readily available and often dirt cheap. Just be warned that the reason they're so cheap is because they're made of dried manure packed into cakes using semen, all with the ultimate purpose of resembling bull testicles.

Harvested from the genitals of a bull

Is the trendy, affordable, and enigmatic falafel.

An Ode to Berries

Summer is upon us and berry season is right around the corner. I started writing this poem two years ago and have only just finished it.

The sun was shining on the shrub
To everyone’s delight:

He did his very best to make

The berries plump and ripe--
And this was odd, because it was
The middle of the night.

The freezer was acting sulkily
Because she thought the sun
Had got no business ripening
What she had frozen by the tonne--
“It’s very rude of him,” she said,
“When berry season’s done!”

The strawberries were red as red could be,
The blueberries, blue as blue.
The blackberries were overgrown
And cast a purple hue
Raspberries were protected by their thorns:
Only the bravest could get through

The Sista and the Sista
Were empty and with ache
They wept like anything to see
Such a bland pancake
“If it were only filled with berries
Our hunger we could shake!”

“If seven maids with seven mouths

Picked for half a year.
Do you suppose,” said Sista One
“They could get the bramble clear?”
“I doubt it,” said Sista Two
“And shed a happy tear”

“O Berries, come and walk with us!”
A Sista did beseech.
“A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk,
Let’s spend the day in speech!

Come and fill our pails,
There’s room enough for each.”

The eldest berry looked at them
But never a word he said:
The eldest berry winked his eye,
And shook his heavy head--
Meaning to say he did not choose
To leave the berry-bed.

The strawberries were the first to come,
Their seeds pressed flush to flesh,
Green caps secured upon their tops
Ensured the fruit was fresh.
They eagerly awaited an afternoon
Free from any stress.

The blueberries from their small bush home
Were next to get in line
The raspberries came afterward,
All red and plump and fine.
Eventually the blackberries
Sauntered over in due time.

Together they strolled until
They found a clearing, nice and neat.
A blanket was lay upon the ground
On which to rest their aching feet.
And all the little berries
Jostled for a seat.

“The time has come,” one Sista said
“To talk of many things:
Of daughters and of nieces
And of sistas traveling.
Of adventures of the past
And of what the future brings.”

“But wait a bit,” the Berries cried,
“—Although it’s just a hunch—
We believe it’s half-passed noon
And yet we haven’t had our lunch!”
They turned their heads and all implored:
“Mightn't we have a bite to munch?”

“A bowl of cream,” one Sista said,
“Is what we chiefly need:
And some sugar and some chocolate
Would be very fine indeed—
Now if you’re ready, Berries dear,
We can begin to feed.”

“But not on us!” the Berries cried,
Releasing beads of sweat.
“A day of friendship you said:
A promise made is a promise kept.”
“The day is long,” said a Sista
“And the sun has not yet set.”

“We are so glad we’ve met you!
We hold you in high esteem!”
One Sista lowered her eyes and said:
“We’re running out of cream.”
Another bowl was brought
And her eyes were all agleam.

“It seems a shame,” a Sista said
“To play them for a fool,
After we took them from their homes
Where it was nice and cool.”
But from the other Sista’s mouth
Issued only a stream of drool.

“I apologize,” one Sista claimed,
“For acting such a brute.
It really tears me up inside
And your services I salute.”
With sobs and tears she sorted out
The very plumpest of the fruit.

“O Berries,” said a Sista,
“We’ve had such a pleasant break!
Shall we get you home again?”
But none of the berries spake—
And this was scarcely odd, because
They were all in a pancake.

Hákarl

For the most part I have nothing but good things to say about Iceland: it’s a beautiful country with beautiful people and has one of the most consistently impressive musical and literary outputs of any country. But there’s something rotten in the state of Iceland (the quotation is relevant because Iceland didn’t become fully independent from Denmark until 1944), and that something is shark meat that is intentionally buried in the ground left to rot because the meat itself is poisonous because it’s bloated with urea and the only way to safely consume it is to let it rot first. All other reasons for disgust aside, there is something seriously wrong with a food when the only way to eat it without dying is to ensure it is thoroughly rotted through first.

It goes without saying that I would never try this food, but the question still remains: why is anyone else eating this? I get that when you’re living on an isolated volcanic island with very limited contact with the outside world and not the most extensive list of edible food readily available, sometimes you have to do what you have to do. And I guess, one of those things might be eating shark meat that you’ve left to rot underground for a few months, but… is it? Look, I would never advocate eating any kind of seafood, but I just feel like if you have access to a shark brimming with urea, you probably also have access to a lot of different kinds of fish and shellfish and whales and that, as disgusting those things are, they aren't quite as disgusting as this rotten shark and also do not have to be consumed rotten. And furthermore, Iceland clearly isn’t the isolated volcanic rock it was in the sixteenth century, so I really can’t understand the continued consumption of this revolting dish except as a misguided commitment to a culinary past that is no longer relevant today.

Does it look like I am driving this forklift? Whatever. I don't even care.
This food is too disgusting to waste any time on a picture.

I've been thinking about hákarl for the last few months. I kept planning to write a post about it, but I couldn't see the point. Of course this is something I would never eat, but I'm also not even totally sure that this can be classified as food. It's just weird, slimy, chunks of urea that for some unknown reason a very, very small percentage of the world's population sometimes puts in their mouth. Additionally, based on the Wikipedia article, it seems like no one else can stomach hákarl, so it's probably time for Iceland to own up to the fact that this gross Greenland shark was not meant for consumption. (Like, really, it was not. Because it is poisonous. I really want to get that point across: it is poisonous because it is so full of urea that if you eat it fresh, it will poison you.)

One of the most important things that a nation can do is to hold itself accountable for its mistakes in the past—to bury them in the sand and let them rot, so to speak. The most important thing that Iceland can do now—nay, the only thing Iceland can do now—is to admit that it was wrong and to move on. The sooner Iceland does that, the sooner we can all forget that this horrific rotten urea-shark ever existed in the first place.

The beautiful nation of Iceland

Once plucked from the sea a shark of Greenland.

Poisonous when fresh,

So they rotted the flesh,

And hákarl has since been universally panned.

Dear Food Thoughtz: Hotdog Sushi

A not-so-special Dear Food Thoughtz which isn't really even a Dear Food Thoughtz at all, but the pickings are so slim these days, that I'll take whatever I can get.

Dear Instagram User That I Know In Real Life,

Thank you for tagging me in this Instagram picture. Although I have already alerted you to my thoughtz on this food, let me reiterate here that I think this is wrong and an abomination. I am not even sure if it's a real thing or if you just made it up because a hotdog, some pastrami, pickles, mustard, and cream cheese were literally the only five things you had in your house tonight. I will say that with the exception of the mustard, pickles, and cream cheese, this looks like it might be an improvement on traditional sushi—which, as I have previously discussed, is truly disgusting and awful.

That said, I applaud your resourcefulness. It is often said that the only path to success is one riddled with failure, and while I don't personally live by that ethos, I nevertheless approve of your commitment to culinary failures with the promise of potential success in the future. Bizarrely, if the rumour mill of Grand Forks is to be believed, you are already a wildly successful Vancouver chef, so forgive me if I am confused as to why you're wasting your time with this mustard-meat-tube when you could be devoting yourself entirely to Baked Alaskans (one of your own is pictured below) and apple pies.

Did everyone else know that this is what a Baked Alaskan
is? I had always assumed you just put a whole cod in
the oven for a few hours. #themoreyouknow.

I would also like to point out that despite multiple pleas for pie-mail, I have yet to receive a single pie in the mail. Consider this a strong hint that you should mail me a pie. (You can tell it's a strong hint because I've put the text in bold.)