EDIBLE

I can't believe that I have been blogging for a month, and we haven't yet talked seriously about food. As you can see from my profile, I have a keen interest in good food. I know, it usually means "I am a fatty". I was going to protest "Not in this case!", but what's the point? You'll have to wait until I decide to publish a photo of myself - in a decade or two. Anyway, it's not good food I want to discuss today, but its opposite. You see, yesterday was Burns night...

For those of my esteemed reader who don't live in the UK, Robert "Rabbie" Burns is Scotland's national poet, and on his birthday, 25th January, Scots celebrate their Scottishness (I mean, even more than usual) with a traditional supper that has to include their national dish, haggis: a refined delicacy composed of sheep's heart, liver and lungs, minced together with oatmeal, suet and spices, and boiled for three hours in the sheep's stomach. Mmm... They even have a poem dedicated to this culinary chef-d'œuvre, written by Burns of course, in which he celebrates the superiority of that fare over effete French and Italian cuisine. Scots have never been afraid of controversy.

I know some would recoil in horror at the evocation of such a dish, but I am made of sterner stuff. In fact, being always eager for new experiences, culinary or otherwise, I have been able to sample from what would seem to some of you the shopping list for Hell's dinner parties: rabbit, octopus, snails, frogs, crocodile, python, cow's udder, lamb's brain, duck gizzard, chicken feet, fish eggs, swallow's nest...

Not feeling queasy yet? Good. Have you ever watched one of these reality shows where people are stranded in the jungle without food or a roof over their head, then made to eat the most disgusting stuff under pain of elimination and, Heaven forbid, immediate repatriation? Well, now you can recreate that lovely feeling in the comfort of your own home. A few years ago, some department stores in the UK started to sell an interesting range of dry goods, from which you can see a sample below:

The funny part of it is that although this, err, food, is probably the very last resort of some Amazonian tribe when they run out of fish eyes, here in London it costs significantly more than the same weight of prime quality steak. Oh, and if you wonder what it tastes like, the toasted ants are quite dry, with an earthy flavour, but not much worse than say, roasted pistachios. As for the Mopani worms, it's a bit more chewy and definitely an acquired taste.

Well, I won't detain you any longer, it's nearly time for dinner. Bon appétit!