Snake - Yeah, We Ate That.
Trip Start
Nov 12, 2008
1
12
17
Trip End
Dec 02, 2008
Hoi An,
Vietnam
Monday, November 24, 2008
By far the craziest looking thing we have eaten while we were here was on our first day on the Mekong Delta - they took us to this island where we were presented with the largest, freshest prawns (twist off the head and pull the tail, split the middle - I'm still not used to that process), which was followed by an Elephant Ear Fish. The EEF was on a stand so that it looked like it was swimming instead of laying flat on a plate. It had been fried so that the scales were now cone shaped and stuck out all over the sides of the fish. The woman serving us dug into the sides of the fish to get the meat and then served it to us in fresh spring rolls. Mine had some of the cone scales in it which I was not okay with and tried to discreetly (because I'm so good at being discreet) pull them out before eating. This was the day that we biked through the mud and ended up at the guest house on another island where we were presented with fried springrolls that looked like larger Triskets. The rice covering was in a criss-cross shape around the outside of it.
It is amazing the number of ways that are possible to combine fish/shrimp, pork and rice or noodles. Just last night we had the white rose dumplings that are unique to Hoi An and they were amazing - with their wide noodle wrapping, and their shrimp and pork on the inside. And I don't even really like pork.
In Can Tho, we stopped at a restaurant and sat outside watching people fish in the river. There Katherine taunted until we gave in and ordered the snake just to try it. The waiter informed us that the curry was better than the spring rolls but we got both to try it. The curry was good. I ate one spring roll and one bite of snake curry before I realized I couldn't turn off the vision of snakes in my head to chew any more. But the others (i.e. Jen and Marie) are way more adventurous on that front. Even Vicki wins at being adventurous. I'd like to say I didn't like the duck curry we had last night but really (while it wasn't great), I once again couldn't turn off the image of the duck as I tried to chew. One bite is enough, isn't it?
Overall though the food has been good. We've spring rolled our way around the country and yesterday's afternoon snack (aka lunch) of pizza, fries, a hamburger, and a ham sandwich (depending on which one of us you were), was a very welcome break from rice, noodles and fish sauce.
The funny thing was that the Cambodian food was awesome. It was by far my favorite and I think most of everyone elses. Not just because we were only at the hotel, but the other restaurants we went to as well - the Thai influence with the curries were amazing. The local favorite is called Amok and basically anything can run with it. Fish Amok, Chicken Amok, Pork Amok. Served inside a coconut, the curry and vegetables inside were a very good combination of flavors and spice.
The eggs in the hotel this morning were also good. As was the fresh fruit that has been everywhere. It will be interesting to see what food we'll find on our hike the next few days. Who knows. As long as it's not dog, we'll be okay. I'm not up for that much adventure.
