Fierce Food: The Intrepid Diner's Guide to the Unusual, Exotic, and Downright Bizarre

by Christa Weil

Bugs, brains, and boiled sheep—a truly extreme dining guide for fans of Anthony Bourdain’s Extreme Cuisine

Is comfort food getting a little too comfortable? Then grab a plate at the Fierce Food buffet, where the world’s most extraordinary foods are dished up for your pleasure. Start the meal with Mexican chapulines, or grasshoppers, and then move along to the Kazakhstan boiled sheep’s head, where the eyeball is reserved for the most honored guest. And if necessary, ease your queasy stomach with dried clay.

An alphabetical survey of the world’s most amazing and unusual edibles, Fierce Food describes what these foods are and where they’re from, and how they’re captured, foraged, or, even putrefied. Readers also learn how the foods are traditionally served and eaten-and best of all, what they taste like, because if you can’t actually bring yourself to eat Filipino embryonic duck eggs, reading about it is the next best thing. Fierce Food is a fascinating exploration of global cultures that definitively proves the old adage, “one man’s meat is another man's poison.”

Genres: Nonfiction, Food

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[ReiShimura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kleine Warnung vorweg: Das Buch ist nicht unbedingt für Menschen mit einem schwachen Magen geeignet, die sich noch dazu alles, was sie lesen, bildlich vorstellen.
Cusine fatal beschreibt 72, Großteils außergewöhnliche Lebensmittel bzw. Gerichte der internationalen Extremküche. 50 dieser 72 Speisen hat die Autorin auch selbst verkostet. Die meisten Gerichte sind mittlerweile doch eher bekannt, ein paar für mich bisher unbekannte Dinge waren aber doch dabei. Schaut man sich eine Kochsendung im Fernsehen an, kommt manchmal der Wunsch nach Geruchsfernsehen auf. So dass man die Speisen nicht nur sieht, sondern auch riechen kann. Im Falle dieses Buches bin ich wieder rum sehr froh, dass die Gerüche nicht mitübertragen werden. Auch auf Fotos oder Abbildungen wird zu meiner großen Freude, Großteils verzichtet. Denn nicht umsonst tragen einige der aufgezählten Speisen die Kennzeichnung abstoßend oder stinkt unglaublich.
Das Buch ist eine Mischung aus Details zu den Lebensmitteln selbst (Geruch, Geschmack, Aussehen), ergänzt mit ihrem Herstellungs- oder Kochprozess und teilweise auch einer Entstehungsgeschichte. Alles in allem eine gute und recht unterhaltsame Mischung. Auch wenn man sich bei manchen Speisen fragt, warum sie in dieses Buch aufgenommen wurde, wie z.B. der Kokosnuss, Topinambur oder Salzlakritze.
Die Kapitel sind zwar eher kurzgehalten, strotzen aber in den meisten Fällen nur so vor Information. Der Schreibstil ist angenehm und lässt sich leicht lesen, auch wenn die Autorin an manchen Stellen ein wenig zum Schwafeln neigt.
Das perfekte Buch für alle, die einmal die etwas andere Art der internationalen Küche probieren möchten.

[Sarah Adler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Schreibstil: ✍️✍️✍️✍️
Thema: 💯💯💯💯💯
Faktizität: 🔝🔝🔝🔝
Recherche: 🔎🔎🔎🔎
Zitierwürdigkeit: 🧾🧾🧾
Was man lernt: 📚📚📚📚📚
Was man fühlt: 💌💌💌💌
Kulturelle Relevanz: ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️

[Kitap · Rating 4 out of 5]

I often joke that my headstone will simply read, "And He Ate It." The author really seems to understand the almost spiritual motivation behind my literally omnivorous nature:

Fierce food turns eating into a form of extreme sport, in which we face down our misgivings and dare to plunge into the unknown. We may not always like what we taste, but the experience of having tasted—of overcoming apprehension about trying something new—is not only life-enhancing, it, like any other kind of adventure, makes for a great story.

It really is about facing down fears, like the time I stared down a plate of bruise-purple cheval tartare at a Montreal bistro. (That's raw horse, in case you wondered.) And it does make for great stories, too, like about the time I purchased hákarl at Keflavík International for the flight home and asked the woman at the register what would happen if I opened the vacuum-sealed jar on the flight. "They vill kill you," she answered with a smile.

My only complaint about the book is that it doesn't describe many of the fierce foods I have eaten (e.g., thousand-year-old eggs, abalone porridge, whale sushi, Icelandic moss schnapps, ema datsi, ostrich, candied baby crabs, and canned pork brains in gravy) while it includes a non-starter like the undergraduate-standard-issue gelatin shot. Turns out I have only eaten of 19 of the 72 referenced foods (which is slightly over 26%). For the curious, the foods Weil reviewed that I have tried thus far would be: betel nut (hardly a food), bone marrow, chicken feet, coconut (baby and mature), cordyceps, corn smut (aka huitlacoche), durian, frog's legs, gelatin shots, the aforementioned hákarl (fermented Greenland shark bits, redolent of ammonia!), honeycomb, honeysuckle, jellyfish, Jerusalem artichokes, natto, prickly pears (and nopales), salt licorice (this is how I came to love non-salted licorice, by a sort of reverse engineering of my tastes), uni (sea urchin roe), and yuba. Tasting the other 74% is something to shoot for before they carve that headstone.

[Gary · Rating 3 out of 5]

In one of the few really good scenes from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Kate Capshaw's character dines on some exotic and extreme (but not very realistic) Indian food. When one of her fellow diners asks why she isn't eating, she replies, "I ate bugs for lunch."

Christa Weil's Fierce Food is an alphabetical listing of extreme foods from Armadillo to Yuba. (Armadillo is apparently tasty, but a major carrier of leprosy--caveat omnivore.)

Weil is a London-based fashion journalist, whose other books are Secondhand Chic and It's Vintage, Darling!. As far as I can tell, this is her first foray into food writing.

These are brief and interesting discussions of exotic food from around the world, most of which just sound too disgusting to eat but a few of which might be interesting. Weil has developed an interesting rating system for each item, indicating for example whether the item "has eyes," "tastes like chicken," or "may cause pain/disease/death."

This book provides good bedtime reading because each entry is only a page or so long, but you might end up with some strange dreams. (You can buy the book used on Amazon for 1 cent plus shipping.)

[Ingrid · Rating 5 out of 5]

I could not have been happier with this read. Not only was it incredibly informative, (the descriptions made me feel as if I were tasting the food myself-which for a scaredy cat like me, is a huge relief since I know I won't be trying the foods out in real life), but I also discovered my new favorite channel on YouTube Food Oddities, where 10 year old Remy eats practically every one of the dishes included in this book! It was well written and I liked the format, but I really wish there had been some photos included. As it is, I had to look each dish up online which, while fun, staggered the process and flow of the book. If I'm curious enough to want to know what a dish tastes like, I'm certainly curious enough to want to see what the dishes look like so hopefully they include some photographs in future editions.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have a strong interest in the bizarre eating of the world. Not that I would eat it myself, though I have had singed sheep's head, rotted shark, rabbit, etc, I envy those who can try what most cultures consider normal nutrition. This book is for the armchair gastronomic explorer - find out why people eat certain folds we find revolting, how they aqcuire them, certain ceremony surrounding the eating of them, and what the taste and texture is like. Ever wonder what happens when you eat a poisonous puffer fish that wasn't prepared correctly? Read this book and find out while staying alive!

[Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

A breezy, but informative and entertaining, romp through some of the world's most exotic, challenging and sometimes revolting cuisine. If this book doesn't awaken your inner Andrew Zimmern, it may put you off trying anything that you don't immediately recognize for a while. As for me, I've never been known to shy from a food challenge (I gladly dined on Cicadas harvested from my front yard once), but there are a few "dishes" in here that I might balk at. Give it a read, though, and you too might discover a craving for rotten, spiny, crunchy, slimy or unmentionable things:) Bon appetit!

[Dorcas · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author goes into lovingly graphic detail of how gross some of the foods are. They are listed alphabetically and chosen from around the world, from wormy cheeses to aardvarks. Some of the foods aren't really as gross as the they may be described, though they may be new or shocking to the western palate.

[Aura · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great book to read around other people so you can shout out the more horrifying or delicious sounding edibles. Like, "Who knew there were so many ways to eat cattails?" or "Whoa-eating grubs from reindeer's backs sounds way gross!" I found quite a few fierce foods I had already eaten, and some I might even try.

[Gwen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fierce Food was an entertaining read over a period of months. I read it in short bursts to digest what I had read. Christa Weil hasn't eatten all the food that's mentioned in the book (con) but writes about Fierce Food with gusto (+). I particularly enjoyed the sarcasm thrown in here and there (+). As a weird person, I wish there were pictures (-), even if they were drawn.

[Ladymidnight · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a vegetarian the only word that describes this book is eeeuuuww! Despite this I enjoyed the writing and the humour. Probably a good idea to read it when you're not planning on eating for a while :-)

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you've ever watched a couple of episodes of Bizarre Foods, then you could probably give this one a pass. It's well written but won't prove to be anything new to anyone who has had an interest in weird things people decide to put in their mouths for a while.

[Judy Zhok · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some parts of this were really disgusting! But it was always interesting. I know there are more gross foods out there that people somewhere eat, so I was wishing that the author had a follow-up second book to this one!

[Lori · Rating 5 out of 5]

Made me want to eat durian, and NOT eat armadillo.

[Hope · Rating 5 out of 5]

An awesome, amusing, and quick read full of disgusting, amazing, and often intriguing foods.