Do you eat fish heads?

I confess that my ability to try different foods has fallen short of my own expectations. I had begun this journey by naturally falling into the perfect circumstances where a strange food was in fact delicious. One day at ICCN, for example, I happened to try (and like) Gujmaji. Until this day I am not entirely sure what the organs were that I was eating. Perhaps it was liver, heart, or stomach, or a combination of all three. It had a walnut sauce, however, that made everything quite delightful. This weekend I tried a cow “stomach-and-tail” soup. The broth was somewhat tasteless, but by no means unappealing. The meaty part of the soup was a bit troublesome for me. I tried a sliver of the slice of stomach that was in my soup, but could eat no more. I loaded (as it is customary) the soup with salt and garlic to give the broth more taste. However, I still failed at eating the entire meal. Shameful, shameful. It was not that the stomach was distasteful, although that was part of it, I admit. I think the bigger problem was getting over the idea, this idea that to eat the stomach of a cow is gross. If I would have gotten over that idea, I would have successfully finished my meal. Maybe.

I feel extremely shameful in exposing my food aversions. But maybe it will help me get over my aversions. Either that, or, the peer pressure to engage in eating these strange foods (again, strange for me, not necessarily for others) will rise to a point where I will be forced to eat such things.

After cow stomach, the dish of choice was heads of fish. How delightful! I must say that I remained at quite a distance from these aromatic aquatic delights. I did not even try them. Shame.

Soon, perhaps… hopefully… I will have some victorious story about how I have eaten an extremely different food. I will tell you when this happens. What do you think of cow stomach and fish heads?