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effenheimer

We are all made of stars

by effenheimer at 10:52 AM on April 03, 2003

I had a brain taco for lunch at La Correta Rosa Tuesday. Of course, it wasn’t called a “brain taco” on the menu, it was called “sesos,” but I knew what I was doing.

I’ve been around the world a time or two (at least I’ve been to New Orleans once which is almost the same thing) and I’ve tried to keep an open mind about almost everything – food, music, social mores and customs. In my experience, in order to truly get to know a people, you have to try their food.

No, that’s not quite right. You have to eat their food and understand why they love it. You have to understand why they don’t just go to McDonald’s like us. I’ve had kim chee, squid and octopus soup from Korea, preserved duck eggs and black fungus from China, Mulligatawny stew from India, alligator and raw oysters from Louisiana and seaweed from ... well, the sea, I guess, but by far that brain taco won the award for weirdest thing I ever ate.

I have to say I’d do it again – in theory – but in reality it might be a while before I eat one again. Try it you might like it is a good rule to live by. I’ve been pleasantly surprised before. Cabeza (cheek meat), lengua (tongue), tripas (tripe) – it’s all good. Brain tacos are an aqcuired taste and while they are pretty common in Mexico, they are just a bit too far outside my comfort zone.

Of course, this works both ways. Do you know what a great many Asian people find absolutely disgusting in Western cuisine? Cheese. I had an Indonesean roommate who was sickened when I put cheese on anything. And not just those Ameican singles. I couldn’t blame him for that. I mean the good stuff, cheddar, mozzarella, cream cheese. To him, eating cheese was just like sucking up warm lard through a straw.

My roommate told me about a delicacy from his country called bird’s nest soup. The primary ingredient of bird’s nest soup is, in fact, a sea swallow’s nest. This isn’t metaphor soup, y’all, this is the real deal. Apparently, sea swallows use a lot of spit to hold together their nests made of seaweed and the spawn of small fish. The soup cooks for days and, like most things in Chinese cuisine that aren’t crab rangoon, it is supposed to bring long life and good health.

So here I am putting cream cheese on a bagel and grossing out this Indonesian guy telling me about this delicious soup made out of bird spit (and lord knows what else a bird leaves in its nest), seaweed and rotten fish spawn. To him, my pure sweet delicious cream cheese was just as disgusting as that thick bowl of mucousy soup.

When it comes right down to it, what ISN’T disgusting if you think about it too much? Our waiter at La Correta Rosa said you can’t be thinking “Oh God, I’m eating brains” while you are eating brains. He was right. How many people really focus on the fact that they are eating the flesh of a dead animal while pouring A-1 all over a t-bone? Did that do anything for you? How many people REALLY think about what’s in that hotdog? You know it’s the most disgusting leftovers from beef, pork, chicken and turkey production don’t you? Frankly, brains are the least of your concerns when it comes to a nice juicy hotdog, but you eat it, because you do one of two things. Either you put the thought of ingredients out of your mind or realize on some level that it’s all the same. Of course a third option is denial.

comments (19)

Hot dogs are the perfect example of the fact that if you put enough mustard on it, anything can taste good. I think I saw a scat video like that once.

by mg at April 3, 2003 1:20 PM


I just had pork that looked more like beef at a Vietnamese place, and I covered it in fish sauce and coconut milk.

Yummm

Brains, though? That's tough dude. Impressive.

by Linz at April 3, 2003 1:32 PM


I think I could handle the brain tacos, but I'll pass on the 'Fear Factor' cuisine.

by Jimnice at April 3, 2003 1:59 PM


My grandfather was a very country gent who loved to hunt. He would shoot and eat anything that didn't get him first. That was all fine and good for him but he involved his grandchildren, often, in eating things like raccoon, opossum, rattlesnake, and squirrel to name a few. He would trick us into believing it was something normal then let the proverbial cat out of the bag when the meal was through. This was how he got me to eat pork brains and eggs. Makes me ill thinking about it. I was sick to my stomachl for two days after that incident.

by Ezy at April 3, 2003 2:07 PM


In Nepal there are restaurants where there's a hole cut in the middle of the table. The waiter pokes a live monkey's head through it. Then they cut off the top of its skull with a circular saw. Dig in! Hot monkey brains!

by Anna at April 3, 2003 3:19 PM


I thought that nepal thing was a myth? The thing about brain tacos is they are still better than antying taco bell has to offer. Round here, we have Taco Johns and they rock when you wan that sissified american fake mexican that is like stuff you might make at home.

but the brains were prepared as taco filling just like pork,chorizo, azada might be. You know wha they were like was bad stuffing. ever had stuffing that was dry and grey and lacked seasoning. Stuffing that had way too many giblets in it and no salt? that's what this was like. I wanted to like it, but it was just too livery, sucked the moisture out your mouth. I finished it though just to prove i wasnt a pussy. My buddy took one bite and I'm not even sure he swallowed it. At least I'm not him.

by eff at April 3, 2003 5:57 PM


Perhaps someone who knows how to link in comments might step in, 'cuz I saw this on the freaking Discovery Channel. Talk about discoveries you don't need! There, chowing down on freshly deceased monkeys' brains is supposed to impart like, wisdom or something.

by Anna at April 3, 2003 6:22 PM


I EAT GOD.

by LOCKHEED at April 3, 2003 9:05 PM


Lockheed is back if he was ever gone. That is it.

by Anna at April 3, 2003 9:39 PM


I've been eating fried brains all my life. My grandma cooked them real often. So I have to say that brains as well as genitalia (meaning "balls", I've never tried any other kind of) are a delicacy you have to get used to before you before you can really enjoy it.
It is pretty much the same thing as trying to eat sushi. At first you think "man, it's raw fish!". Then the taste is a bit weird at first. Later on you discover it's great.
And that's how it works with most "exotic" cuisines.


I could ommit writing this whole comment by simply saying "eff, you are 100% right."

by necropethamenos at April 4, 2003 3:46 AM


monkey brains... that is FUCKED UP! Now I know why I thought it was a myth, it was in an Indiana Jones movie.

I liked sushi right off. the only thing that I didnt dig 100 percent straight away was the cold rice, but smoked eel? oh baby! Raw oysters i started sucking down by the dozen immediatamente. little horseradish, squeeze of lemon or just straight out of the shell... it's all good.

Unfortunately, I can't get raw oysters in the middle of Iowa and even if I could find them, I probably shouldn't.

by eff at April 4, 2003 10:31 AM


Real tamales are made with whole hog's heads. In Texas, the grocery stores always have several juicy hog's heads on display (but you are in Iowa - right? So you have probably eaten every part of a pig!)
It's the only way to make tamales right. The way my Grandmother did. The brains give the filling a distinctive flavour nothing else can match.

by Charles at April 4, 2003 1:01 PM


The worst thing I ever put in my mouth was this really weird dude I met one night down in Miami Beach. Too much asparagus. Oh, what, thats not what we were talking about?

by mg at April 4, 2003 3:17 PM


I thought you said I tasted like strawberries MG.

by Ezy at April 4, 2003 3:59 PM


You know, if you put A-1 on a grilled cheese sandwich, it gives you the illusion of meat.

by TBD at April 5, 2003 10:04 PM


After Necro- Eff, you are 100% right!

I've never had brain taco (which I assume uses pigs?), but chicken and duck brains are great.

by jean at April 7, 2003 1:46 AM


I'd feel a little too much like a mad scientist if I went into a restaurant and ordered brains.

by mg at April 7, 2003 7:39 AM


i think the brains i had were beef, the tongue is definitely beef. i bet pork brains would be better, let's face it the brain is mostly fat and PORK FAT RULES! HUH?! any emerial fans out there?! show me some LUV!

We produce a LOT of pork, and because of that, we feast largely on really thick pork chops. its poor countries and sections fo the US with a poor history that make the best use of the INTERESTING portions of animals, that is the story i get from food network.

since we have so much pork, i can honestly say that the oddest bits we get into are like ham hocks.

veggies are a scarcity as well, we arent starving, but culturally peolpe think they come to the midwest and "this is where the food is" like they should be able to get any veggie they want fresh from the field. but all we grow is corn and soybeans and taht is almost entirely for animal feed.

the great depression didnt even hit us that hard so our stories of being poor are like "one chicken to feed a family of 8" stories. Chicken and noodles were big at one time. chicken gizzards are done with some frequency round here but that's about it.

by eff at April 7, 2003 11:18 AM


i dont know brains dont sound so bad as long as ya got some chokalote ill eat bout everything edible ABOUT anything not
everything but brains wouldnt hurt i mean its brain food.

by freak at April 8, 2003 5:20 PM