snakes

Wish chew were here? The unusual foreign foods we’ve ‘enjoyed’ on our travels, from century eggs and frog stew, to guinea pig in Peru and rattlesnake with bison testicles in Texas

Going on holiday abroad has many pleasures – new horizons to explore, new cultures to embrace and new food to try. But when you order off an unfamiliar menu more in hope than expectation, it’s possible to end up with a plate of mystery morsels.

So, in the spirit of culinary curiosity, we asked our journalists (a pretty well-travelled bunch) for their foreign food memories.

To start the undercooked meatball rolling, I’ll contribute braised jellyfish with ‘century egg’ (fermented for months until a gelatinous greenish-grey) for an awful eggs-over-queasy breakfast in China, whole baby frogs in Thailand, guinea pig in Peru and rattlesnake with bison testicles in Texas. The rattlesnake wasn’t too bad. A bit like chicken…

What’s the most unusual food you’ve ever eaten? Let us know in the comments below or by emailing [email protected]

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• Peter Rickman (production): “Octopus cooked in its own ink in the then Yugoslavia. Now I like a bit of octopus but this was like chunks of rubber floating in a watery black broth with two sad looking school dinner boiled potatoes… no thanks.”

• Ben Rankin (editors): “Horse intestines – never again. We were in a lovely restaurant in Kazakhstan, with a feast of food served to us, including special occasion dish Beshbarmak.

“The noodles and the horse meat were fine but the smelly, chewy, white intestine bites were difficult to, erm, stomach. I couldn’t get enough of the Kumys (mare’s milk) to wash it down and the Baursak (puffy bread) to get rid of the taste!’’

• Clare Fitzsimons (books): “Who doesn’t love a boiled egg? Me it turns out when it’s been cooked for about three seconds and then poured – yes poured – into a cup for you to eat (or clearly in this case drink) for breakfast.

“Singapore is a wonderful place but my breakfast left a lot to be desired and while bodybuilders like to neck raw eggs, it’s definitely not for me.”

• Lawrence Goldsmith (cartoons): “In Iceland I was served Hakarl, or fermented shark.

“It’s a traditional dish made from Greenland shark meat, cured through a fermentation process and then hung to dry. I was told that it was an ‘acquired taste’. If you like a dish tasting like highly spiced leather this is the one for you.’’

• Milo Boyd (travel): “Wiggly eel and frog stew: both fished out of a river in Croatia’s Neretva Delta in front of me and then served whole and steaming.

“The local community even came out to watch me tackle the slippery concoction, despite all of my protestations that I am a vegetarian.’’

• Mark Silver (sport): “I was with my girlfriend in her homeland of Belarus. And I was in the mood to propose to her after a good few years together. Well, I ended up not having the stomach for it, literally, after she dished up a traditional Belarusian delicacy – raw pig sausage.

“The smell did not entice me. It is a pig intestine stuffed with minced or chopped meat and spices.’’

• Michael Ham (sport): “A 10-course meal is not to be sniffed at anywhere, but the Minazuki custard with conger eel, scallop and veggies I had in Japan was also not to be sniffed at, if you catch my drift. And then it was followed by courses of crab brains and squid guts…. ‘’

• Siobhan McNally (features): “On a visit to Vilnius, Lithuania, in the late 1990s, we were served a traditional lunch of chewy boiled pigs’ ears for starters followed by Cepelinai or “zeppelins”, which are stuffed potato dumplings. We hungrily ate them up, and then our host explained ‘cooks make them like this’ before proceeding to spit in his hands and mould an imaginary German airship. We all stopped chewing and regurgitated the remains into our napkins. Now I will eat most things but I draw the line at human spittle.’’

• Andrew Gilpin (editors): “Fermented shark (again!) No one knew how it came to this: our Icelandic host dancing about with a knife in his hand and a giant cod eye in his mouth. That wasn’t even the worst thing eaten that day. The fermented ancient shark buried for months to give it that ­distinctive ammonia taste surely was. Even though it was five years ago I can still summon up the ‘taste’ in my nostrils. ‘A delicacy 400 years in the making’ – and certainly not worth it.’’

• Karin Wright (production): “On a food tour of Florence – lampredotto (lining of a cow’s fourth stomach) from a food truck, served in a sandwich with a strong salad verde (presumably to obscure the taste)… interesting flavour, awful texture. I took a bite to be polite.’’

• Aaron Flanagan (sport): “Singapore’s ‘Ice kachang’ translates very literally into ‘iced beans’ and is a traditional Malay dessert. Online reviews claim it is supposed to be a thirst-quenching concoction, but the combination of ice, jelly and red beans looks like something a five-year-old would throw together. Imagine freezing your chilli con carne overnight and eating it seconds after it leaves the freezer. Some foods shouldn’t have iced alternatives.’’

• Vicky Lissaman (travel): “Wolf, on the Côte d’Azur, France. It was described on a restaurant menu as ‘loup’ and I thought it was probably some sort of fish. (This was long before we had mobile phones to Google the meaning of words). When it arrived, all bleu and bloody, I thought that perhaps they had given me someone else’s steak. But then the waiter confirmed that it was, in fact, exactly what I ordered – wolf. I howled with laughter, and then spent a lot of time chewing it and forcing it down as if it was a bushtucker trial.’’

• Chris Granet (production): “Grilled cat, on a drunken Friday night in a Rio de Janeiro favela. It wasn’t great. A bit sinewy.”

Aug. 6 (UPI) — A federal judge in Florida on Wednesday heard arguments from two groups seeking an injunction to halt the operation and further construction of an immigration detention center in the Everglades called “Alligator Alcrataz.”

District Judge Kathleen Williams conducted a hearing in Miami on a lawsuit by environmental groups and the Miccosukee Tribe, claiming the state and federal government bypassed mandatory ecological reviews required under the National Environmental Policy Act during construction.

They also said the detention facility, which now houses 1,000 detainees with plans for up to 5,000, was built in less than two weeks without public notice or comment, and didn’t comply with other statutes, including the Endangered Species Act.

The detention center, which is about 75 miles west of Miami and 44 miles southwest of Naple, is amid swampland that includes alligators, pythons, snakes and other predators.

Randy Kautz, an expert in Florida wildlife, said 120 to 230 endangered panthers are in the “core area” and increased human activity will harm reproduction.

“There has been a stable reproducing population of panthers in this area in this range at least over the last 30 years,” he said in court. “Panthers have succeeded and resided here.”

Panthers were tracked in the 1,000 acres near the detention facility, which was built on a rarely used airstrip off U.S. 41 in Ochopee in Miami-Dade County near Collier County. The so-called Alligator Alley, which is part of Interstate 75, runs 80 miles across the state through the Everglades.

Attorneys say the work is exempt from the National Environmental Policy Act because it was initially funded, constructed and managed by the state. But Florida state Rep. Anna Eskamani testified the Department of Homeland Security wants the facility.

More than 40,000 people opposed the detention center in a petition on the website of the Friends of the Everglades, a nonprofit, which is one of the parties in the lawsuit.

“We are very concerned about potential impacts of runoff” and “large, new industrial-style lights that are visible from 15 miles away, even though having a dark sky designation,” Eve Samples, the executive director of the group, told the court.

“Driving out there myself many times, the increased traffic is visible. I saw two dead gators last time I visited, so definitely a difference in the area.”

The detention facility neighbors land leased to the Miccosukee Indian Tribe with villages, a school, hunting areas and sacred sites.

Civil rights groups filed a second lawsuit alleging that detainees’ constitutional rights are being violated. A hearing in that case is scheduled for Aug. 18.

WTVJ-TV reported limited access to showers, spoiled food, extreme heat and mosquitoes. They also allege they are being barred from meeting lawyers with some held without any charges.

President Donald Trump toured the facility on July 1 with Gov. Ron DeSantis and Homeland Security Secretry Kristi Noem before the opening two days later.

The first deportation flights departed from the airstrip on July 25.

Legislators in Congress and the state, who initially were denied access, were allowed to visit on July 12 but couldn’t speak to the detainees and access to the property was limited.

“Rural immigrant detention camps — 750 people in cages like animals — is un-American, and it should be shut down,” state Sen. Carlo Guillermo Smith said.

State and federal officials defend the conditions.

“All detainees are provided with proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers,” Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin told NBC News last month. “Ensuring the safety, security, and well-being of individuals in our custody is a top priority.”

DeSantis has said the airport site, called the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Facility, won’t have any effect on the surrounding environment.

DeSantis and Noem have touted the location because it is in a relatively remote area and surrounded by swampland.

DeSantis utilized an emergency order in 2023 in response to Cuban and Haitian migrants arriving in the Florida Keys by boat, with the state offering to pay $20 million for the land.

Florida will seek reimbursement from the federal government for the $450 million yearly cost of running the facility, a senior Department of Homeland Security official told the Miami Herald.

County officials approve the use of the airstrip for immigrants.

The airstrip was envisioned to become an airport with construction to begin in 1968. Work was halted in 1970 because of environmental concerns, but not before one runway was finished. The runway was used for training flights.

The land later became Big Cyprus National Preserve, which encompasses 1,139 square miles. The preserve is north of Everglades National Park, which covers 2,356 square miles.

July 18 (UPI) — A federal judge overturned the approval by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers of a mixed-use project in Chico, Calif., after environmentalists claimed it will destroy the natural habitat of threatened species.

At issue was the Stonegate Development Project, a 314-acre development. It was to include 423 single-family residential lots, 13.4 acres of multi-family residential land uses, 36.6 acres of commercial land uses, 5.4 acres of storm water facilities, 3.5 acres of park and a 137-acre, open-space preserve, the ruling said.

U.S. District Judge Daniel Calabretta gave summary judgment requested by the Center for Biological Diversity and AquAlliance and halted implementation of the project until the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service prepares a legally adequate biological opinion that the development wouldn’t jeopardize protected species.

Calabretta, a President Joe Biden appointee, wrote that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a Biological Opinion for the project in early 2020. That opinion “acknowledged there would be harm to some ESA-listed species, but that the project would not jeopardize the continued survival and recovery of the listed fairy shrimp, tadpole shrimp and meadowfoam.” It also did not analyze impacts on the giant garter snake, he added.

“The court finds that federal defendants’ failure to consider potential effects on the ESA-listed giant garter snake was based on a faulty assumption that there have been no sightings of the snake within five miles of the project renders its Biological Opinion arbitrary and capricious,” Calabretta said.

According to the conservation groups, the project also would permanently destroy 9.14 acres of wetlands. But some meadowfoam habitat may be established through mitigation efforts.

The Butte County meadowfoam is found nowhere in the world but Butte County, Calif., the Center for Biological Diversity said. The species has only 21 distinct populations remaining, and the project would destroy one population and further encroach on two others.

According to the fish and wildlife service, the giant garter snake is one of the largest garter snakes, reaching 63.7 inches long. It has been listed as threatened since 1993 and now only exists in three counties in California. Only about 5% of its historical wetland habitat remains.

Vernal pool fairy shrimp are restricted to vernal pools found in California and southern Oregon. They are found in 32 counties across California’s Central Valley, central coast and southern California and in Jackson County in southern Oregon, the service said.