Argentina is famous for epic barbecues (asadas) and of all the griddled bits testicles are one of the most highly prized. I’ve been to a fair few asadas in Argentina, but on this occasion I was in a fancy Buenos Aires grillhouse when the chance to sample testicles came up.

Raw testicles image courtesy of www.seriousseats.com

My male companion at the time went literally green as I placed my order and stated quite categorically that he would not be eating any of the testicles.

Six were duly grilled and served up rolling around the plate, and looking all too testicle like. Not half as gruesome as the above (raw) pic, but still unmistakable. I didn’t take a picture, but they looking reasonable enough despite the shape – homogenous of colour and the same shade as cooked offal.

I cut into the first and was surprised to find the texture the same throughout. From my experiences with the human equivalent I imagined the inside of the testicle to be liquid, perhaps, or at least entertaining some different sacs or vesicles. Instead it was like cutting into a solid chunk of processed meat – all fine grained and inoffensive.

First bite and the flavour was amazing. Really, really delicious. And certainly understandable why they were a delicacy. The barbecue flavour was evident, and teamed with moist succulent meat. Yum.

My reaction persuaded the male companion to have a dubious bite, and he also admitted them to be delicious. In fact he went on to eat four of the six, proving that testicles can weaken a man’s resolve in more ways than one.

http://www.lasnazarenas.com.ar/

More Thorreblot! This time the miscellaneous meat-leavings after all the testicles and rotted shark have been dispensed with. On this occasion I was privileged enough to attend a real-life Thorreblot celebration local-style, which involved lots of vodka and villager-type entertainments as well as plates laden with putrefied basking shark and many-bits-of-sheep.

Blurry picture of sheep's head with brain jelly

My plate here shows both why I never intend to try out for professional photography and the various sheep-heady brain jelly type bits and pieces which make up the mix. Sheep’s cheek – much as you would expect – fairly dry and a lot like other types of meat. But I was not quite as enthusiastic as the locals how picked the entire skull clean.

Brain jelly was like a meat jelly really, not much else to report. If you like jellied meats then it was pretty good. If that’s not your thing (not mine) then it’s not horrible, but you’re better sticking to the vodka.

Thorreblot party - note high ratio of alcohol to food

Certainly the Icelanders threw plenty of vodka down whilst we all watched local villagers perform very entertaining skits about local life. In my vodka addled state I like to think I understood some of it.

So begins my culinary tour of Iceland at a time when the locals are digging in for some of the least savoury cuisine of the year. Mid-winter is ‘Thorreblot’ time in Iceland, which roughly translates as the time to eat the animal parts which are otherwise forgotten about.

Rotting shark meat - hanging in more ways than one

Testicles, brains, cheeks and other innards make it onto the menu, but most infamous is Iceland’s putrefied or rotting shark meat. This food was personally singled out to me by a floppy haired TV chef whose name escapes me as ‘the worst thing I have ever eaten’ and it made Gordan Ramsey actually vomit. So it would be fair to say I was intimidated.

Incredible how adaptable the human nose

The place to eat rotted shark in Iceland is the prime (only) site of manufacture – a tiny small-holding to the north of the country which catches and rots the shark ready to eat.

You can smell the place long before you see it, and the aroma of rancid urine piques the nostrils if not the appetite at disturbingly heightening levels the closer you get. I met with the very accommodating owner, who took me to see the hanging meat, and cut me off a good size wedge fresh from the shark.

The meat is a beautiful white/yellow colour and looks so much like cheese you’d be forgiven for mistaking the two – with the exception, of course, of the ammonia vapours tunnelling up from the rotted flesh.

I took a small piece, swallowed rapidly, and found it really wasn’t that bad – like strong cheese. Emboldened I made for a larger piece. Big mistake. This bit was sizable enough to need chewing and the texture is of toughened plastic. Ammonia streamed up my nose, making my eyes water as I tried to choke the meat down. But it wasn’t bad enough to gag – Gordon was over-reacting. Or possibly, given his career, in ownership of a finer palate than mine.

Bjarnahöfn shark farm, on the Snæfellsnes Peninsula, near Stykkishólmur. There are only three settlements in the north of the country so you won’t have a problem finding it – just ask a local and follow your nose. It’s about six hours drive from Reykjavik.

Continuing in my Thorreblot (mid-winter animal innards-fest) tour of Iceland I’m expanding beyond rotting shark and deeper into parts of sheep more usually made into hot dogs.

The Thorreblot Buffet

First up is sheep testicle terrine – a smooth blend of testicles with some other bits of offal and plenty of lard to stick it all together. As with my other experiences of testicles (culinary, obviously) the taste is pretty good. And the terrine presentation made it in many ways more palatable. Overall though, the dish comes with some quite strong spices which ruins it for me, and I didn’t eat more than a few mouthfuls. Being as the traditional Thorreblot spread doesn’t vary much past pastes and pates of sheep innards, however, I found myself returning to it as a means of filling up. Generally though I stuck to the bread.

Sheep testicle terrine and lots of other lovely miscellaneous meat stuff

This particular Thorreblot-style buffet was found as the Viking Hotel just outside of Rekyavik, and they also do Viking kidnaps for bored corporate types (seriously – your party arrives and are ambushed and carted off by men in horned helmets). The hotel also augments the nightly dinner offering with Viking style musicians, which whilst not taking away from the general un-palatability of the food, had a commendable grip on the ridiculousness of their jobs.

Musicians serenading guests to sounds of The Beatles

The Viking Hotel, Hafnarf Jordour (mid-way between the airport and Reykjavik) www.vikinghoteliceland.com

Ribollita is one of those hearty rib-sticking type of soup/stews which you eat on cold days with big hunks of chewy bread. It’s a Tuscan specialty, it being chilly in those parts during the winter months, and like a good Bolognese everyone has their own special recipe.

This means that ribollita’s can look surprisingly different depending on where you eat them. The classic ingredients are bread, beans, potato and plenty of olive oil, so depending on the ratio you can have it made with whole beans, or a blended soup – but it’s always chunky and filling. Don’t make the mistake of ordering it as a starter unless you’re in for the long haul – this is a super filling soup. But delicious, and one of those brilliant Italian conduits for flavoursome olive oil and fresh bread.

I tried ribollita in loads of places, but you’ll want to eat in a trattoria for authenticity. I can recommend Trattoria Marios (see previous post for details) and Trattoria Coco Lezzone.

Trattoria Coco Lezzone, Via Parioncino 26r Santa Maria Novella

Tasty meat, bit greasy though

Bit on the greasy side and disturbingly full of gunshot, but really tasty rich meat. I wouldn’t want to eat it every day, but all in all a good choice. And less fiddly to eat than that sparrow we tried in Cambodia.

I ate this in one of those restaurants which manages to straddle the divide between hidden gem and major tourist spot. Marios is a tiny little restaurant opposite the Mercato Centrale which is very well known but simultaneously manages to avoid the usual tourist perils of overcharging and international décor with picture menus. I think the technical term for this is ‘institution’, and it’s hidden away enough that you can feel passably smug for having sought it out.

Menu is posted on the wall daily

It’s a traditional trattoria, so the daily menu is written up on the wall with the idea that you order the first plate if you’re after a light lunch, the first and second if you’re looking for something more substantial, and the full three courses if you’re making an afternoon of it.

My advice – unless you’re really hungry just go one course, but make it really clear you’re skipping the ‘first plate’ which is a substantial stew/soup with equivocal hunk of bread.

Marios, via Rosina 2/R (nr Piazza Mercato Centrale)

I know what you’re thinking – all that beautiful Italian food, how did she manage to unearth something which sounds so unappetising? I was pretty pleased with myself I must say, since I would otherwise have been relugated to posting pretty pictures of gelato etc. which would have been boring to say the least.

Picture from www.breadetbutter.wordpress.com who have done much better justice to this tasty sandwich than I did.

In any case, I’ve never liked tripe, having had it in various forms – soups, stews, poached in milk – but I had every faith in Florenzians to come up with a decent version. Nor was I disappointed. Tripe sandwich is the only acceptable way of eating tripe I’ve come across, and it is generally a pretty tasty eat. This has much to do with the fresh bread roll and delicious tart parsley sauce with grassy shot of olive oil (no matter how many bottles I bring home they never taste the same as in situ…). They’d also done something to the tripe to remove it’s usual blandness and make it taste more like beef. Which is a good sandwich filling.

Little vans selling tripe sandwiches are scattered around the city, though the best are found in the Mercato Lorenzo.

Amazing beer hoi! To blame for so many of my happy times, and my more infamous times!

Probably the cheapest beer in the world, and very tasty

Beer hoi is essentially a home-brewed lager sold direct from the cask on the streets of Hanoi. Beer hoi sellers also provide little plastic chairs so you can drink in discomfort, but for the price it’s well worth it. Fresh beer costs around 25p (18cents) per glass. With glasses being a little under a pint (0.5 litre) measurement.

Look for the blurry sign on the streets of Hanoi...

You can’t tell the strength, thought it’s probably quite weak – although my drunken nights in various late night Hanoi establishments would perhaps beg to differ. The best thing about it is the insanely low price ensures a very pleasing bonhomie, even amongst the uber-budget backpacker types. Depending on the size of your group you can buy everyone at the table a beer for under $2 which is value where you need it most.

Beer hoi is generally found on the larger crossroads of the old town in Hanoi. Luong Ngoc Quyen and Ta Hien Streets is probably the most well known and lively.

Duck Embryo Cambodian Style

Psychologically this was probably one of the most challenging things to tackle, not least because it was around Easter time that I was faced with eating The Egg. In Cambodia duck embryo (or fetus) is a popular snack found at lots of street vendors. At least that’s the general word. When you’re actually trying to find one it’s a different story, and I cycled through several non-fetal eggs before asking the people at my hotel if they could give me firm directions. In true Cambodian style they not only found me an egg they had it collected, cooked and served up on a little plate in an egg cup, which made the whole experience a great deal more appetising.

Cutting into the egg itself reveals a disconcertingly brown streaked innard, and when you open the shell proper you get a glimpse of the little birdy’s forming neck and beck, picked out in dark grey-blue against the wider backdrop. This is a little upsetting.

The good news, however, is that the smell is quite appealing – like meaty egg yolk, and the taste is very much like it smells. Especially the brown exterior part. Digging into the neck/head/beak area was a slightly slimier texture, coupled with a crunch which could have been either bone or errant egg shell. If I was starving there would be plenty worse things than this to eat, and the flavour really was quite nice, but it is hard to get over the whole baby bird issue.

Duck embryos are found all over Phnom Penh, but you’re best off having a local direct you (draw a picture if necessary) to avoid the various other forms of egg. Special thanks to the Blue Lime Hotel in Phnom Penh for finding the egg for me.

I know in many ways this can be considered a boring entry. But these little skewers were so delicious and the context so cool that I just had to put them in.

Jalan Alor is the main ‘streetfood street’ in Kuala Lumpur. And yes it’s fairly well known, yes many people who eat here are tourists. But there are a lot of local families too, the food is great and the hussle manageable. Plus the stalls serve great authentic dishes for around $3 which is not a bad price at all for the capital.

My favourite little dish, however, the nation’s signature, chicken satay. On food street they have a number of turning spits run by fan beaters who have a pretty horrible job, fanning meat by a hot fire. The result of their efforts, however, are delectably spit-roast little morsels of chicken served up in a fresh peanut sauce with a squeeze of lime. For about $2 a plate of satay, served with a cold beer, there are few better meals in Malaysia.

Not-so-happy fan beater (she smiled when I wasn't trying to take her pic...)

Jalan Alor aka ‘Streetfood Street’ Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Satay skewers around $2 a big plateful