Freaky Foods
Abidemi and Rory discuss various foods that they are scared to eat.
Speakers: Sarah, Rory
Transcript
Track 1
Rory: So Abidemi, do you remember we were talking about food combinations which people find strange.
Abidemi: Hmm.
Rory: Well, I was wondering, are there any foods which just freak you out, which youâd never eat?
Abidemi: Well, I think the older I have gotten, the more Iâve become, kind of, hesitant to try new food, which is strange.
Rory: Yeah.
Abidemi: Before, the thoughtâ¦
Rory: I thought you were going to say more adventurous. Itâs the opposite.
Abidemi: It is the opposite, unfortunately. Before, the thought of eating insects or cats and dogs didnât do anything for me. It didnât do anything bad. It was just like, âOh sure, Iâll try it.â Before, my philosophy was if itâs food, and if I see somebody else eating it, Iâll try it.
Rory: Right.
Abidemi: But now, just the thought of it, of trying to eat a dog or a cat, I donât want to.
Rory: So did you try some strange foods when you were younger?
Abidemi: Yes. I traveled to Northern Canada, and I lived in an Inuit community for a little while. And there, they eat a lot of different sea animals.
Rory: Right.
Abidemi: For example, whales, what else? They eat caribou as well. Just different animals and I tried a lot of that. And I really liked it. It was good.
Rory: Okay.
Abidemi: It didnât do anything bad to me orâ¦
Rory: Right.
Abidemi: Yeah, I didnât get sick or anything from it.
Rory: And you didnât have a problem with the connection between this animal, the whale, which people have now raised to be like this is so important for our planet?
Abidemi: Personally, no. I didnât. I think â I donât want to say Iâm being selfish but to me, if youâre doing it for â not to sell, not for commercialization, and for these people, for those people, the Inuits, itâs their way of living. Itâs their way of surviving.
Rory: Right.
Abidemi: So I didnât have any problems with that.
So I think maybe in general, too. Thatâs where that philosophy before was if somebody else is eating it, and itâs okay, Iâll try it. Why not?
Rory: Okay.
Abidemi: So I donât know.
Rory: Iâve never tried anything like that but if I seeâ¦
When I traveled in Southeast Asia, I did try some insects.
Abidemi: Okay.
Rory: And they looked terrible, and itâs really hard to get your mind around the fact youâre going to eat it. When you eat it, it doesnât â I mean, it tastes okay.
Abidemi: Okay.
Rory: They normally cook that maybe candied, served a little bit salt or a little bit salty.
Abidemi: Oh. All right.
Rory: So they taste okay. But your eyes continue to tell your brain that thereâs something wrong.
Abidemi: Okay. Okay. Do you think you would try it again?
Rory: I think I would. I think the future is insects.
Abidemi: Okay. The future is insects. Thatâs funny.
Rory: Yeah.
Abidemi: Itâs funny, in Nigeria, we used to, when I was a kid, we would â I donât know what you call them. They were like â I donât want to say termites â Iâm not sure. But they were flying. A certain type of flying insects that will come at a certain time of the year and they were only there maybe for two or three weeks. And we will just catch them and fry them. Just salted and fried. It was really good.
Rory: Yeah.
Abidemi: And back then to me, it wasnât anything strange. It was just like nice.
Rory: Right.
Abidemi: I would think that I would like to try it again because it was just so good, just from my memories. But I donât know I might hesitate now to eat it.
Rory: Yeah. I think people can quickly become use to strange foods.
Abidemi: Okay.
Rory: So like nobody ate raw fish in England, say, 25 years ago. But with Japanese food becoming more popular, now itâs perfectly acceptable. Lots of people like to eat like raw, raw fish.
Abidemi: Okay. Okay. I think, if you say, if you say something itâs healthy, it can quickly gain in popularity.
Rory: Yeah. Yeah.