Disgusting food I eat, enjoyably so

9.33pm local time / 15°C (59°F) at 91% relative humidity

SOME OF YOU have a penchant for being nosey knowing what my meals are like.

As a glutton — err, I mean — foodie, I can relate to why you’d be interested.

Truth is, I eat and drink anything under the sun.

One of the more brain-damaged aspects about me is that I really enjoy that almost-mediaeval English partiality to boiled meats.

“Eeew! Boiled meats?! What the—?” you say with face a-grimacing and your actual body recoiling back in disgust and horror.

Obviously I’m not going to just eat disintegrating pieces of bland, tasteless body parts floating half-dead in tepid water. Eeew, that’s absolutely revolting…

No, my boiled meats are stewed in flavourful broth and dipped in savoury sauce before being gobbled.

As the pictures below will show.

Last night’s dinner. TV remotes not part of the gig.

I only managed to retrieve these photos from the memory card just now because my camera went on the fritz the day before.

Pork on the bone, carrots and ‘snow ear’ (雪耳 shuet yee), all cooked in pork broth.

The vino tinto de España isn’t visible because I woz drinkin’ it.

Mediaeval fare in a modern world.

Too bad I couldn’t retrieve the shuet yee picture for you.

(‘Shuet’ is pronounced in Cantonese like the German word ‘schüt’. The Mandarin name for snow ear is xuě ěr.)

Shuet yee is a kind of edible Chinese fungus often used in soups. It’s semi-transparent, slightly yellowish in colour, and resembles those really wide rubberbands that post offices use on parcels, but more wrinkly and more delicate. Its English common names are snow fungus, silver ear fungus or white jelly mushroom. The scientific name is Tremella fuciformis.

Shuet yee itself is tasteless and odorless, but it brings out the flavour of everything it touches. It looks a lot like that stuff called bird’s nest (which are in fact congealed bird saliva — but that’s another stomach-churning story).

The dip makes all the difference.

The dipping sauce was made from soy sauce, a teaspoon or two of sesame oil, and a liberal lacing of white pepper powder (the kind you use in salt and pepper shakers). Done!

Before you pump a couple of shotgun rounds into your local grocer for not stocking sesame oil, you can replace it with any other kind of vegetable oil (but not olive oil). Just cook your replacement vegetable oil for a few minutes on low heat, bring to hot (not boiling) — done!

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SOY SAUCE TRIVIA

The common (or generic) name for soy sauce is si yau (豉油) in Cantonese, jiàng yóu (醬油) in Mandarin, or shōyu in Japanese. There are two types — know the difference, or your meal’s a goner.

1. That light (or ‘fresh’) soy sauce is called saang chau (生抽) in Cantonese, or jiàng ch’ing (酱清) in Mandarin. This is the ‘brewed’ (i.e. original) soy sauce made directly from soybeans. Saang chau is used for seasoning because of its saltier taste and less noticeable colour (lighter brown).

2. That really dark-coloured soy sauce (sometimes seen in big bottles) is called lo chau (老抽 : ‘old sauce’) in Cantonese, or lǎo chōu in Mandarin. This is ‘blended’ soy sauce made from the first type, with caramel and molasses added so it’s slightly thicker, slightly sweeter and less salty in flavour. Lo chau is used for cooking to obtain ‘colour.’

If you’re not thoroughly confused by now, just skip the hassle of figuring out which is which and buy the Kikkoman brand from Japan. You’re always safe with Kikkoman because it’s chiefly for seasoning but good as well for cooking.

Caution: If you have coeliac disease or are gluten-intolerant, stick to Chinese soy sauce. Japanese soy sauce is 50% wheat-containing (the Chinese version contains much less).

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TASTE TRIVIA

Know the basic taste sensations?

Bitterness, saltiness, sourness, sweetness, umami, piquance, astringency and fattiness (eight in all).

Come again?

Umami (旨味) is the scientific term (from Japanese) for that pleasant savoury taste usually associated with meat. Umami was identified in 1908 by Japanese chemist Kikunae Ikeda (discoverer of monosodium glutamate). Soy sauce is the prime example of umami taste.

Piquance (raciness or spiciness or hot spicy) is a traditional Asian basic taste — and it makes sense because the ‘traditional’ four-taste theory got stuck for a long time trying to explain piquance.

Astringency (tartness) is a traditional Indian basic taste specification. That’s the dry, puckering mouthfeel we get from young red wines, tea, vinegar and tannin-containing fruits such as sloe berries (a kind of plum), quince (cousin to the apple and pear), persimmon and banana skins.

The tongue taste map is a myth and complete bollocks. Different regions of the tongue DON’T specialise in different tastes. In fact all taste sensations come from all regions of the tongue. And you’d know this to be true if you ever did histology.

The whole myth (that is, a small number of ‘basic tastes’ giving rise to numerous complex tastes) ultimately came from some moron(s) treating taste like primary colours (that is, three or four light wavelengths combining to form a spectrum of colours). And people still believe in this taste-map nonsense, and it’s still being taught in school. It’s so completely bollocks. Srsly.

(Truth is, the tongue-taste map myth was political propaganda. Around the time of the First World War, governments propagated the myth in order to reserve meat and other foodstuffs while trying to avoid all-out civilian rationing. The spiel was that, since all other tastes came from just four tastes, there’s no need to have ‘rich’ foods and one could just mix and match basic flavours to achieve the desired taste. It’s the same story with the drinking hours in the United Kingdom.)

Fact is, 75 years’ worth of food and health research have shown there are more than four or five ‘basic’ taste sensations. There is some evidence for a sixth basic taste that senses fatty substances.

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Yes, yes, yes, I know you’re wondering about that since the first picture.

Relax, it’s a pig’s tail.

No, it’s not the outcome of a kitchen accident.

Hey, c’mon, peep’l, we have oxtail and stuff, so why not pig’s tail? I mean, there’s pig’s tail, horsemeat, catmeat and animal skin in our McBongo burgers, and we don’t complain.

I must admit it would make a darn good prank on the uninitiated.

© The Naked Listener’s Weblog, 2012. All photos by me. Kikkoman soy sauce via Wikipedia.