September 28 - Wangfujing Night Market

WARNING: The following blog entry should probably be read on an empty stomach.

My apologies for not updating in a past few days. Right now over here we're in the middle of an unexpected vacation week as a result of National Day Celebrations,. Thus, I've been trying to make the most of these past few days to see the main sights that the city has to offer, and have been going everywhere by foot and subway. 

While I visited several other places earlier in the day this past Sunday, I thought that you'd all be most interested by the market I visited that particular evening with some friends....and by interested, I mean possibly nauseated. You see, the Wangfujing Night Market is probably most famous for some of the snacks you can purchase here, and I'm not talking about cotton candy or fried dough here, as you can see for yourself.

The taste sensations on the far right are cicadas, while the fat little guys next to them are none other than silkworms.

Of course, no night market would be complete without scorpion-on-a-stick, some of whom were wiggling before they were plopped into the fryer. 

A nice, blurry close-up of cicada, just for you!

You're not imagining it. Those are indeed grasshoppers.

Now, you're all probably thinking to yourself, "There's no way on God's green earth that any of those so-called treats can taste any better than a mouthful of garbage." 

Well, actually you'd be quite surprised....when it comes to a few of the snacks that I consumed, at least. A few others though unfortunately tasted exactly as they looked, AKA not all that enjoyable.

The scorpions actually were one of my favorites, but that was because they really had no unique taste to them, other than fried crunchiness. 

Silkworms on the other hand were....er....well, a bit chewy on the outside and a tad gooey on the inside, which when combined formed a taste sensation that gradually grew more unbearable every moment longer it was inside your mouth. We're not talking about two thumbs down here, this is more like, twenty thumbs down at the very least.

The cicadas were another surprise, as despite their less-than-appetizing appearance, they had no flavor, really. Like the scorpions, it was kind of like eating the skin of fried chicken except without any taste to it. 

Now, if the scorpions or cicadas did have any flavor to them, chances are they'd taste like sea horse, which was crispy, yet had an unsettling salty aftertaste. 

If a fried cicada and a silkworm on a stick were somehow able to have a child, I think it would be the grasshopper pictured above, which was half-crunchy tastelessness, half sadness in my mouth. The softer back half we deemed "the flavor sack" which was more or less a euphemism for the nasty assault it gave our unsuspecting taste buds. 

The squid was  hands down the best thing there, due to the fact that it was the sole item on the menu that actually had a good taste.

The squid's undersea buddy the starfish on the other hand was....well, like woe and misery in my mouth. It's as if they just fished five of the most vile-tasting rocks from the sea, glued them together, then sprinkled them with bread crumbs (or sand, most likely). Strongly not recommended for anyone who doesn't enjoy torturing themselves. 

This was a particularly interesting dish - some type of tiny bird, like maybe a sparrow, or something of that sort. To use a well-worn phrase, it tastes like chicken (but very gamey chicken, with bones so frail and brittle that they get ground to nothing in your teeth.)

You've probably all heard of tofu, but have any of you ever heard of stinky tofu? Yes, supposedly that is it's true English name, and according to a friend, it's a big deal in Taiwan. It tastes exactly like tofu....but smells like the devil himself. First time around sharing a stick of the stuff, we each had a mouthful and found that this entree was just fine if you didn't breath in through your nose. But if you did, like I tried....

....Need I say more? Well, maybe, because that picture's pretty darn blurry. Okay, long story short, I wasn't a very happy camper. 

Fortunately, we were able to purge our taste buds with a combination of coconut juice (they literally just stuck a straw inside a small coconut), and candied fruit. The green stuff pictured above is simply grapes, which were a nice change from the trash that we had been filling our stomachs with. The little red apple-like things on the other hand were....well, okay, at best, save the several large seeds inside every one of them. 

Fortunately, it's been four days since I've been there, and as of now I have not had any pressing need to go to the hospital down the street. I assure you all, my digestive system and I are doing just fine. 

And don't worry....I'm not going to have any midnight cravings for silkworm anytime soon.