- Our menu today includes raw fat, spiders, stones, and chicken anus.
When you want to chew on something but aren’t really that hungry, you get a snack. But what if you’re tired of the same old chips, popcorn, dried fruit, and whatnot?
Then all you have to do is look outside your local supermarket. The world of snack foods is wide and wonderful — and sometimes pretty bizarre.
Here are 7 snacks from around the world for the peckish and adventurous.
1. Pineapple Sandwich, U.S.
Let’s start with something fairly innocuous. We’d be interested in seeing how the vehement enemies of pineapple pizza react to the pineapple sandwich from Southern U.S.
We’d never heard of this but apparently pineapple sandwiches are a thing. Take two slices of bread, slap some mayo on there, and add canned pineapple rings. Bon appetit.
Look, we can already hear you enraged Southerners grabbing your torches and pitchforks. But listen, we didn’t say the pineapple sandwich is bad — but it is pretty weird.
2. Tuna Eyeballs, Japan
Let’s leave the South to its pineapple sandwiches and waltz our pretty little bodies to Japan, where you can munch down on some tuna eyeballs. Strange as it sounds, having tuna eyes on the menu makes sense.
The Japanese do love tuna, after all, and each fish has two big ol’ eyeballs. It’d be kind of a waste to just throw them away, now doesn’t it?
The tuna eyes are typically served steamed with garlic or soy sauce and lemon. But you can also get them fried, braised, or even in a cocktail called Tuna’s Tears — a mix of the eye’s liquids and soju.
It’s not the most popular snack in Japan, but it’s also not difficult to find, particularly in local traditional bars.
3. Fried Tarantula, Cambodia
If you like eating things with as many legs as possible, head on over to central Cambodia. There, you can purchase a-ping — deep-fried tarantula.
This dish was born out of sad necessity. Food was so scarce during Pol Pot’s reign of terror that the starving Cambodians had to eat whatever they could find, including spiders.
After the nightmare ended, spiders stayed on local menus. These days, though, they’re mainly served to adventurous tourists.
The spider’s legs reportedly don’t have much flavor, but the head and body reportedly contain a lump of delicate meat. Don’t eat the abdomen, though — it’s just full of organs and spider poop.
4. Candied Crabs, Japan
Okay, you want a lot of legs but spiders don’t sound appetizing. Then just catch a flight back to Japan and chow down on candied crabs.
Now, eating crabs isn’t anything weird — we sure love them. But baby crabs covered in a coating of melted sugar?
Yet, that’s what it is. An entire crab — claws and eyes and all — fried and covered in a sweet, slightly spicy coating.
They’re sold in Japanese supermarkets in bags, like potato chips. Weird, but we do kind of want to try it.
5. Salo, Ukraine
You’d better not try salo if you’re on a diet. But why, you ask?
Because it’s fat. Raw, sliced pork fatback.
Salo is eaten practically throughout Eastern Europe, but the Ukrainians have a particular penchant for it. It’s often used in cooking, kind of like bacon or lardons, but it’s also a common snack to have raw with an ice-cold shot of vodka.
6. Chicken Butt, Taiwan
Guess what? Chicken butt. That’s a snack you can get in Taiwan.
Just take some meaty chicken cloacas, stick them on a skewer, and grill them. We haven’t tried them, but they are reportedly pretty dang tasty.
I mean, how bad can grilled chicken be?
So, if you’re visiting Taiwan and happen to see a food cart selling “chicken anus” — it’s not a typo.
7. Fried Pebbles, China
Let’s say you’re ending your snack trip in China and are enjoying a whiskey on the rocks. What kind of snack would you pair with that?
How about literal rocks?
Suo diu is one of the most bizarre snacks in the world. It consists of small smooth river pebbles fried with garlic, chili, and other flavorful spices.
You’re not supposed to actually eat the rocks, though. Just suck the flavor out of them and spit the stone out — or save it for re-use as the Chinese sometimes do.
Some people, particularly older ones, like “eat” suo diu while having a drink. And why not? It’s a Chinese tradition to eat something while drinking, but if you’re just not hungry, suo diu will let you uphold good manners without overstuffing yourself.
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