Would you eat?

[Sol Invictus]

Since casu marzu seems to be on every "most disgusting food in the world" list I ever read, I wonder how they ever got the idea to make it in first place

There is this cheese that is made by leaving out cottage cheese for few days, so it gets dry and covered with white mold. Apparently some people can't stomack the idea of homemade cheese with mold. Now would you eat it?

[loqu]

To us, cheese spread from la vache qui rit (we call it La vaca que ríe) is not considered 'real' cheese, but cheese cream, and it's not with other kinds of cheese in the supermarket lines but on the 'cheese derivated' line, with cheese meltable slices and triangles.

Our prices are, for the cream, 1,60 € the 150 g tray (10,60 € / kg), and 1,79 € the box with 16 triangles (7,16 € / kg).

[Hoogstwaarschijnlijk]

To us, cheese spread from la vache qui rit (we call it La vaca que ríe) is not considered 'real' cheese, but cheese cream, and it's not with other kinds of cheese in the supermarket lines but on the 'cheese derivated' line, with cheese meltable slices and triangles.

Our prices are, for the cream, 1,60 € the 150 g tray (10,60 € / kg), and 1,79 € the box with 16 triangles (7,16 € / kg).

Same here.

Prices: 1,28 for 8 triangles (€ 9,14/KG).

[Chekhov]

I've heard of casu marzu and no, I wouldn't eat it. Something about swallowing maggots that might cause internal bleeding just turns me off.

[Hannahanneke]

I love all kinds of cheese: from goat, cow, buffalo milk, soft and hard cheeses, the 'creamcheese',... I just don't get why you should eat cheese containing live insect larvae. It looks very unhealthy and dangerous for your stomach.

Does anyone know btw if cheese is vegetarian? I keep on eating it (i'm a vegetarian), but it's one of these products of which a lot of people disagree.

[Chekhov]

Yeah, of course it is. What it isn't is vegan.

[lama su]

I love all kinds of cheese: from goat, cow, buffalo milk, soft and hard cheeses, the 'creamcheese',... I just don't get why you should eat cheese containing live insect larvae.

well.. I think the reason and origin of this practice is quite easy to explain: my region (but actually every region where people eat cheese + worms) has always been quite poor, milk has always been one of the few things you can produce on the Alps and cheese one of the few and cheapest sources of proteins. In my region, that was the situation until 1950-1960, more or less. I remember that my grandfather told me that when he worked, his lunch was often only bread with cheese with some fruit or chestnut depending on the season.
now it is clear that without refrigerators, it is quite hard to correctly preserve cheeses (especially soft, fresh cheeses), and insect larvae appear quite easily. But cheese was by far too important to throw it away because of some little worm, so people learnt to appreciate them.
they had to, because it was one of the few things they had to eat..

I don't like cheese with worms. That is, I like the that cheese, but I don't like the idea of eating the worms, so in the rare occasions I eat it (today is not so common anymore), I try to remove them. But I remember that seeing me doing that, my grand father (who loved the cheese with the worms) once asked me: "why do you do that? Why do you bother about the worms? they are meat after all..."
and he was right, after all..
he was right, but I still don't eat the worms..

[Hunef]

Does anyone know btw if cheese is vegetarian?

No, it's not.

well.. I think the reason and origin of this practice is quite easy to explain: my region (but actually every region where people eat cheese + worms)

So you have worm cheese too in the Alps?

has always been quite poor, milk has always been one of the few things you can produce on the Alps and cheese one of the few and cheapest sources of proteins.

Milk is traditionally the only farm product you could produce where I live too, but we have nothing like worm cheese. The point with chese is that is doesn't get spoil unlike raw milk.

In my region, that was the situation until 1950-1960, more or less. I remember that my grandfather told me that when he worked, his lunch was often only bread with cheese with some fruit or chestnut depending on the season.

That's still the situation in Norway even though they're the second richest country in the world after Luxury Bourg.

now it is clear that without refrigerators, it is quite hard to correctly preserve cheeses (especially soft, fresh cheeses), and insect larvae appear quite easily.

I'm sure they routinely used root cellars back then. In that way you can keep standard refrigerator temperature.

[Chekhov]

Millions of lacto-ovo vegetarians would disagree.

[Hunef]

Millions of lacto-ovo vegetarians would disagree.

But then they're wrong.

[Chekhov]

Why?

[lama su]

well.. I think the reason and origin of this practice is quite easy to explain: my region (but actually every region where people eat cheese + worms)

So you have worm cheese too in the Alps?

yes, in the southern, italian speaking part of switzerland we have it. But the cheese is different from the sardinian one.

now it is clear that without refrigerators, it is quite hard to correctly preserve cheeses (especially soft, fresh cheeses), and insect larvae appear quite easily.

I'm sure they routinely used root cellars back then. In that way you can keep standard refrigerator temperature.

yes, we had and have root cellars, and they work fine for hard cheeses, but they are not enough for soft cheese like this: http://www.capra-contenta.net/buscion-i.htm

This is a kind of cheese typical of my region (very easy to produce) and this is the cheese which generally has the worms. It is so fresh and so soft that even today, with the refrigerators, it's impossible to preserve it too long. Especially during the summer, which can be relatively hot here.

[hlysnan]

Millions of lacto-ovo vegetarians would disagree.

But then they're wrong.

Nearly all vegetarians are lacto-ovo vegetarians. Only a relatively small minority are actually vegan.

[Hunef]

Nearly all vegetarians are lacto-ovo vegetarians.

This reminds me of Björk's answer to the question "Are you a vegetarian?":

"Sort of, I mean, I eat meat."

(Source.)

[Chekhov]

That's some nice equivocating.

[Qwertzuiop]

This is called Kutteln (which are served with fried potatoes, a typical German sidedish on this picture). Before it is prepared it looks like this:



Guess what it is made of? Would you eat it?

[hlysnan]

I actually don't think it's that weird. I know a lot of people who like it, but I don't like it myself.

[Sol Invictus]

No, for the same reason why I always hope that sausage skins are artifical

As for casu marzu - while not throwing it out to save food makes sense, it dosen't explain why on earth they eat the worms, rather than get rid of them first.

Does this topic make anyone else wonder how come there are so few weird/disgusting items in your local cuisine?

[Chekhov]

Clearly some kind of organ meat but I don't know what. The pancreas? Either way, I wouldn't eat it.

Canadian food doesn't have gross dishes so much as bland ones. It's high in fat and sugar and carbs, not exactly a health regimen.

[Lenguas]

Does this topic make anyone else wonder how come there are so few weird/disgusting items in your local cuisine?

We don't have a local cuisine here in America. It's just all the world cuisines (sometimes blended in delicious ways. For instance kung pao spaghetti is a uniquely American dish.) minus what we consider gross.