<p>hot dogs with mashed potatoes shrimp and ketchup
pickled beets mixed with whipped cream… this is supposed to be a salad
scallop-type potatoes with herring</p>
<p>served in the land of Lutefisk ;)</p>
<p>also putrified shark meat…" ripened" for about 6 months and reportedly gives off a strong ammonia smell …yum. Saw that in Iceland</p>
<p>My son liked the fruit bat soup when we were in Palau. Except for the little tiny bones, which he said were even more annoying than the little bones in salmon. You’ll notice I did not try it.</p>
<p>Amazingly, this is the same child who had to be bribed–I paid him a dollar–to try a chocolate milkshake when he was three.</p>
<p>BunsenBurner–hee on the Lutefisk! Are you of Swedish background? We are & I recently took my parents to a Swedish festival – lutefisk and other marinated fish (um…yucky).
It made it clear to me why Scandinavian cuisine never caught on like Italian – no “PaPa Sven’s” on the corner w/marinated herring & lingonberries to go…</p>
<p>Edit: lje62–funny, I saw a pickled beet salad similar to what you described at the same festival where you could get the famous lutefisk…</p>
<p>Jolynn Smyth, my husband is from Sweden , so I have been exposed to some of their food on visits. It is not my favorite cuisine. Have you ever had a smorgastorta ? I have a picture of me about to eat it and the expression on my face is all telling.
I can describe it as yellow ( or even lemon ) cake , layered with lettuce,tomato, mayonnaise and fish.
I am pretty open o trying new foods, but I would have to say that the food over there has some weird combinations
I swear that my MIL fixes the same dinner every night</p>
<p>Scualum—I LOVE fish head soup. Also LOVE fried sweet shrimp heads.
whenever I order either of these, my husband sings under his breath…“fish heads, fish heads, yummy yummy fish heads, fish heads fish heads…eatum up yum…” An old Dr Demento classic song.
Worst thing Ive ever ordered was in France.
Tete de veaux is not veal as I imagined, but is what can be politely called “head cheese”. I had to eat it since the chef was so sweet and enthusiastic. ughh</p>
<p>lje62–no offense to my ancestors/relatives but, literally, I’ve never tried a single Swedish food that I liked. That’s okay, I’m sure the culture has many other positives…just not cuisine! LOL at the yellow, mayo-fish cake. Neat that you went to Sweden w/your hub–my parents have been; I’d like to go someday.</p>
<p>I looked up a couple dishes online, and have to say Spotted Dick might still get my vote-- aside from the fact that I have a juvenile sense of humor, it just looks pretty awful.
Bats (around here, at least) make me think of rabies, so anything with Bat in the title isn’t going to sound too tempting either.</p>
<p>No way has anyone beat the opening of bluefish marsala. I happen to like bluefish, but it does require some skill with preparation and recipes. A combination with Marsala really sounds disgusting.</p>
<p>Fruit Bat Soup: Oh no, not Stellaluna!!</p>
<p>IMO, the Fruit Bat Soup is still the winner. 
</p>
<p>I actually do not know what my full cultural background really is. It is very, very mixed, and there are some Scandinavians among my ancestors. One of my grandfathers was Ukrainian, so as a child I have been exposed to a lot of dishes with bacon and onions as the main ingredients. Yuck. No wonder I consider pickled herring and the beet salad described by lje tasty. How about a dish combining the two? Imagine layers of herring, onions, carrots, hard-boiled egg and pickled beets topped with mayo. It is a Russian dish called “shuba” which means “fur coat”. It was on the menu at many restaurants in Saint Petersburg.</p>
<p>Jay Leno’s “Headlines” segment sometimes features funny menu items. One time someone sent him a menu featuring a “Poo Thong”. :D</p>
<p>From the dorm menu at the UW (Seattle) back in the day: Dutch Babies. I was too frightened to even ask! Remember the sick “baby in the blender” jokes …</p>
<p>In Peru, the delicacy is … hamsters. Not much meat on those critters, just like there isn’t on the pigeons that they love in Egypt. In Bhutan, the “national dish” is red hot chile peppers in cheese sauce. Yep, that’s it.</p>
<p>“Steak, done to your likeness”</p>
<p>I’ll take mine rare today; I have a bit of a sunburn.</p>
<p>Okay…not for the weak stomachs
[The</a> Sneeze - Half zine. Half blog. Half not good with fractions.](<a href=“The Sneeze - Half zine. Half blog. Half not good with fractions.”>The Sneeze - Half zine. Half blog. Half not good with fractions.)</p>
<p>? Peru, hamsters? I thought it was guinea pigs.</p>
<p>Before any Palauans take offense, I should add how much I enjoyed everything else on the menu (s) there. Wonderful meals of fresh tropical fruit, crab with coconut milk and the like. But I’m glad you all enjoyed your vicarious taste of fruit bat soup.</p>
<p>Not on a menu, but offered to me by Filipino friends: [url=<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balut]Balut[/url”>Balut - Wikipedia]Balut[/url</a>]. I’m a pretty adventurous eater, but I just couldn’t try it.</p>
<p>No offense to anyone’s culture – but, hamsters? balut? yikes. I won’t even eat most regular food…this is really mind-expanding. I guess it depends what you grew up with…</p>
<p>On the street in Taiwan, we ate (unbeknownst to us) fried lard (seriously). It was very crunchy but wouldn’t repeat it.</p>
<p>We have also had hot gizzards over lettuce (tasted good after a 20+ hour train ride to Paris) and Bombay Duck (deep fried FISH–was actually good but had no connection to duck that we could discern).</p>
<p>Second the lutefisk. My dad was of Norwegian ancestry and every couple of years, he’d fix it for him and my aunt. No one else would touch it. </p>
<p>When I was teaching and we talked about food. I always asked the students to come up with a French meal that would gross out an American and a typical American meal that would gross out a French person (read almost any European). The favorite was peanut butter & concord grape jelly on Wonder Bread, served with green jello cubes + Cool Whip, Fritos, and a big glass of cold milk. Sometimes Velveeta and various colored sweet drinks (Hi-C, blue Kool Aid) were added.</p>
<p>lje, I love that someone else here is a Sneeze fan.</p>
<p>I have no idea how the Norwegians and Scots thought that inventing things like lutefisk and haggis was a good idea.</p>