The Year of Eating Dangerously - Soft-shell crabs

The Year of Eating Dangerously: A Global Adventure in Search of Culinary Extremes

By Tom Parker Bowles

374 pages, St. Martin’s Press, 2007 (Ebury, 2006)

The year was 2008. I was just starting to be more seriously interested in food. While browsing in a bookstore, I glimpsed this book on the discount table (sorry, Mr. Parker Bowles) and bought it, as I often do, on impulse. I emerged from reading it a more erudite person; but would that still be the case today?

British food writer Tom Parker Bowles’ The Year of Eating Dangerously chronicles his adventures as he travels the world with a twofold goal: to see how local food cultures are standing up to globalization, and to try dishes that, while commonplace in some regions, strike the Western imagination as strange or repulsive.

Flipping through the book now, five years my first reading, I found myself wondering which has changed more in that time: food culture, or me?

I’ve certainly changed since those days, at least as far as my knowledge of food is concerned. Back then, like Socrates (and Jon Snow), I knew nothing. I hadn’t read much on the topic, and we didn’t have cable, so The Food Network was not a procrastination option (quite fortunately, because I doubt I would ever have finished my dissertation otherwise). Today, I still don’t know much, but I know a bit more. I read whatever I have time for, including current articles. We still don’t have cable, but I read from people who do, and who keep me informed. While I’m still usually late to the party, I get there eventually.

But food culture has changed a lot, too. It strikes me that Parker Bowles was part of a global movement that denoted a growing Western fascination with so-called exotic cuisines. Right around the time his book came out, the Travel Channel was beginning to air shows like Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations and Andrew Zimmerns’ Bizarre Foods, shows that took us to parts and meals unknown. There were also shows like Man v. Food, a symptom of our budding interest in extreme food and how much of it we could handle – another trait of this feast-filled book.

What I am trying to get at is that The Year of Eating Dangerously was a product of its time, and I am not sure such a book would be as relevant today as it was then. Five years later, few of us doubt that local food cultures are thriving when you bother to seek them out. Yes, bad fusion and fast food are rampant, and authenticity is often lost where tourists abound, but tradition is also fiercely preserved in smaller bastions. We know this thanks to shows like No Reservations, and books like this one, which demonstrate that good, authentic cuisines are still to be found. We’ve also come around to the idea that offal and bugs are perfectly acceptable meals in themselves, and it is only our perception of them that makes us reluctant to eat them.

Similarly, I wondered whether I would get as much out of The Year of Eating Dangerously if I were to discover it today. But that may be precisely because it taught me quite a bit five years ago. As things were, with me being a relative novice, this book and I found each other at just the right time.

Because Parker Bowles’ twofold mandate is so wide in scope, it gives him reasons to travel pretty much anywhere – and he does. Among other things, he chokes down chicken feet and stinky tofu in Shanghai, acts as a judge in a barbecue competition in Nashville, feasts on fugu in Tokyo, explores a chilli festival in Albuquerque, tastes dog meat in Korea and eats live shrimp in Laos. Most of it makes for very entertaining reading, as Parker Bowles reveals himself to be an engaging narrator. His self-deprecating humour erases any fear you might have that he could be trying to emulate Anthony Bourdain: rather than position himself as an intrepid explorer, he dwells on his various misadventures, such as being forced to eat tripe in Sicily with a hangover, or foolishly choosing to consume chilli extract in New Mexico. He embraces his lack of cool, which endears him to us.

Ultimately, even though food culture and knowledge have evolved considerably in recent years, Parker Bowles still manages to convey information from which even accomplished foodies can benefit. I might not give this book to a foodie friend today, but I find myself still quoting bits of it in conversations. We learn about the history of fugu, the many nuances of chili and barbecue, the dangers of fishing for percebes (barnacles) in Spain, and much more. Its erudition makes this book still relevant today. At the same time, it never feels like you’re plodding your way through pages of information that have been dumped on you; instead, the information feels like a part of the narrative. Which ultimately makes this book a good gift for non-foodie friends who want to share your interests.

For today’s recipe, rather than simply make one of the more accessible dishes mentioned in the book, such as chili, I thought I would tackle one of my own food phobias. Not offal, because to be honest I’ve never really been afraid of offal. Not chicken feet, because… well, baby steps. So instead I tried out this recipe for soft-shell crab that was published in The New York Times a couple of weeks ago. This may not seem like much of a taboo-breaker, especially since I’ve eaten crab and lobster often. However, I had never prepared whole crabs before, and I tend to get squeamish about creatures that have more than four legs, so eating an entire soft-shell crab, legs and all, seemed like a sufficient challenge.

The crabs were simply broiled and served on toast, with a lemon-parsley sauce (I skipped the jalapeno because I wanted to season my toddler’s pasta with the sauce). In the end, the legs weren’t so much of a problem, but something about the flavour bothered me. There was an acrid aftertaste that my husband noticed as well. It’s likely that I overcooked the crab. And for some reason, the toddler, who is the least picky child I have ever seen and normally loves sour things, absolutely refused to eat his pasta. So the meal wasn’t a big hit with anyone. Still, they look pretty, don’t they?