Sunday, November 05, 2006

Poking out a Pig's Eyeball and Eating It

Suckling Pig

One of the plates in a part of a big Chinese banquet tonight was some roast pork, done up rather nicely with very crispy cuts of skin and fat neatly laid out on a plate (with a little hint of Chinese spices infused into it too). I was pretty happy with this until we were left with only some strange-looking U-shaped piece that remotely resembled a jaw. I dismissed it at first since I didn't think a pig's head would be so small and flat, but when I saw the teeth, I realized that this was the real deal, complete with the same ethereally tasty skin that was on the body.

By the time I peeled and devoured the skin from it, I was left with a rather naked and unattractive skull (OK, half a skull...and it still didn't really look like a pig). I dug into the cheek meat a bit, which turned out nice and tender. By then the only edible thing left was the eyeball. Hmm...I'd never had an eyeball before (not even from a fish). Was I going to try it? Aw, screw it...I'd gone this far already. As grotesque and inhumane as it sounded, I shoved my finger into the skull and poked the eye out of its socket from behind. I hesitated a bit before popping it into my mouth, but down it went.

And it really didn't taste like anything in the end. I was expecting maybe a gelatinous consistency followed by perhaps even a hard inedible glass-like center or something, but it was just like any other part of the meat, all seeming decently "normal." Hmph. It was actually rather boring in the end. As a result, that probably won't be anything that I'll yearn for again, but at least I tried it. And with that, the caveman went back into his abode to rest.

6 comments:

Colin said...

Yeeks... eating fried eyeballs sounds like chinese food nightmare. I'm sticking to my roasted chicken breast rice thanks.

Anonymous said...

omg...i think i just threw up in my mouth.....

Anonymous said...

I've had a fish eyeball once. It sort of pops realeasing a lot of liquid. Then you have a rather thick membrane with a hard chalky thing which I assume is the lens. It doens't taste like much but I would never do it again.

Unknown said...

it looks a bit like a mini dinosaur head.

Anonymous said...

Hi there, great blog you have here.
Btw, Peach Garden (the outlet at OCBC Building? not so great when i had it at Novena) has GREAT roasted pork. I give it 11 out of 10.

(I haven't read all your entries so I'm not sure if you already knew this, but it came to me when I saw your posts on roasted meat)

Anonymous said...

This sounds gross and all but I love fish eyeballs. It's an acquired taste, I guess.