Dining with Death- Wk. 1

Recently I watched a show titled ' Dining with Death' on the travel channel.  The show described the potentially fatal foods that are ingested by people all across the world on a regular basis. The episodes I watched were mostly concerned with people located in Southeast Asia (Philippines), East Asia (Japan), and south Asia (India). People in these areas were eating things like rats, crocodiles, live octopi, sea urchins, and komodo dragons! All of these foods have been known to cause numerous human deaths whether it is in the hunt for the animal or the actual eating it. While some of these things were eaten on a regular basis others were considered rare delicacies.

                In class we discussed food cultures as its own entity, However I believe that food is a signifying element of cultures and differentiates it from other cultures.  The information presented in this show echoes this idea.  The practices of capturing and preparing these possibly deadly meals were often passed down from generation to generation, and very tradition based, making them even more distinct cultural foods because they are unique to every population of people (that chooses to eat it). Also the ingesting of these peculiar food items sometimes reflected the culture’s religious, supernatural, and superstitious beliefs, for example in one small village they believed that the intake of poisonous centipedes (although first diluted in alcohol for a week; creates antivenom) had healing and beneficial medical properties(it did contain beneficial minerals and vitamins!).  I think that food is a signifying and potent part of cultures because what may be considered a delicacy in one country/culture could be considered grotesque and avoidable at all cost in a different culture/country.  Our environment and upbringing can effect what we see as edible and nutritious. Our own food culture(s) definitely plays a part in the way we view other food cultures.  

Dining with Death was an interesting show, which allowed its viewers to momentarily view the maybe odd or peculiar food practices used around the world that they might not have been able to see otherwise.