A story about South American Edibles

An essential part of travelling is using all of the sensations. South America is the perfect continent with this particular sour kind of traveling.

Mostly, odor, as each town assaults the uterus with the acrid odor of ammonia, crap, decomposition and dust. Another continuous assailment is to the ears South Americans enjoy their songs and anybody who has travelled there will testify to the fact that at the end of your journeys you'll never, ever need to hear cumbia (Bolivian folk songs ) again. Touch is another feeling that receives a beating about the buses of Bolivia -- you can compare a trip from state, La Quaica into Tupiza from Bolivia's southwest, to being placed within a maraca within an Argentinian tango series, just with much more dust, and maybe some hens, and surely no toilet...

So that is another sensations covered, the sole remaining sensory experience is in the flavor group, which brings me to the intriguing eatables which may be experienced in South America. In Belen road market in the bizarre Amazon jungle city of Iquitos, I had been fortunate enough to attempt one of Bear Grills' favorite weed snacks, moth larvae. The flavor is nutty, and creamy, and really pretty good, until the mind kicks in and informs you that you're ingesting a bug, which squishy piece is oozy insect intestines, then it requires extreme self control to not throw up it again.

I understood it had been guinea pig, a thing that I had been eager to try as it's among the chief meats eaten in Peru. I didn't understand that if I agreed to test it I'd witness the great lady catching the crying critter (who seemed very like my childhood pets), and afterwards revealing it to usskinned, on a pole. I also didn't understand it could be served with its crying face and outstretched small feet still undamaged, and not-so-delicately ordered on the plate.

Yum.

Another tasty treat on a rod available in the Belen Markets is pig center, which I'm assured is high in iron, also great for you. Yet more, the flavor is rather inoffensive, maybe even (dare I say it) great? Until your mind kicks into action, and informs you exactly what you are gnawing on. The niches in Iquitos include a broad selection of common Peruvian weed edibles that you sample, in case your brain, stomach and taste buds can manage it. The largest battle however is obviously a psychological one, with possible cannabis food including gutted and chopped turtles, pig eyeballs, and everybody's favourite bite, cow nostrils.

Journeying throughout South America there's the broad variety of intriguing fresh fruits and veggies such as acai, jack fruit, star fruit and pepino (to mention a couple ), but possibly among the most fascinating edible plants would be that the Brazilian jambu plant. The leaves of the Amazonian plant possess numbing properties also it's employed in northern Brazil both for its medicinal properties, and its capacity to add something unique to salads and sauces. The plant numbs your tongue and lips as you sip it in the gourd.

A similar effect is reached using the coca leaves which are popular during Bolivia. You place the coca leaves on your cheek, in which they assist with the altitude illness, and numb the back of your neck. Despite common misconception, that they do not result in any mind-alteration, and therefore are a massive part of Bolivian culture -- seem a bit closer in the little old woman selling you that your 100% alpaca jumper and you're going to necessarily observe a permanent cheek bulge and stained teeth that are stained.

And nose. And ears. .