Vacation Food & Taboo Meals

When abroad, one should try different dishes right ? At last, my parents always told me to taste a bit of something new. I raise my kids like that as well, although I do have my own "taboo foods". Aligators, turtles, dogs, snakes, ants and a lot of things are in my list. Snails at well. Hubby is a snail lover, especially when we are in France. Topped with garlic and butter.  My oldest son, apparently, is developing the same taste for molluscs.

If you follow this blog for a while you know I love Mediterranean food. When in Valencia I have at least once per stay enjoy a paella de bogavante (above). Salty, but the best in my opinion.

Yes, I have mentioned here before that this year I have been again in Valencia some while ago. This time with my  whole (extended) Dutch family. After that,  due to sickness in the family I barely had some time to blog about it. During my Wednesdays off I had to bring my mother in law to the hospital, sometimes twice a day, so that se could visit her husband.

My sister-in-law and her husband enjoying their paella, with mushrooms and duck. She is making the very odd Dutch gesture of shaking a hand near your ear (???) to inform she find her meal yummy. This was my fater-in-law  last meal outside home, he passed away just some weeks ago. He was in Valencia already very sick but we didn't know how sick he really was.

Now, back to snails... When I pick some in my back yard and throw it into the canal my son makes an ugly face of disgust. My daughter rans away. He learned my husband loves escargots (the the very big snails) and the rest of his family as well. He thought for a moment and concluded it cannot be wrong eating something with garlic and butter. He has even asked me to cook some snails he had found in the garde since then. I think I would faint already if I had to research how to do that !

They also love Gerit from Sponge Bob (in English it is "Gary", I guess). It is the very silent Bob Sponge's pet. Because I have collected scargot shells for decoration along the years,  they are impressed with the volume of snails my husband has already eaten.  Have a look:

Are you able to see the light brown/white escargot shells in the cornucopia vase above ? I have another couple of vases with plants which are adorned with escargots - it has always caused an impression in my son that his father has eaten up all the contents of those shells...

So my son decided to ask a paella with fish and snails for him, his sister and his nieces. The girls were completely indifferent about it, they were already enjoying bread with ham and manchego cheese. He probably knew the girls would reject the snails and therefore he would ende up eating all of them. My little girl, indeed ate just some spoons of rice and fish.
Now... I have refused ever tasting snails.
NO-WAY Brazilians are going to eat this (but my kids are just half-Brazilians, ha !)
We do not eat exotic food. Protein comes from cows, fish and chickens, that's it.

My son found it very yummy. My little girl did tried some at the end, but she didn't find it special.

My nieces have very limited palate, they do not like even rice... so they ignored the paella completely. After finishing his meal, my son urged me to collect as many snail shells as possible, which I put into a paper napkin and brought to the apartment. There, I have washed them carefully and they brought them to Holland.

 

 

"Proost !"

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Back home, the snail houses adorn a a mini vase with a desert plant in my kitchen.

Lovely !  Hubby and kids are already in France - I will be joining them soon,. You will see in September lots of posts with a French flavor (hopefully I will not be too lazy to take some pics...).

Straight from the sunny Roussillon and the Provence. At least I hope it will still be sunny when I arrive there.

Some markets in Valencia and southwest France here  and here.

They are one of my most popular posts !

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Do you have any taboo foods ???

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Thanks for following my blog !