I interrupt my India stories to share a short anecdote. On Saturday night, I ate a chicken foot. After a night out with friends, we stopped for a late night snack at a dim sum restaurant downtown, and enjoyed unidentified dumpling-like objects, noodle soup, and…chicken feet. These particular feet are boiled, or pickled, or something, so that they’ve become a mushy brown foot-like object, still identifiable, but floppy and declawed.
The technique:
-Pick up foot with your chopsticks.
-Insert entire foot into your mouth.
-“Swish” it around your mouth, to enjoy the flavor and take out the little toe bones and cartilage that remain. Remove these.
-Once bones are removed to your liking, swallow and enjoy.
-Repeat with more feet.
Unfortunately for the documentation of the chicken foot experience (and my previously unshaken sense of security), my purse was stolen on the ride home (but not with my big camera, luckily). I was riding on the back of my housemate’s bike, two guys sped up close to us, and snatched my clutch bag, before we even realized what happening. The zipper snapped, and off sped the thieves and the chicken foot photos. But luckily, there are plenty to be found online.