Culinary Delights: Part I

One thing I love about living in Asia: the food! Prepare your palate because I will be leading us through a series on the culinary delights available here. Because some of the variety proves a bit shocking for the typical Western taste bud, I thought I'd start with something fairly tame: fruit! I love the varieties of fruit around here, and most of it is SO cheap compared to America. (Of course, in the tropical climate of my favorite place to vacation - Thailand - it's better, more varied and cheaper still!)

Shots from our local market where I buy fruits and veggies on the top floor. I think the fruit vendor was kind of honored when I told her I wanted to take pictures of her fruit to share with my friends and family in America. On the far left are delicious mangoes and a little to the right are some leeches wrapped in plastic. Archie loves the Elizabeth Melon in the basket at the top.

This is a mountain bamboo fruit. As far as I can tell, it has nothing to do with bamboo, though. It's really sweet and really good. The white part is for eating, the rest is skin and shell.

This gui yuan is a winter fruit. In my hand is from left to right is the fruit meat, the seed and the skin. It tastes like a grape only sweeter. Although it's trouble separating the fruit from the skin and seed, it's worth it!