Ongoing Tofu flashbacks

Trying new food, for me, is a personal game. I look for places with no tourists, only locals. Sometimes, the dirtier, the better. I used to say I wanted to eat where the “rats eat.” Writing this now, I realize how disgusting that sounds, but I promise it’s funny in Portuguese, especially when I say it to my parents. My mom completely freaks out every time, which honestly just makes it better.

I could try to explain the phrase, but maybe it’s best not to. The point is simple: I want real food. Local food. Cheap food. The kind of place where everyone eats and nothing is adjusted to please a tourist’s palate.

Honestly, Sam was fully like this before July 2023. Before I got really sick in Colombia, lost twelve pounds in five days, and ended up in the emergency room. I learned my lesson… sort of. I didn’t stop playing my food game, I just became a little more selective about where I play it.

Before that experience, I would eat literally anything. Scorpions, chicken hearts, rabbit, crocodile meat, thousand-year-old eggs, grasshoppers, and even Spam. Sadly, I still haven’t tried some of the truly extreme things we see on TV, like eyeballs, kashk, or Icelandic hákarl, but I’m open to it.

China, though, is hands down the best place to claim you’ve eaten unusual food.I still have flashbacks of the moment I tried the infamous Stinky Tofu!

As soon as we arrived, I already had a list of things I wanted to try, duck, insects, whatever I could find. And about insects, let me say this to anyone who’s afraid: if they’re fried, just try them. They don’t taste bad at all. Honestly, they taste like nothing. Just fried dough with salt.

When we got to Shanghai, our tour guide told us we had to visit a flea market for local food. That’s when I got really excited. I knew this was where I’d find the kind of food I’m always searching for. Maybe I’d even see a rat or two running around in the back. (Sorry for that image again, it’s funny at this point.)

The market had everything: frogs on sticks, fish on sticks, fish parts on sticks. But one stall stood out. There was a long line, and everyone waiting looked local. Most of them were young women, dressed impeccably, like those Asian girls you see on TikTok with flawless makeup.

I looked up to see what everyone was lining up for. All I could see was a huge pot and a frying pan. Nothing else. I waited, curious, and finally saw the girl at the front leave with a bowl of black, square-shaped puffs covered in sauce and topped with something green and cute.

I couldn’t read the sign, of course, so I got in line. When it was my turn, I asked what it was.

“Stinky tofu.”

Stinky? Like… smells bad? I understood tofu. That made sense. But how do you make tofu stinky?

I ordered it.

They dropped five big squares of tofu into the fryer until they turned almost completely black. I’d had fried tofu before, dark, crispy, delicious, and it never smelled bad. Then they opened the giant pot, scooped out a thick liquid, and dumped it all over the tofu.

The smell hit me instantly. That’s when I understood the name.

Out of our group of twelve, I was the only one brave, or stupid, enough to order it. I took one bite, and my entire life flashed before my eyes. You know those movie scenes where someone is about to die and

suddenly remembers everything? That’s exactly what it felt like.

Crocodile meat, thousand-year-old eggs, scorpions, nothing came close to this.

It tasted like opening one of those sewer lids in New York City, the ones steaming in the middle of winter, climbing down inside with your mouth open, and swallowing whatever warm, fermented liquid and mystery chunks were sloshing around at the bottom. Not just one gulp, but a mouthful you can’t immediately spit out.

The smell alone was enough to confuse my brain. My tongue registered rot. My nose registered something dead. My stomach immediately sent an emergency alert to the rest of my body. I chewed once, once, and that was already too much. The texture was spongy, slimy, and somehow gritty at the same time, like a soaked kitchen sponge that had been marinating in garbage water for days.

I’m sorry for being this graphic, but just writing this makes my throat tighten and my stomach flip. It was the nastiest thing I have ever put in my mouth. Not the scorpion, not the thousand-year-old egg, not the crocodile meat, nothing even came close. Almost five years later, I can still remember the exact taste, like it permanently branded itself onto my tongue.

And all I could think was: why? Why do beautiful, well-dressed Chinese girls line up for this? What am I missing? Is this an acquired taste, or is this some kind of collective prank I accidentally volunteered for?

Stinky tofu now sits firmly at the top of my list of the weirdest foods I’ve ever tried, and to this day, it’s the only one I couldn’t even swallow.

I guess every adventure traveler has a limit. Turns out, mine is fermented tofu that smells like sewage.

the smile before the disaster

had to get some fruit after to disguise the stinky tofu lingering taste (it didn't work haha)