For the Love of Durians
Those who have been to the Southeast Asia region may know the one thing that is popular among us Southeast Asians: the durian. It is crowned the ‘King of Fruits.’ For those who are not familiar with Southeast Asians, please refer to the picture below.
Many non-Southeast Asians despise the fruit for its strong smell and awful taste. In fact, the fruit is banned from being present in many forms of public transportation and hotels for just being too smelly. I have come to develop an interest in watching and observing non-Southeast Asians eating this glorified fruit of the Southeast region, and here is the list of words or phrases they use to describe the taste of the fruit. (Disclaimer: this is for fun and I have no intention of hurting anyone or anything, it is a mere casual observation)
· Trash that’s been under a heat lamp
· Smells so good
· Smells like mango and pineapple
· Salads that have been in the fridge for too long
· Smells like feet, gasoline and vagina
· It has a weird texture
· In between delicious and disgusting
· That’s not good
· It’s not bad
· Tastes like onion
· That’s not great
· Oh my God
· It’s really good
· It tastes good and then it tastes like garbage, literal garbage
· Like carrot
· Popcorn
· Yogurt
· Kinda tastes like chicken
· Almost like sweet potato, carrot but not a carrot, egg salad, almost garlicky
(Credit to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgzsUWPrf_s)
To us Southeast Asians, Malaysians specifically, we find the durians a delicacy. It’s not an exaggeration to say we craze over durians so much that we pay a lot of money just to eat them like a buffet. The word ‘duri’ from durian means ‘thorn’ in Malay, thus the name and appearance of the peculiar fruit. When the season comes for the trees to bear fruit, we stop by stalls that sell them for an outstanding price, up to RM 25 per kilo. However, recently the price has dropped, probably due to the abundance of the fruit and low demands. As a child, my father once brought a sack of durians for the whole family to enjoy and indeed, we enjoyed it very much. Other than eating it by itself, we also make a dish out of it. One particular dipping sauce or condiment is the tempoyak, which is the flesh of durian fermented with salt and green chillies. We eat it with rice and other dishes generally called lauk. We also cook the flowers with green chillies and eat it with rice, something I haven’t had the chance of trying. Durian is a part of a lot of Malaysians’ childhoods, and I am very glad to know that some people who are not familiar with the fruit claim that it is a part of a culture so they do not insult the fruit. I give my full respect to these people. What I know is Jessica Chastain really likes this fruit. She brought one to Jimmy Kimmel Live and had him try the fruit.
If you have tried the durian, share your experience. I would love to know what you think of the bleu cheese of fruit.
