Worm vs. Beast

Posted by Miss Bonnified on January 15, 2010 · 7 Comments 

If you follow me on Twitter, you know that last night was a gathering of * sort of * epic proportions. 7 of us converged in the middle of Ktown to partake in a most peculiar delicacy – LIVE OCTOPUS!

AAAAGGGHHHH!!! * squeal *

If you have no clue what I’m talking about and think I’m weird for freaking out over the things you see when YOU go eat regular sushi, I’m gonna show you a clip of what eating live octopus is.

I’m gonna warn you, this isn’t for the faint of heart.

Actually, that entire friggin movie isn’t for everyone. The movie is “Old Boy” and I desperately wished I could wash out my mind by the end of the movie. I was seriously screaming “WTF??!!! WTF WTF WWWWTTTTFFFF!!!!” as I clutched my head. Yeah…it’s a definite mind f*ck of a movie.

Anyway, back to food. So, from what I understand, I’m supposed to chew like crazy and then swallow. I hear the little suction cups still function and they’ll be sticking themselves on the insides of my cheeks, tongue, whatever they land on. I also understand the octopus won’t look like the movie because it’s supposed to be sliced up in little pieces.

Omfg….I dunno if I could so this…I mean, I joke around about how I like my dead cow carcass cooked rare because I like it half alive and kicking but, dude, I was kidding. I don’t think I could eat steak if it’s still sort of moo-ing on my platter, you know?

After multiple rounds of bekseju and stuffing all manners of deliciously raw but not alive seafood morsels into our faces, we had sufficiently hyped ourselves up enough to try this live octopus. As we were summoning the waiter, my friends were joking around that it’s a good thing I’m there because I’m a trained ICU nurse.

I didn’t get it until I realized they were hoping I’d Heimlich / CPR them all should they choke on the bits of twitching, sucking, semi live, mostly masticated chunks of Mini Kraken. Huh….wow, that’s a lot of responsibility!

Not that I’m not up for it (they’re my friends and I really Really REALLY like them a lot. Alive.) but if they all start choking at the same time, I’m gonna have some problems! And what if I’m the one who’s having difficulties battling it down? Barney the Tapeworm can’t help me unless the food has hit his home – my stomach and intestines. 😀

You’d think I’d be used to eating live foods. My favorite way to eat lobster is as sashimi. I FRIGGIN’ LOOOOOOVE LOBSTER SASHIMI!! It’s so friggin’ delicious…omg…..I’m drooling. Sexy, I know.

I last had some at a place I know didn’t have experience in preparing it that way but I really wanted some. I know they didn’t have a whole lot of experience because of how they presented it. I could be wrong but most of the places I’ve had it prepared this way served it on either a pretty shell, arranged artfully on green leaves….or something. The focus was the skill in which they surgically sliced and diced the lobster.

This last place arranged the head and claws around the mound of translucent lobstery heaven as garnish. Call me weird but I didn’t like that. I mean, I know wtf I’m eating. I don’t need you to remind me by artfully arranging the rest of it’s carcass around it for emphasis. I mean, who sees the hooves and head of the cow around the juicy piece of ribeye they’re about to cut into? Right?

So I’m picking at the pieces and enjoying them as I chatter away at my dinner partner. Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I thought I detected movement. I have bionic hearing and I’m sensitive to movement. That’s why I noticed something had just moved ever so slightly.

I looked down and saw nothing amiss. I chalked it up to having a whole lotta sake and shook it off. A few minutes later, I noticed trace movement AGAIN but it was towards my left hand. I look down and still saw nothing wrong. Now I’m paranoid because I’m starting to think I’m hallucinating.

I decided to continue to eat my lobster but instead of looking away, I’m going to focus all my attention on the table because :

– I know I’m not crazy
– I know I saw something move

Sure enough, a few minutes later, as I’m eating the last pieces of the lobster, I saw the head move from side to side and the claws were still waving around as they clicked weakly.

I don’t normally scream but I screeaaaamed like a little bitch at that moment. You have to understand. The head and claws were completely severed from the rest of the body…and it’s still moving….as I’m eating it.

The staff came over and listened in disbelief as I told my story. I made them stay and watch and sure enough, my little lobster didn’t disappoint. They immediately whisked it away and boiled it into miso soup. It was really good but I felt like Barney the Tapeworm was losing the wrestling match against those quivering pieces. I kept imagining they were flopping around in my tummy.

I was thinking about this last night when we were ordering the octopus from the waiter. But wait! What’s this I hear?!

THEY DON’T HAVE IT?
THEY HAVEN’T SEEN IT FOR A WHILE?!

How could this be?! We came all this way to do battle with our food! It turns out the octopus is seasonal and apparently winter is not the season for chomping on pieces of the Kraken.

Dammit….we were so disappointed…I know I was. Barney the Tapeworm was angry. He was looking forward to wrestling his food into submission.

Oh well. I guess that means we’ll just have to go again but we’re definitely calling ahead first. 🙂

Filed under Barney the Tapeworm · Tagged with fail, live octopus, lobster sashimi, Old Boy