As our well-traveled readers pointed out, small fish are eaten whole in many cultures, from British whitebait to the dried fish snacks ubiquitous at Asian groceries. Fish eyes seem the most acceptable form of ocular cuisine, my fastidious soup-eating friend excluded. Maybe the eyes of other mammals are just a bit too close to home for most people. "Eyes may be special because it is so clear that they are an animal part, and they have some special significance for many people." When it comes to Americans, "people in our culture are disgusted by eating any non-muscle part of edible animals, says Paul Rozin, a professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania who studies human food choice and disgust. "When I said, 'Where's the brain?' they looked at me with horror." "The consistency is quite offensive," he reports.īut even traditional Icelanders have their food taboos - the sheep head was served without the brain. Ears, eyes, nose - everything."Įverything, including the eyeball. "You get half a sheep's head on your plate," he told The Salt. They served svio, or boiled sheep's head. Serpell learned that firsthand when he sat down to eat with a family in Iceland. So it's not entirely surprising that we find eyeballs disconcerting." Boiled sheep's head is traditional in Iceland and Norway. "Eyes represent faces," he said, "and it's through the face that we learn to recognize and empathize with others. So I called James Serpell, director of the Center for the Interaction of Animals and Society at the University of Pennsylvania, and asked why eyes creep people out. Alas, when the bowls were laid out, the one with fish eyes staring balefully upward landed in front of the most fastidious eater in the room.
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