Do you eat to live or live to eat? Well, either way, who
doesn't love food?
In pursuit of expanding my culinary horizons, I chanced upon
the world of excess culinary expenses. And, as baffled and awe stricken I was… I
concluded that filthy money allows more stupidity. Representing the ‘Mango’ people (‘Aam junta’),
let me take you on a wonder struck little expedition (laced with a lot of
sarcasm) on some of the most outlandish, outrageous, and, above all, the most
expensive food buys of the rich.
1)
White Truffles: Priced at $6,000 and above, per
pound, a truffle is a valuable fruit of a group of subterranean fungi. (Ouch! Shocking as it was, until more
discovery made me speechless. Apparently, every year an auction for white
truffle is held and a kilo worth of this fungal delicacy was sold for $330,000
to a casino tycoon in 2007)
2) Caviar:
Caviar or the salted fish roe is 'synonymous with luxury.' Beluga caviar is
considered to be the best and is priced at around $4,000 a pound. (Fungi and now unfertilized eggs of a fish…this
list gets even crazier! The Almas caviar is sold for approx. $25,000 in a gold
tin and is only available in Picadilly, England. For me, this is still a useless
pile of unfertilized eggs! If I was a
roe fish, I would have sued these free riders!)
3)
Kobe Beef/Wagyu Steak: Kobe beef comes from cows
(raised mostly in Japan) that are allegedly fed only beer. A rib rack of Kobe
can cost up to $2,800 in a posh restaurant in NY. (An
expensive steak with an unhealthy load of fat! I get it…if you don’t consume
fat, how will you justify the 3- month long Thai vacation to learn kick boxing
and get lean.)
4)
Civet Coffee/Kopi Luwak: It is considered to be
the world's finest coffee. It has a delicate flavor as it is partially
fermented by passing through the digestive system of the Civet (rodent). It is
priced at $350 per pound. (Rodent feces
for a hot cuppa? Yikes! Seriously?)
5)
Matsutake/Mattake Mushroom: Grown in Japan and
is expensive because of its rarity. Priced at $2,000 per pound. (Another fungi! And if it is rare… preserve
it! Will any activist please save these poor mushrooms?)
6)
Criadillas Fritas: A very expensive delicacy
popular in Chile. It is made from a bull’s testicles. (I don’t know the price and am sure I wouldn’t eat it even if they were
sold for pennies.)
7)
Glace Luxury Ice: These ‘perfectly spherical’ chunks
of ice are made from purified water and are precisely 2.5 inches in diameter.
Priced at $8-10 per cube…oops! sphere. (The
clientele includes the likes of Mr. Hefner!)
Need I say more? Don’t you agree that us
being the ‘have nots’ is a blessing in disguise? At least, we don’t have the
pressure of eating crap (read fungi, feces, testicles, etc.) and paying in
gold.
