With a vomit bag as the ticket, visitors are stepping inside the Disgusting Food Museum to taste, smell, and sample a plethora of unpleasantries.
Sheep eyeball juice, fermented shark, bull testicles, maggot-infested cheese are just a few of the dozens of foods likely to provoke extreme disgust in many people. But, these food are considered palatable, even delicious, in many home cultures.
That point is at the heart of the new Disgusting Food Museum in Malmo, Sweden.
“The evolutionary function of disgust is to help us avoid foods that might be dangerous, contaminated, or toxic,” says Samuel West, curator and chief ‘Disgustologist.’ “Disgust is one of the six fundamental human emotions.”
He conceived this house of horror as an entertaining experience, with a very serious message: that what is considered delicious or disgusting is culturally learned.
“I want people to come here and be fascinated by some disgusting foods, from - for them - exotic cultures,” says West. “But, [I hope they] also see some familiar foods that they like and then ask themselves the question - what is this doing in the disgusting food museum?”
Some of the 80 food items on display include frog smoothies from Peru, a Chinese wine made with baby mice and an infamous Swedish putrid herring.
“We identify, culturally, with what we eat,” says West. “So, [calling someone’s food disgusting] is [culturally] sensitive but I think by turning the lens on ourselves, on Swedish or American food culture, we’re saying we treat everyone the same.”
Also included are food items that many western visitors might not consider disgusting at all. American foods on display include Jell-O salad and from the cornbelt pork brains with milk gravy.”
