Wildest Bite - Frog

Have you ever eaten a food that pushed you out of your comfort zone? What is the most unique or strangest thing you’ve ever eaten?
When considering if I have ever eaten a food that pushed me outside of my comfort zone, I think back to the first time I tried frog.

Where did you eat it?
I was on my honeymoon in Southeast Asia at a restaurant in Hanoi, Vietnam. In addition to frog, the menu also featured dog and other animals I had previously only understood to be pets. The experience provided the opportunity to step outside our comfort zone as guests dining traditionally, seated on the floor. Needless to say, it also provided a good opportunity to test my flexibility.

Did you go into it willingly by ordering it, were you persuaded to try it, or were you dared?
I went into this experience willingly and have since come to love frog.

Have you ordered it since or attempted to re-create it in any way?
We have gone gigging for our own here, in the Napa Valley, and cooked with it many years ago at The Restaurant. We would go in search of frogs late in the night with a gig and headlamp – the frogs freeze from the light, and you gig them to put in a bag. What I did not know at the time is that frogs are resilient. The next morning, that first bag of wounded frogs had all escaped into the cold room of The Restaurant, and a young cook and I had to gather up these mortally wounded frogs to finish them off.