A Japanese ramen restaurant in Tokyo, Japan, is experimenting with two robotic-chef to cook the noodles; would be really cool if the whole restaurant’s operation is automated, with robots serving the dishes as well…
Bizarre Food
Heart-shaped watermelons in Japan
Hiroichi Kimura, a farmer from Kumamoto, and his wife, have found a way to cultivate heart shaped watermelons.
It took the Kimuras three years to create the perfectly heart-shaped fruit; the couple managed to ship out 20 of the watermelons for the first time this year.
Five of those were for sale at Fukuoka’s Iwataya department store at 15,750 yen (160 USD) apiece [news and image from Asahi, via Japanprobe]
Chocolate ramen for Valentine’s Day?
Japanese chocolate manufacturer Lotte is teaming up with popular ramen shop Menya Musashi to create a chocolate flavoured ramen (chocolate as garnish to be precise).
The name of the dish is Ghana Miso and will be available until February 15th in honour of Valentine’s Day, where Japanese women would give give men chocolate as an expression of love or friendship [via Cscoutjapan]
The Testicle Cookbook – Cooking with Balls
Eat kangaroo, save the planet
Dr Ross Garnaut, a professor of economics at the Australian National University, has urged Australians to ditch beef and lamb for kangaroo steaks to help save the planet in his recent climate study commissioned by the Australian government.
Rat meat in demand in Cambodia
The price of rat meat has quadrupled in Cambodia as inflation has put other meat beyond the reach of poor people, according to Reuters.
A kilogramme of rat meat increased to around 5,000 riel (USD1.28) from 1,200 riel last year. It’s still cheaper than other meat though… beef for example costs about 20,000 riel a kilogramme.
Some communities in Asian and South American countries have long history of eating rats or other rodents, but food shortages and inflations have pushed others to try rat meat in recent years.
Earlier this month, a state government in eastern India encouraged its people to eat rats in an effort to battle soaring food prices and save grain stocks.
Sometimes it’s hard to relate to poverty around the world. Here we are, using high tech gadgets and surfing the web while at other corners on earth people are eating rats because they can’t afford other meat… and it’s far from being the worse scenario yet. It’s kinda sad actually.
