Adventure Food: Sangkhaya Thurian at Pok Pok || Brooklyn, NY
I recently ate dinner at the Brooklyn location of Pok Pok, one of my favorite (if not my absolute favorite) Thai restaurants. I’ll have a new video for you guys soon, but for now, I couldn’t resist sharing this dessert:
This is called Sangkhaya Thurian and it tastes something like a semi-sweet rice pudding/custard. Here’s the thing: it’s made with this crazy fruit called a ‘durian.’ I hadn’t heard of it before, so in case you haven’t either, here’s the deal on durians: they are large, spiky, and yellow and in some countries, because of their extremely strong smell, it’s illegal to eat them in public.
The odor has been compared to sewage, stale vomit, skunk spray and used surgical swabs (seriously). On top of that, the smell can be detected up to half a mile away by many animals. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never heard of a crazier fruit.
But here’s the thing: People actually eat (and enjoy) it. The British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace wrote:
The pulp is the edible part, and its consistence and flavor are indescribable. A rich custard highly flavoured with almonds gives the best general idea of it, but there are occasional wafts of flavour that call to mind cream-cheese, onion-sauce, sherry-wine, and other incongruous dishes. It is neither acid nor sweet nor juicy; yet it wants neither of these qualities, for it is in itself perfect. It produces no nausea or other bad effect, and the more you eat of it the less you feel inclined to stop. In fact, to eat durians is a new sensation worth a voyage to the East to experience.
Pok Pok’s dessert is an extremely mild version of the durian mixed with a coconut and palm sugar custard. I split it with my date and we both agreed: it’s good!
So, what do you think? Would you try it?
