35 Weird Foods That We Now Know Are Edible, But It’s Surprising How Our Ancestors Found That Out, As Pointed Out By Folks Online

There are times when you will eat literally anything available just to stay alive. In Victorian Britain, oysters were plentiful, cheap and nutritious. There were oyster cafes everywhere because it's all the poorer classes could afford to eat.

I mean, to each their own, people like what they like, but yeah,who looked at this thing that looks like a giant booger and thought "MMMMMMMMMM...I bet this is gonna be TASTY! "

We're humans. There are literally folks with a fetish for eating feces. This is nothing.

"Hmmm, a shell full of sea-snot, that looks appetizing! " Yeah, I'm gonna pass. Gross!

Well it's a great source of protein for sure, easy to catch. I think it's pretty smart to try and eat them

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Chocolate covered coffee beans are amazing!

You've also gotta ferment them. Pick, peal, ferment, wash, dry for months, roast, grind, soak in hot water.

hot bean water

"So it's a bean soup?"

"Dude! You gotta try this!" *dies "Hey bro! Try this!" *dies. Now repeat.

Actually, all the fish is edible IF prepared correctly. To be more precise, all the flesh is edible once the liver, skin and ovaries have been carefully removed by a specially trained and licensed cook. Mind you, there are hundreds of them in Japan. There even are chains of restaurants specialized in Fugu.

The picture is a blowfish. Though it also contains tetrodotoxin. Very confusing species when is comes to names, but it is usually separated as puffer fish having smooth skin and blowfish having spikes (also called porcupine fish). Blowfish are easy to clean, easy to catch, and very delicious here in the US.

That is typically japanese: it's dangerous, let's try it. They still eat fresh cut (and still moving) octopus arms. Which sometimes get stuck in their throat and suffocate them.

Well, if it is alive we can kill it and if we can kill it we can eat it. From that point it is just trial and error.

They used to be fed to prisoners in the U.S., but I'm guessing it was without melted butter, which is really the only reason people like lobster anyway.

Lobster was once food for the poor...then some rich bugger found out what the poor had been hiding, cornered the market and sold them to other rich buggers for an exorbitant price. Me? Lobsters are filter feeders, one of the ocean's janitors. If you want clean oceans, don't eat the janitors.

This would be my first thought. Curiosity can really get you sometimes

I agree! How did they know to crack it open and eat it, then let me see, melted butter will make it taste even better!

lobster were initially seen as food for the poor. they were first used as animal feed and fertilizer, but the french thought it was going to be good food. this is in the west though. in asia, seafood are usually prized.

and obviously, found in australia

In theory it you use fire (a torch/lighter) for a few seconds the hairs should be gone and the fruit safe to eat. Any volunteers to test my theory out?

Well, of course, Satan’s pets need to play in Satan’s garden.

Where is this plant? I'd want to be sure to avoid it.

It will surprise no-one to learn that Gympie Gympie is native to Australia. Because of course it is.

The hotter the spice, the longer the food keeps

Don't think the original chillies were as strong. Like a lot of other produce they have been cultured for thousands of years.

Didn't Christopher Columbus try to pass it off as a peppercorn? And peppercorns were used to cover the taste of rotting meat so... I can actually see how this one came about

Perhaps they were just intelligent and/or creative chefs that maybe thought after that first bite...wow, that's powerful and terribly hot and spicy, but maybe if we finely chop it and add it smaller amounts it will add flavor and not be as potent? Dunno - it's a total mystery...

Hides the taste of rotting meat