Those who know me well know about my ineluctable weakness for grand theories and tidy systems. The latter category includes much to be excited about, for example the renowned nervous system! The incomparable sewer system! The hella-awesome solar system! The wacky honor system! The very elegant Heimlich system! [Oh wait, that's a maneuver.] And then there's the system from which I recently benefited: the barter system.
The other day, the phone rang as I was tending to the effects of my domain--folding my felicitous collection of underwear, in fact. My pal Sarah, it seemed, had a gift for me, and she and Jeremy were en route. My prospects brightened. I am a man made exultant by the pop-in.
So along comes Sarah and Jeremy flush with the vitality common in people who choose to move themselves around via bicycle, and Sarah presents me with a very intriguing bag of Malaysian prawn crackers and a cosmic-looking bottle of Thai coconut soda, both acquired from the curiosity-laden shelves of our local "world" grocer and given to me as a gesture of thanks for my bicycle consultation services. Sarah obviously knows about my love for the world's variety of snack foods. One prime reasons for traveling, I think, is so one can prowl the aisles of foreign supermarkets and convenience stores, examine the wrappers, giggle, and take photographs.
So, the prawn crackers. The bag opened with an impressive scent-burst of prawn--the sort usually only smelt in prawn discotheques at three in the morning, after hours and hours of dancing to 80s music, right when "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" comes on and all the prawns go crazy and rush to the dance floor and their antennae shake and they start to sweat out the rum and cokes they've been drinking. That sort of prawn smell. The taste, though, was pretty subdued--like toasted, puffed starch. And despite the enticing inclusion of something called "permitted colouring 19140" in the list of ingredients, the crackers were only a mundane shade of yellowish-beige. Still, they were pretty fun to eat and ponder.
The coconut soda, however, was excellent. The wrapper promised "young coconut juice," which seemed a bit racy, but I personally thought it had the composure and maturity of a much older coconut beverage. No preservatives graced the soda, and it was composed only of coconut juice, water, coconut meat, and sugar. I particularly liked the sweet, nutty taste of the floating bits of coconut. I enthusiastically recommend this drink to anyone seeking a tropical soda with floaty things in it. It's like holding a universe of coconut in your hand.
Also, non-culinarily, here is a thing one can watch.