Once again, taste of Crocodile

This was not the first time I have tried crocodile meat. I still remember (more or less) the taste of the whitish meat that I believed was pork. On that day we were at a crocodile farm, my uncle-in-law was having a clear Chinese soup, and he offered some to me without any explanation. What I, an inexperienced ten-year-old kid perceived at that time was some tight meat with a plain taste. I asked him later if it’s a pork soup. Once he told me what kind of meat I just had, I wasn’t shocked or unnerved but amazed by the experience I just gained – It wasn’t bad tough.

My second time having crocodile meat was twenty years later. A restaurant in an outskirt of Bangkok provided various kinds of dishes and crocodile sauté was one of them. As my boyfriend loves trying new things and he isn’t scared to try some odd things, I ordered this special menu for us. However, we were quite upset by its tasteless meat. I believed that the restaurant use a canned meat creating this dish.

A few months ago, at a local temple fair in Prachuap Kiri Khan, we had another chance to give another try to the same kind of meat. The local fair in the town is regularly plain and monotonous, but this time was a bit different. We were bored enough seeing the same merchandisers that we saw at every fair in Prachaup, and started thinking about going back home. We however continued the walk just to finish the whole round. At almost the end of the fair, a huge reptile’s body was being spun on the grill drawing greatly our attentions, as well other peoples. 

We didn’t need to read the shop’s sign; from its shape, we could tell that it’s a real crocodile dude. The stand offered the meat in a form of barbecue skewers marinated in different kinds of sauce: original, black pepper, and Mala (Sichuan pepper mixed with chili pepper). While the original ones were sold out, we bought one each with black pepper and Mala sauces. Despite the strong taste of the sauce, we perceived the texture of the moisten flesh better than the last time we had in Bangkok. I could tell that these skewers were good enough, while my boyfriend was totally impressed by the meat.

The sign showing the price per skewers: 20 baht (around 0.6 USDs or 0.5 Euros)

Apart from the skewers, the shop as well sold the meat in pieces like steak. While one guy trying a skewer and finally bought a big chunk of crocodile meat back home, I heard a little voice passing behind me saying “Poor him, mommy”. My boyfriend and I looked at each other without saying a word after so.

Bodies of baby crocodiles died at young

I’m on the point where I can judge no one, or if I could, I wouldn’t rather do it. I see these merchants living their lives. They raised crocodiles like a grazier does. At the same time we, human, has many choices we can make; avoiding eating some kind of meat or not eating meat at all, or eat different kinds of meat, they are all your choices.