[Kara] Durian: The Stinky Fruit

The subway in Singapore (called the MRT) is beautifully clean and well organized.  No eating or drinking is allowed on the MRT.  And, no . . . durian?  Obviously I needed to figure out what a durian is and why it's forbidden.

Durians, it turns out, are controversial fruit.  FRUIT.  Whaaat?  A quick Google search told me that Durians are a south Asian delicacy . . . to some.  To others, they are a stinky menace.

So when I saw durian mochi ice cream in the grocery store, of course I had to buy it.  It might not taste as good as mango mochi, but it's mochi so it can't be bad, right?

We opened it up when we got to our apartment and immediately realized we were wrong.  The smell was distinctively like cooked onions that had been left on the counter for a few days and had gone rancid.  Our apartment in Singapore was very compact, and the kids were making gagging sounds, so I moved the mochi out to the balcony to eat it in peace.  But one taste had me scurrying for a glass of water.  It did not taste better than it smelled.  The closest I can come to describing the flavor is like leeks that had been simmered in butter for a long time and then mixed with a little (not enough!) sugar.  And the aftertaste got worse.  Yikes!  I wrapped the rest of the mochi in a plastic bag, tied it off and tossed it in the trash.  

But maybe that was just one bad experience.  How can it be such a delicacy if it is so gross?  I had one more chance to double-check my anti-durian stance when we spotted this shop at the airport on our way out of Singapore.

As soon as Cannon and I stepped into the store, he started making choking sounds because the smell was so strong--and just as grossly distinctive as it had been in our apartment.  We can definitively say we are an anti-durian family!

But there is obviously a significant pro-durian population in South East Asia.  The Esplanade performing arts center at Marina Bay in Singapore is even designed to look like a durian and encourages patrons to post pictures with the building and the hashtag #mydurian.