A crime that’s guaranteed to raise a stink
Last week the Bangkok Post carried a story from Lang Suan in Chumphon province, concerning a couple who were arrested for selling unripe durian. Probably not a lot of people are aware that this is a crime, but apparently it is regarded as “deception”. Last year a Rayong orchard owner actually received 15 days in jail for this heinous offence. Mind you, some might argue that anyone who sells this smelly fruit should be incarcerated immediately for gross offences to the hooter.
I must admit to never having attempted to buy a durian and would only guess that the ripest ones are the smelliest, not exactly a professional observation. I have enough trouble with bananas. I can’t stand overripe bananas, but the nice green ones purchased in the market always seem to have transformed into a smelly, yellow mush by the time I get round to eating them.
We happen to be in the midst of the durian season, which most people with a functioning proboscis are well aware of. For visitors, the durian is the fruit that allegedly “tastes like heaven and smells like hell” as a T-shirt I bought in the Philippines succinctly put it. With its menacing spikes, it is certainly one of the more exotic tropical products.
A matter of taste
I am not a great fan of the durian, not because of the smell, but because the creamy fruit is simply too rich for my taste. A couple of mouthfuls is about as much as I can take, but I have friends who demolish plateloads of the stuff. It is definitely an acquired taste and one that I am happy not to have acquired.
According to British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, the durian tastes like “rich butter-like custard, highly flavoured with almonds, but intermingles with wafts of flavour that call to mind cream cheeses, onion sauce, brown sherry and other incongruities”. Just imagine all that slopping about in your stomach. No wonder I can’t handle it.
Just one whiff
It’s the smell, however, that dominates most conversations about the durian — and not without reason. It has been variously described as resembling decomposing fish, dead cats, stale vomit and rotting garbage. It has also prompted comparisons to kerosene, rotten onions, unwashed socks and decaying laundry.
In fact there is no single word that accurately characterises the odour. Author Anthony Burgess in his excellent The Long Day Wanes: A Malayan Trilogy, described it: “Like eating raspberry blancmange in the lavatory.”
Nothing to sniff at
Back in 2007 there began an attempt in Thailand to produce an odourless durian that would make the fruit more acceptable to a wider market. One enterprising orchard owner came up with something called the “Chantaburi 1” which emitted just the faintest of smells.
Not surprisingly durian connoisseurs were unhappy with this development, arguing that you shouldn’t mess with nature. To them a durian is not a durian unless it really stinks. Among them was esteemed Post food critic Ung-ang Talay. When asked by the International Herald Tribune what he thought about it, he remarked: “Making a non-smelly durian is like producing a thornless rose. It’s really like cutting out the soul.”
Stirring the loins
It will probably come as no surprise that the durian is also believed to be an aphrodisiac. Apparently there’s a Malaysian saying that “When the durians come down, the sarongs come off”, although I can’t say I ever experienced that on visits to Kuala Lumpur.
There are even durian-flavoured condoms available, so I’m told. One Western writer observed that if you ate the fruit you would be “aflame with erotic desire”. Afraid it didn’t work for Crutch. Mind you, not a lot does these days.
Lethal weapon
Ung-ang Talay speaks with some authority on the durian as I can recall the days when he used to stink out the Bangkok Post office by bringing in exotic specimens of the fruit for us all to savour. He also had the dubious distinction of being chased down the street by an angry ladyboy durian seller after suggesting the vendor’s produce didn’t smell quite right.
The durian can also be quite an effective weapon as another Post colleague discovered some years ago. He returned home after a night out with the boys when he was greeted by his wife wielding a durian. She scored a direct hit and he was limping round the office for weeks.
Hell hath no fury like a Thai woman hurling a durian. Gentlemen, you have been warned.
The sneaky bean
Another Thai food item which can create bit of a stink, although in a more indirect fashion, is sa-taw, a type of bean that grows on giant trees in the South. It looks a bit like a broad bean and is often referred to as the “stinking bean” because of the unfriendly activities it gets up to in one’s stomach, not unrelated to flatulence.
In his Thai-English Dictionary, George Bradley McFarland explains that those brave enough to consume sa-taw enjoy “great pleasure, despite an objectionable odour”.
As he delicately puts it, “When the pod’s been eaten, the odour is exhaled by the eater.” Strangely, culinary experts swear by this stinky bean and it regularly turns up in fancy restaurants to assault unsuspecting stomachs.
I certainly wouldn’t recommend consuming sa-taw and durian on the same day. That is definitely asking for trouble.