EATING RESPONSIBLY
As a food enthusiast, the bulb in my head lit up when an offer to try new treat was up.Owing its name to Indonesia's most popular tourist destination and a strip of beach there, a newly opened seafood stall included giant crabs imported from Papua in its menu.
These crabs weigh up to 2 kilograms a piece, feeding 3 to 5 people depending on how big your appetite is.
The online community of gastronomy and foodies organized a Meet and Eat soiree in the newest seafood chain somewhere in Pasar Modern BSD, a thriving food center that's becoming more popular for the last couple of year.
The gathering is designed to host up to 40 people, referring to the number or crabs available that night.
Priced at 22,000 per 100 grams, the bills will be divided equally among participants.
At first, I was excited about the meeting and without thinking twice I registered and put myself on number 20 and 21 on the list.
The quota of 40 people has long been fulfilled and another 50 or so is waiting to devour the enormous, presumably-very-tasty-crabs which will be traveling three quarters of the country's length.
Tasting exotic food and meeting new friends would be a perfect way to spend my birthday evening.
Last weekend I went to an eatery just outside Jakarta to accompany a colleague from Houston. In order to give him a memorable meal, we took him to have some giant catfish grilled in huge bamboo tubes.
Since I realized that the bamboo tubes were disposable, I keep having issues about going there. I think that the cooking methods is not environmentally friendly. I never know if the bamboos are taken from a sustainable source, and yet, hundreds and hundreds of stalks are going up in flames everyday, all in the sake of exoticism.
The catfish are farmed on nearby ponds, so now I opt for regular grilled catfish minus the bamboo, and to me they taste even more delicious without the guilt.
Then I remember my upcoming meeting this Friday.
When we will consume crabs flown in from thousands of miles away.
First, think about the carbon footprints.
Then, the giant crabs themselves may have been irresponsibly harvested from a dwindling mangrove forest, handed out to brokers by indigenous people who in return only received a few thousand rupiahs.
They unknowingly destroy their natural resources just to live by, and surrender to city people's greed because they think they will never run out of crabs.
They have been around since forever haven't they?
They will last forever of course.
Or so they think.
And so I decided to put an end to this demand-and-supply chain, at least for myself.
The excitement resulted will only go as far as my tongue, and maybe my cholesterol level.
Between exotic experience and taking the first step to saving my earth, I choose the latter.
Labels: crabs, earth, eating, environment, go green
posted by Nemot @ 7:18 PM
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