YUM! YUM! HEART EXPLOSION! VIET STYLE!!

If I die overnight by heart explosion, this bit of prawn toast eaten at today's Victoria Street New Year's festival, is the reason.

It's bread deep fried in vegetable, sesame and fish oils.

Then they get some taro, nuts, carrot, minced shrimp and a king prawn and deep fry the lot in them evil oils.

Then they pour some hoisin on top.

Then I bite.

And then my heart and stomach start a long and explosive demarcation dispute.

Afterwards I shared a big cup of iced sugar cane water, some minced beef wrapped in betel leaves skewered on a stick, some honey pork mince skewered on a stick, a crazy massive prawn cracker drizzled with molasses and sprinkled with fresh, shredded coconut, and for irony's sake an icy cold can of coke from the Vietnam veterans stall.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to line the walls with plastic for when my heart explodes outta my chest later on in the evening.

YE HA SMOKEY AMERICAN YUM ATTACK!!

USA Foods is a small warehouse shop in Moorabin full of ridiculous American chilli sauces, drinks, mixers, powders, chocolates, cake mix, junk, instant dinners, rice dinners, gumbo ingredients, crab flavored nuts and most importantly stomach ulcer medicines.

Here’s a roundup of the crazy ingredients I bought when I visited last week.

Chef Paul’s Smokey Cowboy Beans and Rice
An impressive looking box of instant rice and dried black beans which was cooked up for dinner as soon as I got home. Added some chopped up Christmas ham marinated in the tequila BBQ sauce I bought and a can of lentils. Surprisingly, no saddles blazed afterwards. Great meal but.

Wright’s Liquid Smoke Hickory
Yes, you read it right. 1.5 litres of liquid fucking smoke. But isn’t smoke a smokey thing? Surely not. Well, that’s why Americans are ace. Someone thought smoke was such a great tasting thing they decided to work out a way to bottle it. Splash a teaspoon or two in tomato sauce and you got yourself Glenn MacGrath’s Smokey Tomato sauce circa 1998. Drizzle some on top of a steak and whack the whole thing in the microwave for ten minutes and you could swear Ian Hewitson, before his tragic flirtation with healthy eating, barbequed it.

Louisana Hot Chipotle
A saucier, smokier tabasco sauce based on chipotle peppers which are favored for their smokiness. Yes, there’s a theme here. Americans and me love smokey flavored shit.

Zat’s Gumbo File
Hank Williams referred to it when he sang, Jambalaya crawfish pie, file gumbo. File powder is powdered sassafras flowers used to thicken gumbo when okra is out of season. Mentioned in so many gumbo recipes, I’ve been looking for this stuff for the ten years I’ve been making gumbo. Seeing the small jar priced at $3.99 was for me, an epiphany. It smells like arse.

A&W Root Root Beer
Didn’t buy this for me. Don’t like the stuff but it did taste better than I expected with a heap o’ ice.

Brazo's Legend Tequila BBQ Sauce
I like cooking with tequila. Goes well in salsas and a splash with a creamy prawn pasta also works. Not sure if I’ll be adding it to my barbecue sauce recipe.

Blueberry Pop Tarts
Just like our very own pink lamington, pop tarts look so good, sound so good but ultimately, are disappointing.

David’s BBQ Sunflower Seeds
Great pack with the ever versatile catch-cry emblazoned, Chew, spit and be happy! Also the directions on how to eat sunflower seeds entertain. Did you know that the more experienced sunflower seed eater stores broken shells between his left cheek and teeth while chewing the meat with his teet on the opposite sid e of his mouth? Tasty as buggery and such fun to spit the shells out the car window in times of road rage.

Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup (can)
Bliss in a can. This morning I drizzled it on my muesli. Why? Because I rock. That’s why.

Hunt’s BBQ Manwich
You read it right. Manwich. A smokey, tomatoey sauce to mix with mince meat to make a hamburger patty to grow hairs on your chest. Haven’t opened the can yet but when I do it will be a celebration. A celebration of man-dom.

Dale & Thomas’ White Chocolate and Peanut Butter Popcorn
Heaven is not in the back seat of no fucker’s Caddilac. It’s in the packet of Dale & Thomas’ White Chocolate and Peanut Butter Popcorn. Not very peanut buttery which is a relief. Why are Americans so obsessed with peanut butter flavor? Just a slightly nutty white chocolate drizzled™ (yes, they’ve trademarked the word ‘drizzled’) on Lolly Gobble Bliss Bombs. If only the Pies’ Dale Thomas could be so consistently marvelous.

Appetite Pleasin’ Real Western Flavor Ranch Style Pinto Beans
I bought them because of the Western style fonts on the can. Tastes better with a teaspoon of Liquid Smoke Hickory and a splodge of Tequila BBQ Sauce. Half a can of Hunt’s BBQ Manwich wouldn’t hurt either.