“The brains give energy to the head, while the testicles have a power of their own.”
On the side of traffic clogged roads in Jakarta’s old town, men looking to improve their sexual performance flock to stalls to drink snake blood.
Customers pick out a snake, which go for 70,000 rupiah ($6) each, before a vendor carefully hauls out the selected serpent, hacks off the head with a meat cleaver and grips the snake’s headless body vertically to allow its blood to drip into a teacup or glass.
A spoonful of honey is added to sweeten the bitter mixture, seen not only as a virility booster but also as a remedy for diabetes, high blood pressure and other ailments.
At the Beijing penis restaurant, customer Wei Jingsheng, 47, is a devoted believer.
“It does work very well,” said the 47 year old construction businessman. “After I took it, my hair stopped falling out, and now I feel very energetic the whole day. Before, I needed to sleep at noon to not get tired, now I don’t need to. Every aspect of my life has become fantastic.”
Embarrassing questions
The restaurant’s nutritionist says that its most popular dish is deer, seen as particularly effective due to each breeding male having scores of sexual partners.
“One deer penis has the same potency as three bull penises,” said Du Yuemei, who goes to each table to enlighten guests on the supposed health benefits of the dishes and regale them with tales of the animal’s vigour in the wild.
With a hint of a smile, she admits to being asked embarrassing questions by some customers, but is immune to attempts to make her feel uncomfortable.
“I know my job is kind of unusual, but it makes me feel good though, that I am involved in dietary therapy for men. It’s very unique,” she adds, before curtseying and leaving the room, a signal for the waitress to begin placing the ingredients into the boiling soup, made up of deer heart, duck stock and Chinese medicine.
The first to emerge steaming hot and the slices slightly shrivelled compared to their earlier appearance are the goat and bull penises.
The bull, having curled into a squid like ring from the heat, had a familiarly beefy flavour, but with a firm texture not easy to swallow.
The goat was tendon like, rubbery and slightly stringy, like a flavourless, flaccid stick of liquorice.
Both donkey and horse penis were presented in bacon like strips, but the neutrally flavoured donkey was dark, while the intense, meaty horse was easily the most distinctive ingredient of the meal.
In contrast, the testicles had lighter textures, varying from flaky to somewhere between tofu and pate, and often delicate tastes.
The deer penis was slightly frayed and another rubbery offering, while the wild Russian dog had a spicy, almost zesty flavour, despite looking like slices of undercooked pig skin.
It was the only imported dish on the menu and the only animal to have a penis bone, ceremonially presented in a red gift box at the end of the meal for good fortune albeit not the original owner’s.
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