Restless Pursuits

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Disgusting Food Museum Malmo: A Stinky Good Time

The Disgusting Food Museum Malmo is an exploration of different cuisines from around the world. The museum offers a unique experience where you can learn about bizarre foods. But that’s not all. It is a multi-sensory experience too. Not only will you see the foods that make you squeamish, you also can smell some especially stinky ones and taste them, if you dare!

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What To Expect When Exploring The Disgusting Food Museum Malmo

The Disgusting Food Museum Malmo is set up well to guide you around the museum. After paying, you receive your ticket that doubles as a barf bag. You know. Just in case. 😉 On the back wall, you can even see how many days ago the last person vomited. It is not a very reassuring first impression.  

On the way to the first exhibit, you walk by a collection of unique items for sale. The small shop is like the most interesting gift shop you could ever go to. You can buy hot sauce, spicy chips, strange tasting candies and more. On the floor are lines with arrows to direct you around the room. 

Dangerous Foods Around The World

At the first led exhibit you learn about various dangerous foods that were served at one point . You will find foods that were created and later considered too dangerous for consumption. There was wine that had antifreeze added to it to make it sweeter and tuna that was packaged, but then considered too dangerous to eat. It was ultimately still shipped off to Ethiopia during a famine. Don’t worry the Ethiopians didn’t eat it either, thankfully!

You will also find hazardous foods such as the Horseshoe Bat, linked to the origin of COVID-19, and foods that must be prepared carefully to avoid being poisonous, like Fugu (pufferfish).

Cultural Food Difference At The Disgusting Food Museum Malmo

Many of the items that are on display are what I would consider cultural food differences. For example, Salt Licorice is a common treat in Northern Europe and loved by many people that grew up there, but to many others around the world, including myself, salty licorice is gross. 

Another example is root beer. This tasty, to me, soda is very common in the U.S. and Canada, but to everyone else around the world, it tastes too sweet, too weird or like cough syrup.  

Another interesting food I saw was Jell-O salad, which was common in the 1960s in the United States. It may have been in its prime in the sixties, but it is still fairly common throughout the midwest. At least it was when I was a kid. One difference, however, is that the museum’s version had vegetables in the Jell-O, but my mother-in-law only makes it with fruit and marshmallows. 😆

Some of the items made me wonder how common they really were worldwide, though. Rocky Mountain Oysters, or otherwise known as bull testicles, was one of the items on display in the Disgusting Food Museum Malmo. After living in Colorado, I had heard of them, but you won’t be sitting down at a dinner table with a testicle on their plate. I do know of one restaurant, however, that serves them if you want to have a taste! Buckhorn Exchange even has rattlesnake and fried alligator tail! 🤢

Smelly Foods

Not only are you able to learn all about the fascinating foods at the Disgusting Food Museum Malmo, you also can take a sniff of some of the truly smelly things. There were a lot of stinky cheeses to smell which were quite disgusting. We smelled very pungent smelling foods like the durian fruit, stinky tofu and surströmming, fermented herring. Surströmming’s scent is so strong and so foul that when opening a can, the staff brought all of us outside of the museum for the demonstration.

Food Awareness At The Disgusting Food Museum Malmo

One interesting section of the Disgusting Food Museum in Malmo was about food awareness or the way things are processed or treated.

I clearly remember a small pig with like 20 needles sticking out of its body to represent the overuse of antibiotics that are given to pigs used as livestock due to cramped, unhealthy living conditions. 

Other fascinating exhibits showed information about lab grown meat and the shelf life of Pop-Tarts and Twinkies because of chemical food additives. 

Gross Food With Health Benefits

Some of the most disgusting foods to me that were presented seemed to be used mainly for health benefits. Some of these included pickled sheep eyeball in tomato juice from Mongolia that is supposed to be a great hangover cure; three penis liquor from China that claims to increase male virility; and mouse wine that is to help asthma and liver disease but apparently tastes like gasoline. Yuck!

Tasting Challenge 

The best part of the Disgusting Food Museum Malmo, in my opinion, is the tasting challenge. Many people might think the opposite, but even though it was incredibly gross, it was also fun at the same time. When you first enter the museum, you are given a bingo sheet. This sheet has the food and drink on it that you can try at the tasting bar. You don’t have to try everything. Honestly, you don’t have to try anything if you don’t want to, but you might be surprised by some of the items. 

Some “icky” foods that we tasted were black ants (not bad – a little sour), crickets, Milkis which is carbonated water with sugar and milk in it (Tasty! I would compare it to cream soda.), durian fruit (not my thing), sauerkraut juice (also not for me), salty licorice, beetles (Very crunchy but pretty tasteless! One was a little too big that I just couldn’t try!), and a hot sauce challenge at the end. I think that they change up which foods they offer but there are usually about 20-25 different food and drink options. 

Is The Disgusting Food Museum Malmo Worth Visiting? 

Yes! When we first arrived in Malmo, we walked by the Disgusting Food Museum and honestly it didn’t look very impressive. I was skeptical, but the kids all really wanted to check it out. After a little pressure from them, the parents gave in, and I am very glad we did. The information was interesting and, because it was interactive, it was really fun too!

Where Is The Disgusting Food Museum? 

The Disgusting Food Museum Malmo is right by the river in Malmo near the center which makes it very conveniently located. The address is Södra Förstadsgatan 2, 211 43 Malmö, Sweden. 

There is also another Disgusting Food Museum located in Berlin, Germany.

How Much Are Tickets?

Adult tickets are 220 kr which is roughly $22. Children between the ages of 6 and 15 years old are 75 kr which is a little over $7. Children under 6 are free. All children must be accompanied by an adult. There is also discounted student and senior pricing. 

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