Live Cobra Heart (Vietnam)
That meal is not for the fainthearted—pun intended. Live cobra hearts cannot be considered a common meal in Vietnam—but some people do eat them, mostly because they believe that, by eating a snake live, they will inherit a part of its power and enhance their strength. The ritual goes like this: A live cobra is picked by the customer from a selection of specimens—the meaner, the better. Its head is then cut off and its still beating heart ripped out, placed in a saucer with a bit of the blood, ready to be chugged and swallowed whole. According to Ross Lee Tabak, who tried eating live cobra heart in Hanoi, “you might feel it beating in your throat.”