Salak: Smelly Feet Fruit

Snakeskin fruit. Everytime I touch one of these, I have to control my urge to shriek and run. Look at that, isn't it like the skin of a snake?

The reddish-brown scaly skin even peels like a snake, breaking along the scales.

Smelly feet. That's what I thought when I passed by my dining table just now, where a bowl of salak, given by my neighbor, was placed. It smells like somebody's feet after a long day wearing boots. No wonder Wey asked me if these strange fruits are rotten.

Salak is a fruit (related to the oil palm) that has only recently (last 10 to 15 years) appeared in KK. When I was growing up, I never saw this fruit. I'm told it's from Indonesia. I've never bought them because they look so...reptilian, but I do eat them although I wish someone would peel them for me. They are really quite good and fun to eat. My girl likes them (and I think of her whenever I eat salak) because they taste tarty-sweet and crunchy (they are more of a girl's fruit) and when opened, they don't smell like smelly feet. They just smell like...salak.