Nantes (AFP)

Testicles of bulls, wine to mice or epoisses: disgusting foods for some but delicious for others are presented in an exhibition in Nantes that explores the links between our cultural and food habits.

"One of the really fascinating things about the concept of disgust is that it's really determined by our culture: the things you've grown up with, you're going to find them delicious and often something foreign, weird and different you will look disgusting, "said Samuel West, psychologist and curator of the exhibition" Disgusting Food Museum ".

This museum, born in Sweden a year ago and has already traveled to Los Angeles, also aims to "get people to realize that we must move towards new sources of protein better for the environment, such as insects or laboratory-grown meat, "said director Andreas Ahrens.

"These things may seem disgusting to you at first, but if you're open-minded and tasting, it's actually pretty good," says Ahrens.

In addition to the free visit of the exhibition, presented in Nantes from September 25 to November 3, before leaving for Las Vegas, it is possible to taste for 3 euros fermented shark meat or anal gland liquor. beaver.

"When you enter this exhibition, you are given a bag of vomit as entrance ticket," warned Astrid Gingembre, project director of the Voyage à Nantes which hosts the Disgusting Food Museum as part of the festival "The tables of Nantes ".

Among foods from around the world, French cuisine is well represented with steak tartare, snails, roquefort, epoisses or foie gras, judged morally disgusting by some because of its manufacturing process.

Still on the issue of moral disgust, one can see the reproduction of a wooden table used in China to eat monkey brain.

"It's an illegal practice nowadays to take a monkey, put it on a table, immobilize it, open the skull and eat the brain while it's still alive," he said. told Andreas Ahrens.

This eclectic selection, which also includes testicles of bulls and cobra hearts, is also an olfactory experience since jars can be opened to smell most foods.

© 2019 AFP