Gastronauts Press Release

THE CLUB FOR ADVENTUROUS EATERS

“I don’t eat to live, I live to eat.”

Roman Maxim

www.gastronauts.net 1

ABOUT THE GASTRONAUTS

Back in the winter of 2006, we—Ben and Curtiss—organized a little dinner at

a Malaysian joint in Chinatown. We coaxed a few folks along, with the idea

that we’d like to create a venue to taste the strange and authentic foods found

on menus around this city. The idea behind the club wasn’t to eat Fear Factor

stuff, but to get people away from solely eating foods they were comfortable

with; we fi gured having friends along would amortize the awkwardness. By way

of background, Curtiss grew up in Austria/Germany/Italy, and Ben in Brazil/

Australia/Thailand, so we were both accustomed to nasty bits and odd foods. We

had six folks along that fi rst night, but soldiered on, hosting a dinner each month.

We tried to keep it pretty quiet, taking in only friends and their friends, and

shooing away media inquiries, but it grew and grew.

Today, our little club has expanded to roughly 800 people, we receive international

and domestic press requests on weekly basis, and receive a handful of applications

every day. Without exaggeration, we’re by far the biggest dining club of this sort

in the world. Our monthly dinners have an average of 70+ people (and a long

wait list) which allows us to create custom, adventurous menus with chefs and

restaurants. Take a look at the website for a glimpse at what we’ve had of late.


http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/09/nyregion/09gastronauts.html


NEW YORK (AP) - Ben Raisher [CORRECTION: BEN PAUKER] watches as the writhing Octopus on his plate has its tentacles clipped with giant shears, then squirms in amber sesame oil like a pile of bisected earthworms.With a deft pinch of his chopsticks, the wriggling, still-alive limb is in his mouth and down his throat.

Raisher, 28, smiles. It’s what brought him to his local food adventure club, one of a handful of groups dedicated to din-ing on exotic and bizarre foods from New York to Denver to San Francisco.

The iron-stomached champions of New York City are the Gastronauts, who meet monthly to feast on foods many wouldn’t consider, such as pig hearts and intestine in vinegar, goat kidneys or sauteed lamb’s brains.

“Nothing’s off the table,” said co-founder Curtiss Calleo, who grew up in Austria and Italy and wants to bring Old World curiosity to New York plates. “Any restaurant worth its salt

has sweetbreads or tongue or pork bellies. There’s a food renaissance going on.”

Offal is old hat for groups like the Boston Gastronauts and the Organ Meet Society of New York City. There are groups devoted to eating only insects and some that venture into ex-treme territory, like the San Francisco Food Adventure Club that recently organized a human placenta tasting (the dinner had to be canceled due to potential formaldehyde exposure).

Most of the adventures are in good fun, but some have pushed boundaries. Last week, federal prosecutors fi led charges against a restaurant and sushi chef accused of serv-ing endangered whale meat in Santa Monica, Calif.

The Gastronauts have more than 300 people on their mail-ing list, and nearly 50 attended the March meeting at a Korean restaurant in Queens, where gastro-warriors tried live octopus along with lobster sashimi, freshly vivisected, then displayed on the plate on a bed of lettuce in front of its

Live octopus? It’s what’s for dinner‘Nothing’s off the table’RYAN McLENDON, Associated Press Writer


meaty core. The head appears to watch the body get eaten as its antennae and claws twitch.

Delicious? Perhaps not. But that’s hardly the point.

“Boring food bores the crap out of me,” Raisher, 28, said between bites.

For Jenna Volcheff, a pastry chef who has been attending Gastronauts meetings since November, it’s a chance to taste food from different cultures “instead of going to a differ-ent country, which I can’t do on a monthly basis, or often a yearly basis.”

That wanderlust is one of the reasons adventure eating has gained popularity over the past few years, said Epicurious.com Editor Tanya Wenman Steel. “Americans are venturing around the world in increasingly far-fl ung places,” she said, trying new foods at their source.

Machismo-laced TV shows such as the Travel Channel’s “Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations” and Andrew Zimmern’s “Bizarre Foods” also push the boundaries.

“Eating as a bloodsport has become this kind of macho quest to see who can eat the most bizarre and disgusting foods,” Steel said. People have been playing with their food — and the gross-out factor — at long-standing festivals like the Waurika Rattlesnake Hunt in Oklahoma, the Road Kill Cookoff in West Virginia.

Still, while many are trying bizarre foods just to push the envelope, others are searching for authentic eats instead of boring snacks, said Kate Krader, restaurant editor for Food and Wine magazine.

“Non-challenging foods are being eaten by the truckload,” Krader said. “We’re coming out of a time of very boring food in America.”

In Denver, adventurous eaters might get whatever’s left in the kitchen of Jon Emanuel, 42, founder of the Denver Adventurous Eating Club.

“As a chef, sometimes opportunities land in you lap,” he said. “You get assorted pig parts or the random case of tongues. In these types of times, this is a responsible way to eat.”

Recently, he’s enlisted the local restaurant community. The group’s next meal at Opus restaurant will include frog curry, pork brain lettuce wraps and balut — a fertilized duck egg, poached or deep-fried, that contains a partially formed embryo.

One attendee, upon reading the menu, sent a message to Emanuel: “You had me at embryo.”

While some may fi nd the eating of brains and embryos unsavory, Emanuel said the point of adventurous eating for many is to try something new, not to get involved in the ethics of eating.

“It’s not for me to judge whether or not it’s right or wrong,” he said. “How else are you going to be exposed to these bits and pieces of culture?”

One ingredient that both Krader and Steel agree could be the next big culinary delight is insects. Within the next decade, insect eating could be as common as sushi is today.

“Insect eating in general has gone from being perceived as an extreme sport to an inexpensive snack,” Steel said.

If insects will soon fi nd their place next to the green beans, it’s only fair they should have their own eating club too. The Brooklyn Bug Biters, founded by Brooklyn-based artist Marc Dennis, specializes in concocting sweet and savory masterpieces from garden-variety insects, like silk worms and crickets. Dennis has staged several dinners where the majority of the dishes contain a sizable amount of bugs.

“They’re everywhere, they’re plentiful, why not eat them?” he asked.

Insects, high in protein and low in fat, are a healthy way to balance your diet, according to Dennis. He says people will have to get past the “yuck factor” and educate themselves on the merits — and fl avors — of an insect-based diet. “It’s matter of taste,” he said.

And experts like Steel agree. She said within the next 10 years, many bizarre food will be welcome to the table.

“There are some foods that will become part of the norms to eat,” she said. “Fried insects will be one of them.”


Watch the video at www.foodcurated.com(http://foodcurated.com/2010/06/an-eating-club-for-the-brave-the-gastronauts/)


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Gastronauts Go Whole Hog in WoodsidePosted by: admin on Jan 14, 2010

Tagged in: Woodside , pig roast , Gastronauts , Filipino

This little piggy and its sister fed 80 or so.

Special to World's Fare: On Tuesday night, Engeline’s, a wonderful Filipinorestaurant/bakery that's just a stone’s throw away from Donovan’s, an Irishpub renowned for its burgers, was the site of a porcine feast held by TheGastronauts, a club for adventurous eaters. Gastronaut Dan Kim was kind ofenough to provide World’s Fare the following dispatch about the evening’sfestivities. Take it away Dan…

It’s no surprise that the Gastronauts had a record turnout with more than 80diners at Engeline’s. We saw a lot of pork and organs on the menu and thatwas enough to RSVP as quickly as possible. We casually grabbed bottles ofSan Mig light beer and braced for the feast.

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PRATT PEOPLE

What prompted you to start Gastronauts?

Did you design the club’s clever logo?

How does the club work?

What types of people are inspired to join the club?

What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever eaten on one of your outings?

What was your favorite food when you were a student at Prattt?

Curtis CalleoM.S. Communications and Packaging Design ’06

Graphic designer and cofounder of the New York and London–based Gastronauts, “the club for adventurous eaters.”

Photographed with a giant clam at the seafood shop Aqua Best on Grand Street in Manhattan’s Chinatown.

RE

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THE MAGAZINE OF PRATT INSTITUTE


OTHER SELECTED MEDIA:

TIME OUT MAGAZINE: http://newyork.timeout.com/articles/own-this-city/80923/dinner-parties-you-can-join

NPR: http://www.npr.org/blogs/bryantpark/2008/02/fl y_in_your_soup_yes_please.html

NEW YORK MAGAZINE: http://newyork.grubstreet.com/2008/02/whats_it_take_to_get_an_edible.html

WNYC: http://culture.wnyc.org/articles/features/2010/jan/12/vegetarians-worst-nightmare-meet-gastronauts/

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/35914118/ns/today-today_food_and_wine/

http://gastronauts.net/audio/GlobalNews_31_May_10_AM_GastronautsEdited.mp3

SLASHFOODS: http://www.slashfood.com/tag/gastronauts/

SERIOUS EATS: http://newyork.seriouseats.com/tags/Gastronauts

The AP article was picked up in hundreds of papers and blogs. We’ve also been featured in several German and French television programs and magazines.


GASTRONAUTS WEBSITE


Ben Pauker Curtiss Calleo


CONTACT INFORMATION

Ben [email protected]

Curtiss [email protected]

All photos are property of Gastronauts and may only be reproduced with express written consent. More photos

available on www.gastronauts.net

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