Biltong Gone Wrong

I think I just ate a maggot. I think WE just ate a maggot, maybe more than one. Oh. My. Gawd.

It all started out innocently enough. We were told to try this nice restaurant, la Husser Grill, in Stellenbosch with local game meat on the menu. Awesome, local stuff! We even had to make reservations because the place is so popular. We were also told we HAD to try the biltong, a cured meat, because it’s very uniquely African, or at least South African. The menu even touts they’ve been curing “our own damn biltong since 1964.”

We arrive, order a bottle of wine for R118 (~11USD) and decide to try the Biltong and the Springbok carpaccio appetizers, things you really cannot get in the States. Both appetizers came at the same time and we were a good way through when Nick stopped and pushed something on the Biltong plate aside, away from a piece of meat.

Holy cow it’s a worm. Holy crap, it’s a MAGGOT!! A maggot, wriggling around in the balsamic vinaigrette I had been dipping my meat in.

Mind you, I’m mid-chew. I have a mouthful of this stuff and we’ve already killed about two thirds of this dish. A little dry heave came up before I could stop it. Immediately I spit out the meat that I had so joyously been chewing moments before. Now I’m repulsed and fighting nausea.

I flag down our waitress and as politely as possible notify her that we have a “creepy crawly in our dish.” She immediately adopts a look of horrification and revulsion and goes to tell the chef. The chef is so polite and apologizes profusely (“I’ve never been so embarrassed in my life”) and comps our dinner for us, but I’ve still eaten a goddamn maggot. Naturally I’m Googling (a blessing and a curse) and finding out things like myiasis, maggots living through your stomach acids and trying to burrow in your GI tract. Lovely. I feel like my whole body is crawling, and I’m still trying to decide if visiting an African doctor would really help the situation or not. We’ll keep you posted. For now, it’s almost midnight and I feel as though I’m already in a bit of a nightmare. I also think I’m now a vegetarian. Pleasant dreams, friends!