Wednesday, May 12, 2010

let them eat cake dirt

Indonesian village snacks on soil for better health
In Indonesia, soil is not just a raw material for bricks and ceramics, it's also a snack that one family has been making for generations.

Tuban, in East Java Province, is the only village that produces "ampo," a snack made from clean, gravel-free dark earth collected from nearby paddy fields.

Although there is no medical evidence, villagers believe the soil snacks are an effective pain-killer and pregnant women are encouraged to eat them as it is believed to refine the skin of the unborn baby.

There is no real recipe: makers of the snack use a wooden stick to pound the soil into a hard, solid mass.

Rolls of dirt are then scraped off the with a bamboo dagger, baked and smoked in large clay pot for half and hour and then they're ready to serve.

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