30/11/2007

Whale of a curry for Japanese

TOKYO: Whale curry made its debut as a takeaway business lunch hereyesterday, attracting curious customers who seldom eat the meat amid aninternational row over hunting the giant mammals.

Asian Lunch, which says it sells 1,000 to 1,500 lunch boxes daily inbusiness districts, offered South Asian-style keema curry with groundwhale in a trial for the meat.

Dozens of customers, aged mostly in their 20s to 40s, ordered whalecurry sold on a van at a cost of 650 yen to 700 yen (RM19 to RM21) a box.

When asked about the international furore over Japan's whaling,24-year-old engineer Hiroki Nakashima said: "I understand foreign peopledon't like this, the same way that many Japanese don't like Koreanseating dog meat. But I have no prejudice against whale meat."

Another customer said: "I wondered for a second if it was really okayto eat whales, but I'm curious." - AFP