Thankfully, the building was smack-bang in the middle of town, where mediocre lunchtime fare is never far away. Whilst meandering down a road I never go down, I stumbled across a no-frills Persian restaurant. Peering through the window, I saw that they had more staff than customers, and dusty, plastic fruit dangling from the walls; never really a good sign, but the menu looked lush and so in I went.
I ordered the homemade falafel and houmous, which was served up with the best, fresh flat-bread that I've ever tasted. So yummy. However, this is no happy-ever-after ending; everything went tragically downhill when I saw 'yogurt drink' on the menu. No further description. Shall I chance it? I thought. Would it be something savoury like salted lassi (adore), or something sweet and thick like mango lassi or strawberry Yop (also adore). I ordered it blind, figuring that whatever came would be delicious. But when it eventually arrived... Oh my god! It tasted bad. So bad, in fact, that I feared I'd fallen foul of a mean prank. I stopped short of spitting it back into the glass, and wiping my tongue on the serviette.
Bafflingly, people actually drink this stuff for pleasure. When I arrived back at work, I Googled 'Persian yogurt drink' and discovered that it's called a doogh or a dugh, and contains nothing but carbonated water, yogurt and salt. But I swear that mine was laced. It tasted like three-day-old Lambrini leftovers mixed with a gob of yogurt and doused with salt. Like fizzy, alcoholic vomit - glammed up with ice and a straw. I'm actually shuddering at the taste memory; it's been ages since I've had an eye-wideningly-awful taste sensation like this one. So, what have I learned? I've learned that curiosity doesn't always bring rewards. Sometimes it takes a running jump, and bites you hard and square in the mouth with its fizzy teeth.Image credited to: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ario/148475191/
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