Excuse Me, Waiter, There's a Poppy in My Soup

 

Some of you know that I used to be a pharmacist in a past life. To be clear, I’m using “past life” as a figure of speech, not in a woo-woo spiritual kind of way. Although I DO believe that our souls come to experience life on Earth many times before our souls finally get to rest and retire. Of course, I have no way to validate that. I suppose nobody really does. That thought just makes me feel happy and less stressed.

I also believe that we carry over emotions and feelings from past lives into this one. Like, I suspect that I probably died in a violent car crash in a past life, and that explains why I am such a nervous car passenger. You see, I just can’t help it. I work so hard not to freak out when someone else is driving that I am usually exhausted by the time we arrive at our destination. My kids all thought it was very helpful and wonderful the way I screamed and cowered and insisted on wearing a helmet when they were learning to drive. A hundred million times more stressful than potty training for all parties involved.

I am pretty sure I have never been a pharmacist in a past life. It is only in this life that I became a pharmacist to learn that I don’t like being a pharmacist very much.

I don’t regret the experience at all. I’m actually very grateful for all the relevant and useful information I learned and the experiences I had as a pharmacist. The day I graduated from pharmacy school, my brother-in-law said, “Congratulations! What do we call you now? A drug dealer?” I think the word he was looking for was "druggist."

I actually am quite a geek when it comes to drugs. And I have also told you before about how much I love noodles. So you will understand why this story intrigued me. A restaurant owner in China…..because WHERE ELSE??....got in trouble for using opium as a secret ingredient in his noodle recipe to add a little flavor. Oh, yeah, and also to make his customers addicted in order to increase business.

The restaurateur got in trouble after one of his customers got pulled over for a DUI and tested positive for morphine, the active ingredient in opium. The customer was tossed in the slammer for 15 days, adamant that he didn’t take drugs, but the cops didn’t believe him.

So what did this poor fellow do? He sent his family to the noodle shop to eat the drugged noodles, after which they also tested positive for morphine. A family that BLAZES together STAYSES together.

After the family reported the finding, the police went to the noodle shop to investigate. The police seized a packet of snail powder which actually contained poppy seed powder. Now, HOLD UP A MINUTE. Did you say that the poppy seed powder was being disguised as snail powder?

I have been Chinese for over 50 years and JUST WTF IS SNAIL POWDER and why is this in a restaurant? Let's learn about this together, shall we?

Luosifen is a noodle dish served in a soup made by stewing pork bones and river snails for many hours. JUST. WHY. As if that’s not nasty enough, some other ingredients in snail powder include sour bamboo shoots, peanuts, and dried radishes, tangerine peel, anise, and ginger.

The restaurant owner ground poppy husks to make this powder himself. Wait, is this possible? OK, here’s your poppy anatomy lesson. We all know that opium comes from a certain species of poppy. Opium is the sticky sap from the seed pod and contains a high concentration of opiates (like morphine and codeine).

After the sap is extracted, the husk can be dried. Poppy husks are usually used for decorative purposes, but apparently can also be ground up and added to soup to low-key roofie people. Here is a poppy husk wreath I found on Pinterest. It’s not exactly my style, but maybe it looks better after you’ve slurped down a big bowl of noodle soup.

And then there are the poppy seeds that are inside the husk. Poppy seeds don’t contain morphine but sometimes they absorb opium or are coated during harvesting. About 90% of the opium is removed during processing, but this is why poppy seed bagels and muffins can cause a problem if consumed within about 24 hours before drug tests. It takes about 40 grams of poppy seeds (about 1/3 cup) to equal about 10mg morphine. That is an awful lot of bagels. It would be hard to distinguish whether you're actually high on morphine or you're just in a carbohydrate coma.

In the end, the restaurant owner fessed up to spiking his soup and spent 10 days in jail. That’s five days fewer than the guy who got busted for just eating the soup in case you’re keeping track. Apparently, lacing food with opium isn’t uncommon in China. At least three dozen other restaurants have also been investigated for this sneaky soup scam.

Please do not feed drugs to people without their permission.

Thank you for reading, my friends!