A quick twist of the fangs and the spider is rendered poisonless. A thumb squeeze of the thorax and it is left lifeless. It is tossed onto a pile of perhaps 100 other arachnid cadavers as the cooking begins. Once they have cooled, the cooked spiders will be despatched from this countryside kitchen by motorcycle to the nearby dusty town of Skuon and touted alongside dried crickets and stuffed frogs to countless salivating punters. But those other delicacies are secondary to the spiders; treats of
the eight-legged variety are undoubtedly Skuon's most renowned product.
An hour outside Phnom Penh, unassuming Skuon sits on the main route to Angkor Wat, Cambodia's biggest tourist draw. At first it appears little more than a dust-blown truckers' stop - perhaps a dozen scruffy roadside restaurants scattered around a barren roundabout. But not much traffic passes through Skuon without stopping and the edges of the roundabout have grown increasingly indistinct as minibus after minibus skids to a stop to grab its fill of arachnid specials.
Punthea Khoeun has made the journey especially from Phnom Penh to stock up on fresh Skuon spiders. Only one, a type of tarantula known as a-ping in Khmer, is eaten. Like all spider aficionados, she rates the town's fresh produce much more highly than what is available in Phnom Penh. 'I just love them,' she says. 'And every time I pass through Skuon I have to stop.'
And like other connoisseurs, Punthea especially prizes pregnant females laden with eggs, claiming that both the nutritional value and the taste of the spider are at their best. But as dozens of arms reach out of every minibus, almost matching in number the spindly legs they crave, there are few signs of fussiness.
The origins of arachnid consumption lie in necessity rather than gourmandaise. During the years of terror and genocide instigated by the Khmer Rouge, eating spiders helped save the population of Skuon. As people were driven deeper into the jungle to avoid persecution, starvation was rife and culinary invention became essential for survival. The size of the spiders was undoubtedly their undoing - being up to 15cm across made them obvious targets - and they provided vital protein during severe shortages of more orthodox food. But although reliance on the spiders for survival is a thing of the past, the taste for them has endured, and Skuon has capitalised on it.