What I’d invite you to consider today, at least hypothetically, even from a distance, is roadkill, and why it isn’t as taboo or foul as it’s made out to be. Contrary to the jokes and stigma culture would have us believe, eating roadkill is completely safe with a basic knowledge of food safety, and…
Offal
Brain Fritters with Gruyere, Lemon and Sage
If you’ve never eaten brains, but are curious about them, these fritters should be the first thing on your list to make. If you’re a seasoned eater of elusive cranial sweets, you can probably say hello to your new favorite brain recipe. The key with brains, at least for me, in trying to serve them…
Brain Salad with Herbs and Pickled Peppers (Salade de Cervelle)
Nothing conjurs up the appetite like a canape of cold, chilled brains, am I right? In all seriousness, I’m serious about normalizing offal, and, as brains are some of the most obscure, wiggly, and to most, ghoulish of organ meats, I’m trying to build a section of this site that can show how to cook…
Smoked Venison Shank and Trotter Terrine
I love a good chunk of charcuterie, and this year’s wealth of venison has been crying out to be made into a sliceable terrine en gelee./aspic. The venison trotters I mention in this post are chock-ful of collagen, making them the perfect thing to help bind a chilled headcheese-style terrine. You could definitely make a…
Venison Trotters
Today, for your viewing pleasure, I present one of the most enjoyable culinary rabbit holes I’ve been down in a very long time. Behold the lowly deer foot, also called venison trotters or Bambi tootsies. Yes, you can eat the feet of deer, including what’s inside the hoof, and, although it might sound bizarre to…
Scrapple
Do you like bacon? Pancakes? Crispy, browned things cooked on a griddle? Maple syrup? Of course you do, so fasten your seatbelt and come aboard Alan’s organ train, because we’re traveling to scrapple country. if you like offal, shoot, even if you don’t partake in the finer parts (sucks air through teeth) if you’ve never…
Venison Braunshweiger Dumplings
I’m always looking out for interesting ways to serve liver to people that don’t think they like offal, and these traditional German dumplings are a great way to do that. Liver and kidneys, especially from ruminants like deer, lamb and goat, are some of the hardest to get people to like, and alot of times…
Smoked Rocky Mountain Oysters
Fries, rocky mountain oysters, eggs, cowboy oysters, balls, or gonads, whatever you call them, the technical name is testicles, and if you’re here, you’re probably looking for a way to eat them. Congratulations, because this is hands-down the best recipe for rocky mountain oysters I’ve ever had–and I’ve eaten plenty. The first ones I had…
Wild Rice Blood Sausage
Black pudding, mutura, kaszanka, boudin rouge, zungenwurst, blutvurst, biroldo, morcilla, sanguinaccio. Across cultures, historical preparations for blood sausage will be found just about anywhere animals are harvested. And those are just sausage, don’t even get me started on the legion of other sanguine-devoted cultural specialties. Like most meat eaters, I love homemade sausage, and, once…
How to Prepare Rocky Mountain Oysters (Testicles)
The first testicle I ever ate would be the last one I ate for nearly a decade. I was still at St. Pauls Heartland Restaurant, which was a nose-to-tail palace of Midwestern Cuisine the likes of which will probably never be seen again. We cooked with only whole animals, and everything was used. Everything. Well,…
Unlaid Eggs
For the most part, we don’t appreciate older animals much. We want things young, tender, and easy to chew. Old dairy cattle are an unwanted, tough by-product of industry, the same goes for old milking ewes (and their unwanted male offspring necessary to keep them producing goat milk for cheese). Old laying hens are the…
Cibreo: Renaissance Chicken Livers on Toast
Cibreo, also known as everything-but-the-cluck stew, is an interesting Italian sauce off the beaten path of the usual tomato sauces, ragus, sugos, and things you might associate with Italian cooking. It’s a literal, visceral celebration of chicken, and speaks to a time when nothing was wasted. Not. A. Thing. This version is basically a little…
Venison Heart Bolognese
I love coming up with creative ways to introduce people to eating offal, and venison heart Bolognese is one of my new favorites. Many recipes don’t, especially those designed for Americans, gut my Bolognese (as I was taught by my chef from Rome, Angelo) always incorporates a little bit of offal, typically chicken liver, but…