"offal" news and stories

Bruschetta. Photo: YumSugar

Each Thursday, we round up a selection of scrumptious links from our friends over at YumSugar. Here's what they've got cooking this week:

A photographic journey through San Francisco's new Thursday farmers' market with a focus on artisanal street food.

Definition: Offal (not "awful"!) is the entrails and organs of a butchered animal.

Che Guevara becomes trendy once again as his granddaughter bares it all for PETA.

Could Right Gin be the right way to learn gin appreciation?

Finally! Heirloom tomatoes are coming into season, and YumSugar offers a bunch of dishes featuring them.

Calling all tv trays: Do you eat dinner in front of the television?

Perhaps this is just indicative of the sort of folks with whom I keep company, but I've known at least half a dozen people who've used a brain can as comedic decor, and it's certainly been the butt of jokes around the blogosphere. I cannot, however, recollect any of 'em actually popping the top and feasting. My husband's Aunt Frances, though, couldn't get enough of them as a kid in Plymouth, NC, and told me how she'd hover right by her mother in the kitchen so she could gobble down brains and eggs straight out of the hot skillet.

Who am I to argue with Aunt Frances? I picked up the can in the picture above at Harris Teeter over Christmas in North Carolina, and fixed myself some brains and eggs for breakfast this morning. Picture after the jump.

Time Magazine reports, with a soupçon of punny glee, that sales of offal in Great Britain have surged as of late, likely in response to the international economic downturn. Quoth London's Liz Logan:

"Tough economic times have Britons eating their hearts out and swallowing their tongues. Not literally, of course. But offal - or "variety meats," as the food category is euphemistically called in the U.K. - is experiencing a surge in popularity, with sales up 67% over the past five years."

Thing is, even in advance of the pound sterling's plunge, the nose-to-tail herd, helmed by offal stalwarts like Fergus Henderson and River Cottage's Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, had been squealing 'bout the culinary benefits of tripe, kidneys, brains, tail, giblets and trotters. Come for the savings, stay for the savoring -- the message seems to have come home to roost.

I posted a while back about my love of grilled chicken hearts, and I'm no stranger to whisking up a batch of giblet gravy, or a neckbone ragout, but I'm hungry for your favorite takes on organ meats. Post 'em in the comments below.

[via: Time]

Thank you to Flickr user vvvanessa for uploading this drool-inducing image to the Slashfood pool.

Giblet gravy recipe after the jump.

I'm not gonna pretend that this picture is pretty, or in the least bit appetizing, but I will note that the results are disturbingly delicious. The heart of the matter is that I went to a cookout a few weekends ago and was offered a grilled chicken heart by a friend who has yet to serve me anything that is less than madly tasty. Emboldened by this, I picked up a package of chicken hearts on a shopping jaunt this week, and started perusing my favorite recipe sites for marinades. It didn't take me long to find a 1956 James Beard recipe suggesting that these would make a dandy appetizer for a group of 25. Twenty-five of whom, I'm not entirely sure, 'cause even as staunchly carnivorous as my pals tend to be, few of 'em dig getting their offal on as much as I do, and I wouldn't subject them to it. There are exceptions, though.

Some friends came over this afternoon to serve as panel members for AOL Food's upcoming Hot Dog Taste Test. As I tended the grill between rounds, one of them began holding forth about how methods of barbecuing and grilling really were born of the necessity to bring greater flavor to cheap and previously discarded cuts of meat, and how folks were getting way too fancy-schmancy with the whole thing these days. I left my post at the flames, walked him to the fridge, pulled out the plastic container full of marinating hearts and started putting them on bamboo skewers.

He shut up and started eating.

James Beard's 1956 Grilled Chicken Hearts Recipe on Epicurious

(Note: In the above pic, I was out of sherry and subbed in brandy, which proved perfectly yummy.)

• Beef stews from around the world.
• The world of offal.
• A close-up look at the grill of the Deluxe Town Diner in Watertown.
• The Plonk of the Month.
• Restaurant reviews: Isaac's on the Waterfront, Georgie Ds Place, and 65 Main and Dog Bar.
• This week's recipes: Chocolate Brownie Custards, Chocolate Souffle Cakes, New Year's Rice Cake, and Molten Chocolate Cakes.