TAILS

Ever seen a whole oxtail at the market? It looks like a flesh duncecap. Frightening.

Take the butcher's knife to that hat and carve our as many inch-and-a-half cuts as you can. Season the TAILS with salt and pepper. Brown them on all sides. A three to four hour braise in chicken stock or wine works well. Toss in some whole peppercorns, juniper, bay leaves.

I used brown chicken stock and made a gravy. Added fresh butter beans and shredded the TAILS over top. Parsely. Fleur de Sel. Glass of ale. Ah, looks like springtime.

Photo: TAILS & Beans!

LIVER & ONIONS 02

Would that calves liver were as easy to find in whole lobes at your good ol' suburban grocer. Not the case. What's there is a vacuum packed mess of liver slivers so thin they barely survive the necessary thaw.

Follow the Justin boots and Resistol hats to the Hispanic grocer. They may not be able to say a single word of Anglais, but they'll point you in the general direction of fresh livers - an abundance actually.

Now don't render them worthless by overcooking. Control yourself. If blood isn't slowly seeping from the organ to your plate, you may as well be eating a bicycle tire. Add some carmelized onions, horseradish sauce. Salud.

Below: Bleed for Me!

HOUGH

Potted meat for sophisticates? I can't say. I'm partial to the unsophisticated stuff, too. This one appears to be of Scottish origin and doesn't come in a small pull top tin can. And with the gas range adding hundreds of dollars to the monthly bill, I've gone to a crock pot for the long slow cook. Great.

Basically your braise is a few beef shin, two trotters (split), aromatic vegetables, water, and 1/2 a bottle of drinkable red. This cooked at the low setting overnight. About six to seven hours.

Came home from work and pulled the meat from the pot. Chopped it all up. Salvaged the skin and bits of meat from the trotter bones. Chopped it all up. Mixed. Seasoned aggresively with salt, pepper, cayenne, mace. Chopped it all up. Added some cooking liquid. Chopped it all up.

Grabbed a bread tin and smoothed the beef/trotter mixture into the receptacle. A ladle of cooking liquid over the top. Covered with cling film, foil. Layed soup tins over the top to shape it. One day in the fridge.

Ate with fresh bread, butter; wilted watercress, some dijon mustard.