Pig Ears

I get to do the cooking around the house. The wife does not like to cook. Living with me is not the easiest thing in the world and since I like her and want to keep her happy, I cook. That means I also do most of the grocery shopping. I also usually take the step-kids to the grocery. Now, while at Harvest on Columbus I am trying to show the ten year old why he needs to work on his reading and show him a container. He reads the words. His eyes get big. Pork brains! He asks can we get them? Well, we do. Turns out the kids like them. Luckily, I had a great aunt show me how to fix brains and eggs.

Well, that was last summer. Since then we began to notice what I would call exotic stuff but my older relatives would probably laugh at calling them exotics. Seems that brains and eggs were once - fifty plus years ago - the standard Sunday breakfast in my dad's parent's home. The aforementioned great aunt loved her pig's feet. I do remember the old Matthhew's grocery carrying pig ears and tail and cow tongue but that was about thirty years ago.

So what I am calling exotic meats? Well, Payless and Harvest have got beef tongue. That started last summer. More recently, Payless and Harvest are both carrying pig feet. Payless has something called pig maws. Harvest has pig tails. Payless has what I call mountain oysters. Harvest has pig ears. (I probably ought to say the Harvest on Columbus does, I have not checked out the Harvest on Scatterfield for about a month or so).

I have not idea why we are suddenly seeing all these spare pork parts in our local groceries. None of them have logos from national producers. I assume that they are local product. By local product, I mean Indiana pork producers and not just Madison County farmers. This article in the Washington Post says this is a big trend. Maybe Anderson is on the cutting edge of culinary delights?

I do know that the wife has told me in no uncertain terms what would happen to me if I fix any pig ears for her. Like, I said, I got to keep her happy. No telling her what she would do if I bought the hog's head that Harvest has in its freezer section!