Thank you, Bessie, for keeping Dave and I fed for lo these many months. As some of you readers may recall, Dave entered a raffle long ago to support a friend raising money to support her choir. The top prize was a quarter of beef. "But who wins the top prize", we guffawed... only to have the answer be clear. WE won the top prize, and needed to find something to do with a quarter of a cow.
My unbelievable Tetris-skills came into play as I carefully arranged the best cuts into our tiny, tiny freezer. For a long time, our freezer was full of all the ribeye cuts, New Yorks, sirloins, roasts, ground beef and sausages that we could ever want, and we still had plenty to give away to friends and a soup kitchen.
The beef was wonderful, flavourful, and succulent, clearly speaking that our Bessie had had a happy life. How wonderful. Moreover, to think that we had so many cuts of meat, all of which originated from the same cow, was entirely strange from a North American perspective. Ground beef, for example, tends to contain hundreds of different cows. Our ground beef was all Bessie. Something feels very right about that.
We finished the last of Bessie last week, in a delicious Italian pasta sauce. Above is a picture of her being thawed beforehand. I miss her already.
Thank you, Bessie.
1 comment:
You carnivores may be interested to learn about a creature called a "beefalo" that can be bought by the quarter in Manitoba.
Don't even ask why I know this.
But if you get lonely for Bessie once you return, maybe you can find a replacement...
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