(Okay, maybe not God. Or god. Or whatever. Maybe just Steve, the nice, cute butcher down the road, who reminds you that life is meant to be lived in moderation.)
We were never big eaters of odd cuts, or offal, in my family; most Jews aren’t, with the exception of chopped chicken liver. For me, it wasn’t a religious thing: once, when I was eleven, my father took me out to Brooklyn for lunch at my grandmother’s house, and she served me a brain on a plate. Just like that. Brain. Plate. Knife. Fork. I had just seen Young Frankenstein at The Ziegfield. I’ve written about that here, but it was a pretty memorable afternoon, and very much informed the way I felt about variety meats.
