Sweetbreads, kidneys, tongue, heart, brain

[donrad]

I am thinking of ordering bulk grass fed meat, like a side. The supplier offers organ meats - sweetbreads, kidneys, testicles, brain, tongue, liver, heart & tallow. Does anyone have experience or advice on eating these raw?

I have read numerous accounts where primitive people preferred the internal organs and would feed the muscle to the dogs, and would not even eat the muscle if was too lean.

[TylerDurden]

Well, all I can state is that raw brain is an acquired taste(looks and feels like porridge, IMO). Of course, I never got hold of genuine grassfed raw brain, just raw, grainfed pigs' brain. Sweetbreads(ie thymus/pancreas) I found similiarly bland in taste, testicles were awful(I only managed to get raw testicles from wild stags but they were impossible to chew and rank in taste). Don't touch tallow ever - tallow is just heated/rendered suet and is 100% anathema to rawpalaeodieters, being full of heat-created toxins etc. The other organs are fine, such as raw tongue etc. Many RAFers, like me, also tend to have a preference for raw marrow(the creamy kind, not the dry kind) instead of raw suet, just a thought.

[JaX]

Many RAFers, like me, also tend to have a preference for raw marrow(the creamy kind, not the dry kind) instead of raw suet, just a thought.

What determines if the marrow is going to be creamy or dry - what factor is most important: what bone it is, age of animal, the breed? I only rarely get the creamy kind but how do you ask the butcher or farmer to give you the specific creamy kind every time?

[goodsamaritan]

What determines if the marrow is going to be creamy or dry - what factor is most important: what bone it is, age of animal, the breed? I only rarely get the creamy kind but how do you ask the butcher or farmer to give you the specific creamy kind every time?

In my case, I go to 2 wet markets.  The variety of the cows they get in Marikina wet market have creamy bone marrow.  So this is where I buy when I want creamy bone marrow.

[donrad]

I am more interested in the nutrition. I believe the body will respond beautifully to food that meets its core needs. The internal organs have huge amounts of nutrients compared to the muscles.

I shot a rabbit a week ago. I butchered it immediately. The liver was fantastic warm (I cut out the little purple sac). My ex-wife once cooked beef kidneys that smelled so bad I had to leave the house. The raw rabbit kidneys tasted mild and great. I was unsure about the lungs and stomach, and did not eat them. The heart was very good raw and warm. I did not try to get to the brain. I am learning about the other parts that may be too small to consider on a rabbit but that might be large on a cow.

The rabbit muscle was tough and tasteless, even after aging a couple days. Rabbits have a very very low muscle fat content.

I find lots of internet information on internal organs but they usually cook them to death.

Intestines are/were used for sausage casings. Most is synthetic now.

So much of the knowledge of hunter & gatherer & fisher culture has been lost. What wild plants and insects are good for me? Bad for me? How do I eat a buffalo?

Sea plants ...

Seafood...

 

[TylerDurden]

Well, why not try shooting wild hares? They taste absolutely lovely. I admit I prefer them with a little extra fat like raw eggs or marrow, but that's just bhedging my bets.

[TylerDurden]

What determines if the marrow is going to be creamy or dry - what factor is most important: what bone it is, age of animal, the breed? I only rarely get the creamy kind but how do you ask the butcher or farmer to give you the specific creamy kind every time?

Well, quite frankly, I don't have the guts to specify what kind of marrow I get from each (100% grassfed) farmer. About all I can do is pluck up the courage to ask that they select bones with lots of marrow in them(I make it clear that I'm only interested in the marrow, not the bone). This is because of the fact that raw  suet, and especially raw marrow, are extremely rare to find in UK farms due to excessive, costly, government regulations, so I dare not antagonise the farmer(after all, suet amd marrow are sold at such cheap prices, usually, that I don't want to take liberties).
I've been told that marrow from older animals is less creamy and there's a remark from Stefansson's book:-
 "but the explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson describes two types of marrow, one type from the lower leg which is soft "more like a particularly delicious cream in flavor" and another from the humerus and femur that is "hard and tallowy at room temperatures" (The Fat of the Land, page 27)"

[donrad]

Well, why not try shooting wild hares? They taste absolutely lovely. I admit I prefer them with a little extra fat like raw eggs or marrow, but that's just bhedging my bets.

The ones I shoot are wild. They are in my garden. I am trying to expand my territory.

[TylerDurden]

Even wild rabbit-meat doesn't compare to the taste of wild hare meat. I've had both.