TRIPES A LA MODE DE CAEN

Tripe will always remind me of the two years I spent drifting unemployed, broken and broke, living on bi-weekly c-note netted from running a 10 hour newspaper delivery route while my wife busted her ass to pay our bills, mortgage, et cetera. If it sounds too angsty, it's only because it was. I had been shitcanned from every grad school I applied to (my grades were great; my letters of rec greater) and short fiction of the experimental variety from my pen was generating more rejection letters than I care to recall: Best of luck placing this elsewhere. It was not a happy time.

Ennui being more plentiful than money, I sought ways to stretch what little we had. Lunches of beans and rice soon became beans, rice, and trotters slow-cooked to silly gelatinous wobble in Clovis Era crockpot. Explored lesser traveled areas of the protein aisle: Jowl, heart, livers, and tripes. Tried several sorts of tripes. The honeycomb, which appears to be bovine reticulum. The bible leaf - a spectacular moniker, no? - which appears to be omasum, or bovine's third stomach compartment that serves in absorption of water and minerals. And finally the reed sort, also spoken of as abomasum - a fourth compartment that secretes rennet, which gives this rotten world its fresh cheese.

Honeycomb is a favorite. Cooked it many ways. Stewed with summer tomatoes and crushed red pepper. Simmered in wine. Boiled in beer and juniper. Easy to deal with, easier to eat. Surprising, I suppose, since so many people are frightened of it. I'll suggest sampling it at your local Dim Sum before taking the home cooked plunge. But when you do, put your best foot forward and attempt Tripes A la Mode De Caen. A Norman dish, Tripes A la Mode de Caen combines pounds of honeycomb tripes, trotters, onions, carrots, cider, and calvados. A painfully long stew of 10 hours on the stove, where the swimcap like stuff breaks down into fibrous whatness, cracking open and soaking up sauce much like some mollusk-shaped pasta yet to be designed.

Assemblage is key here. Line the bottom of a large dutch oven clockwise with chopped yellow onions, then a layer of chopped carrots, then your trotters - cleaned and trimmed of hair - and your tripes. Cover with Norman cider and a few glugs of calvados. (It's difficult for me to keep calvados in my house, so I substituted cognac.) Toss in a few white peppercorns. Some whole allspice and juniper. The trotters will release their natural gelatin and thicken the cooking liquid. Most - if not all - of the onions will break down completely. The tripes will brown and wither, but will absorb all the appley flavor and rooty, sweetness of the carrots.

I add another step and finish this on the stove top. While the coooking liquid reduces, chop the tripes into half-inch pieces. When the liquid is reduced by half, add a knob of butter and incorporate. Thyme, parsley to the sauce. Return the tripes to the liquid and fold. What remains is a weave of tripes and carrots and mushy onions held together in a velvety brown sauce. Serve with plain boiled potatoes tossed in olive oil and parsley. Reflect on your station in life. Be thanful, and bon appetit.

Sur ta demande, Jeanneton,
Je t’écris pour te donner
La recette des tripes à la mode.
Pour cuire de bonne façon,
Parfaitement selon le code,
Pieds de bœuf, feuillet,
Les mulettes et le bonnet.
En vue de cette ripaille,
À l’eau claire bien lavés
Coupe en morceaux carrés
Toute cette tripaille,
Carottes, oignons en rouelles,
Poireaux, bouquet garni,
Clous de girofle, céleri.
Alors, ma toute belle,
De la pote en terre,
Tapissé de beurre frais,
Va monter l’odeur des prés.
Avec onction à ce mélange
De produits du cru,
Dispense de calva un verre,
Couvre l’édifice de pur jus.
D’un bon sel modérément,
De poivre moulu abondant,
Assaisonne cette vendange.
Douze heures de cuisson au four
D’un boulanger d’alentour.
Il importe au bout de ce temps
Que le jus onctueux, doré,
Réduit, odorant, corsé
Baigne ce mets truculent.
Tu serviras cette merveille
Dans des assiettes brûlantes.
Et voici, ô ma charmante,
La recette sans pareille
Que m’a léguée un mien parent
Des tripes à la mode de Caen.