Going With My Gut

Adventures of the Evil Eye Goat

Hyderabad, India. We're guests at an extended family member's wedding. Belief in nazur (evil eye) -- instigated by envy -- is strong in these parts. To protect auspicious events, rites are conducted or else donations are made to the poor, to nullify the nazur. A small example: just before Babs's sister and I set out for the evening in our pretty saris, the wizened old housekeeper where we were staying, took a cast-iron pan and fanned us in long downward strokes and tapped the pan on the ground while we faced North, South, East then West. She was chanting the whole time -- I guess to extract nazur vibes and banish them into the ground.

To nix any potential nazur cast on the wedding couple, the groom's family bought a goat. Come the end of the wedding ceremony, the goat was to be hoisted and circled in front of the wedding couple in a ferris-wheel like motion. The evil-infused goat was then to be taken to the butcher and killed, and its meat distributed to the poor. (How poor do you have to be to be happy to eat accursed meat, I wonder?)

'Twas roundabout midnight when we bade farewell to the sacrificial goat in the banquet hall parking lot. I can't even make up what happened after.

At some point between midnight and 2.30am someone notices that the goat has gone missing. Panic ensues. The groom's family's driver sets out on foot to hunt down the goat.

He scurries here and there, and comes across a cluster of shanty huts. He describes the goat, and asks if they've seen it wandering around. They all say no.

Except a rather loud and incriminating "mmmmmm..e..hhhhhhh" sounds from one of the huts. (I suppose the goat was distinctly unimpressed.) The driver barges in, and whaddaya know, there's the goat, tied up, with its unmistakeable band of blue dye across its head between its ears.

Some kind of argument ensues. The driver manages to take the goat back to the banquet hall. He ties it to a car, and instructs his son to guard it with his life.

2.30am. The family photo shoot is finally done, and it's time for the nazur ceremony. The goat is trotted over to the wedding couple. Family members by now are exhausted. And perhaps too generous about their goat donation -- after a series of attempts, it seems no one in the family is able to lift the goat, let alone whirl it around the couple.

A decision is made, then announced to whoever's left at the banquet hall. Whoever can lift the goat to do the nazur ceremony can keep the goat.

The driver of the hired wedding Mercedes steps forward. He lifts the goat. The ceremony is conducted. Huzzah! Mr Mercedes pops his reward into the boot, the wedding couple into the car, then leads the wedding convoy to the local fancy hotel for the night.

Now, since Mumbai got attacked by terrorists in November 2008, fancy hotels have all ramped up security in a big way. This hotel, in particular, demands that all incoming cars pop their hoods and boots for inspection.

Mr Mercedes tells the security guard "I have nothing in my boot, but I cannot open it."

This doesn't go down well, as you might imagine. A back-and-forth ensues. And escalates. Until finally the security guard grabs the car keys from Mr Mercedes to open the boot himself.

The goat -- doomed to begin with, kidnapped once already, then used as a cosmic sponge for evil, then transported in a car like a kidnap victim all over again -- is by now somewhere between panicked as shit and mad as hell and lunges at the security guard. The guard apparently shrieks like a girl and falls over backwards. Wedding party reinforcements stop guffawing just enough to wrestle boot and booty back down. The rest of the convoy is waved through because the security guard doesn't want to know what might be lurking in the other cars.

The groom got a telling-off from his father the next day. Not because the goat got nicked. Not because of nearly botched ceremony. Not because of the late night palava with hotel security. What really, really got the father's goat, was the groom sleeping so late that he missed the hotel's complimentary buffet breakfast. Then ordered room service.

Kenyan Goat Feast -- For Farewell Floyd: Food Blogging Event

Prologue:

• First things first. This is not going to be a pretty blog post. As a meat eater I decided it was important for me to experience something like this at some point, to see if I could face the reality of the process of getting meat to my plate. Vegetarians and animal lovers, proceed with caution.

• Thanks to Julia Parsons (A Slice of Cherry Pie) and James Brewer (Back to the Chopping Board) for coordinating this food blogging event to honour the late Keith Floyd. I was heartbroken when the original deadline passed and I had not yet gotten access to electricity and internet to post this while WWOOFing on Rusinga Island in West Kenya, but was delighted to see the deadline extension. Huzzah!

• This post is dedicated to my Dad, with whom I used to watch Keith Floyd's culinary adventures around the world. We'd always have a good chuckle at his "wing it and swig it" approach to cooking and life. I'd like to think that Dad watches me undertake my many a hare-brained adventure with a similar bemusement.

• Finally, this goat feast was very much a team effort. Thanks to Michael Odula for helping us source the goat, Samuel Odula for showing Babs how to kill it with minimal suffering, our fellow volunteers Dan and Cyrill for first raising the idea, co-financing this whopping 1,500 Kenyan shilling (~£13) enterprise, and being amazing comrades-in-arms throughout our stint. Finally thanks to the kids -- Michael Jr, Tanya, Gloria et al for being fabulous team players on the day.

So. Our fellow WWOOFer Dan walks into our living room on Rusinga Island in West Kenya one day and says "Hey I heard these WWOOFers back in July bought a whole goat and BBQed it. Are you interested in us pitching in to get one too?"

I say "YES", probably about as fast as I said yes when Babs proposed. Just possibly a wee bit faster.

And then Babs ups the ante (as he does): "Yes, but only if we buy a live goat and I get to kill the goat myself."

The week leading up to feast day was surprisingly unhyped. We simply agreed on a budget for a medium-sized goat and our homestay host Michael Odula spent a morning and an afternoon asking around if anyone in the neighbourhood had a goat from their flock for sale. He appointed his youngest son Samuel to help us through the kill.

D-Day. Our goat had arrives before breakfast. We went out to find it chilling out and snacking on a bush. Samuel reckons it weighs about 50kg. I get Babs to pose next to it for perspective.

Samuel takes the goat out to a stone plateau behind the Odula house and trusses it up. Under his guidance, Babs cuts deep into the goat's throat with Dan's camping knife. The key thing here is to cut right through the jugular. It's a steady hand and a sharp blade, and the goat stops moving in less than 3 minutes. There's less of a blood spurt than we expected.

Being behind the camera provides a strange sense of detachment but it's still a fairly intense experience watching my first food-animal kill. I wasn't sure if I would feel nauseous (I didn't) or feel huge pangs of guilt (I didn't either, given the goat had lived outdoors all its life, had a quick death, and we were damn well going to eat it nose to tail.)

It could have been scarier. Had we been with a more traditional tribe, they would have cut a pouch of skin under the goat's neck to catch the blood, then drink it as part of the ritual. I'm not ready to go that native.

A moment of solemn silence, and then Babs unties the goat in preparation for the next task...

...Skinning it. This requires some help from Michael Jr (back) and a neighbour (front) to hold up the legs while gentle but firm slits are made down the middle of the belly and down each leg.

Next, the shoulders are removed at the joints -- surprisingly easily, says Babs.

And now to remove the belly flap. This is to be done with great care so as not to puncture the stomach and contaminate the meat with half-digested stomach contents.

Samuel removes the guts into one neat pile.

Samuel and Babs section the ribs and joint the legs.

A neighbourhood dog gets a treat of spleen, lungs and kidneys. Later I remove the hooves and he comes back for those. He proceeds to follow me around for the rest of the day...hoping.

Samuel and Babs do the initial round of cleaning out half-digested greens from the small intestines. There's a lot of it. The smell, while not knock-you-out overpowering, is distinct and sticks in your head. Now I can always smell a goat (or their poop) that's anywhere in a 10m radius.

And now to empty out and scrape clean(ish) the stomach....all 4 of them.

Samuel and Babs wash and scrape fat from the goatskin, then nail it as high as they can on a nearby tree in the hope that the dogs won't get to it overnight. Idiotically we forgot this when we left -- we've asked Cyrill to wear it home to Frankfurt as a cape or something. Very Heart of Darkness, no?

Mama Odula panfries the liver for lunch on her charcoal cooker. She also stews whatever goat meat bits that won't be used for the nyama choma (Kenyan-style BBQ) dinner. The stomach and guts need a long hard soak and scrub before they'll be ready for cooking.

After lunch I get down to marinading the legs and ribs. Am keeping it simple as Floyd would have done. Wash the meat thoroughly. Place in basin. Pour Coca Cola into basin to tenderise the meat. Swig the rest of the bottle. This cooking with Coke business amuses the kids to no end. Floyd might have used local Tusker beer instead, but there was none available at our neighbourhood trading post.

Anyway, back to it. Divide 4-6 large garlic cloves into thick slices, make deep incisions in the legs, and stuff the garlic into the slits. Rub a generous amount of Royco mchuzi mix, the ubiquitous food seasoning found in these parts... Royco is a Unilever powdered concoction of constarch, salt, sugar, coriander cinnamon, fennel seeds, tumeric, ginger, garlic, cumin, methee seeds, flavour enhancers -- must be MSG I reckon -- and permitted food colouring, whatever that is.

I rope in Tanya to wave away the flies while the meat soaks.

Dan and Babs dig a hole for the fire in our "front yard" and pile up twigs and branches by size. We use dried corn cobs and corn hairs for firestarters. Not that I've ever had one, but I absolutely cannot ever go back to gas BBQ grills after this.

Waiting impatiently for the fire to reach optimum heat...

And away we go! 30 minutes of grilling, turning and basting...

And then, perfection.

Samuel was quite keen about grilling the goat's testicles...unfortunately due to the coarseness of the grill mesh Samuel accidentally dropped both into the flames while cooking them. He was quite despondent.

In the Odula living-cum-dining room, Babs carves up the legs, and Mama Odula brings in the matumbo: chopped up stomach and braided intestines stewed for hours in cooking fat, tomatoes and onions (and Royco I'm sure, judging by the colour). I try a little for my honour's sake, but it holds too strong a taste and smell of grass-half-digested-in-stomach-juices for me. Babs digs it though, having grown up with innards curry.

Gloria's had enough talk! It's time to chow down. Strictly traditional nyama choma doesn't use any wussy stuff like marinade, so our garlic adds a fabulously novel infusion to the meat.

The ribs -- between the Royco and the slow fire -- are deliciously smoky. The bits between the ribs could definitely work as a jerky snack.

Mama Odula is well impressed at how tender we've kept the meat. Mr Odula asks Babs if he's ever worked in a restaurant or a hotel.

We nearly choke on our goat laughing, but we're pleased at the compliment.

More importantly, we hope we've done the goat -- and Floyd -- justice today. A toast (of Coke) to both.

Beef Butchery Class Booty Part 2 - Easy Slow-Cook Stew

As promised, the recipes for what I did with the booty from The Ginger Pig Beef Butchery Class. Part 2 was an easy stew with all the rib trimmings I saved from the class.

This was a bit of an experiment, tossing in whatever I had available at home at the time. The result was a couple of very delicious and hearty dinners with minimal effort.

First I browned the beef, frying it for just a few minutes with 1 large sliced onion. I just added salt, black pepper and paprika, letting the meat and onions fry in the beef's own fat in a skillet.

Then I tossed the beef and onions into a large roasting pan, along with roughly chopped red peppers and carrots, 1 bulb of skinned garlic, the leaves from a few sprigs of thyme, and enough homemade beef broth to form a thin layer in the roasting pan.

Next time I make this I'll add some chopped celery, mushrooms and possibly some Guinness or red wine.

Create a tight foil lid for the roasting tray, and cook in the oven at 120 deg C for 2.5 - 3 hours. The end goal is to have the beef pull apart easily into tendrils when you poke it with a fork, and that starts to happen only after the 2nd hour. (In my usual impatience I started to check every half hour or so after the first 90 minutes)

Garnish with sliced spring onions (an inspiration from Diner in Brooklyn, NYC) and serve with your choice of stodge.

Beef Butchery Class Booty Part 1 - Roast Dinner and Gravy

As promised, the recipes for what I did with the booty from The Ginger Pig Beef Butchery Class. Part 1 was a roast beef dinner as a farewell to friends from work.

Roast Beef Dinner

Slightly controversial for those who are disciples of the simple salt and pepper marinade, but what I like to do for beef roasting joints and steaks, is to do a 2-3 day marinade in a ziploc bag of light soy sauce, a splash of sesame oil, a generous dash of garlic powder and ground black pepper. From time to time I've also added a splash of red wine or port just for kicks.

Make sure the beef starts cooking from room temperature, so take out the joint a few hours before oven time.

Bed a large roasting tray with a layer of thick-sliced onoins and skinned garlic gloves, and a few sprigs of rosemary. Lay in the joint, and wrap the top of the tray tightly in foil. Roast in the oven at 160 deg C / 300 deg F. This particular joint took just under 2 hours, but cooking time varies greatly with the size of the joint, whether or not it has a bone in, the pecularities of your oven, and what else is cooking in the oven at the same time (e.g. roast potatoes). And of course, how rare or cooked you like your meat. Ochef gives a good lowdown on all the permutations and combinations of temperatures and times.

An observation (especially for those who like their meat on the rarer side) is that heat continues to conduct through the meat while the joint rests after cooking. So to be conservative, cook it for a little less time than you think it needs. You can always leave it in a little longer if you decided it needs it, but once it's overdone, you can't bring it back!

Gravy

After roasting the joint, spoon out the onions and garlic from the roasting tray into a saucepan. Sprinkle in 1.5 tablespoons of flour and stir for a minute, then pour in the roast drippings and whatever leftover marinade liquid was in the ziploc bag. Stir until you get a smooth consistency. Season with salt and pepper if needed.

If you like, pimp up the gravy by sauteeing some sliced mushrooms along with the onions and garlic, before adding the drippings.

This time around, we served up with sauteed spring greens and red cabbage, and a vegetable roast of potatoes, courgettes and butternut squash.

Beef Butchery Class at The Ginger Pig, London

Warning: Vegetarians and vegans might find images in this post disturbing and should proceed with caution.

"Hello, my name is Wen, and I'm a carnivore."
"Hi Wen."
"I've been a carnivore for at least 29 years. My first memory is demolishing a chicken drumstick on my first birthday, even though the drumstick had more meat than I had teeth."

==========

That's not actually how we started the beef butchery class at The Ginger Pig's Moxon Street premises in London last month in late May, but it may as well have been. Throughout the 4-hour hands-on Monday evening workshop hosted by veteran butchers Perry and Borut, there was a constant gleam in the 10 participants' eyes, oohing and aahing, moaning and chuckling, salivating and sweating.

Borut started us off with an introduction to The Ginger Pig's animal husbandry approach -- lots of outdoor space, grass, and proper time to mature naturally rather than the industrial rush to slaughter -- rather than an organic label per se. And a strict 45-day ageing process after slaughter, to tenderise the meat and concentrate flavour as moisture exits the carcass. Then he took us through the major cuts of beef on a chart and what kind of cooking each cut was best suited for. If biology classes back at age 14 were like this, I might have stuck with it for longer.

After the lecture came the lab session, where Perry put our white coats to good use. Working with an assortment of knives and saws, and the half-backs of 3 mighty steers, Perry had us wrestling and separating the fore-ribs (front) and the sirloins (middle-ribs) and the rumps (backside), then trimming our individual fore-rib chunks for a chateaubriand to take home with us.

Left: Eyebrows jump when we see saw. Right: Perry explains that a well-aged rib-eye makes a much more value-for-money steak than the dearly-priced fillet

Above: My dear friend and fellow food dork Melf gets busy with the beef. Many thanks to Melf who generously sponsored my spot in the class as my "mini-retirement" gift. Along with previous gifts such as a carving knife and a giant stock pot, she counts this gift as "an investment that will pay dividends for years to come". I'm a big fan of her philosophy!

Melf catches me all strung up. I realise for the first time that French-trimmed ribs (right) are NOT a natural occurence. Each participant gets to take one of these roasting joints home as part of the class.

While we've been playing with our food, ahem, I mean, getting educated about beef, Borut has been working quietly away in the background preparing dinner -- roasted prime rib, salad, red wine, and unbelievably fluffy potatoes that have first been par-boiled then roasted in beef fat. More oohing and aahing ensues as Borut carves.

As we tuck in, the participants start to chat. Some are long-time foodies, eager to improve their understanding of how their meal makes its way to their plate. Others are here on a whim as a "oh why not" replacement for someone who had to cancel, ever so glad they came, and now trying to figure out how to keep the take-home booty for themselves. We trade compliments ("You handle your knife like a surgeon"..."I like your knots"), recipes, and quips from Ginger Pig's other classes. We tease each other about how quickly or slowly we're attacking our dinners. We laugh. Is there any better way to end a Carnivores Anonymous meeting?

Yes there is!

Throughout the class we had watched Perry toss trimmed bones into the bone bin. The Ginger Pig crew do what they can to make the trimmings into burgers and pie-filling, and the bones into beef stock, but with whatever is still left over they are obligated to dispose. A few brave souls ask if we could take some bones home to make stock. Perry gladly doles them out, happy to see that they will be put to good use. I nearly faint with happiness.

Perry hands me a set of ribs that looks like a pan-pipe for a colossus.

"Do you have a pot large enough for this?" he asks.

Melf and I look at each other and start to cackle. "Yes I do!" I declare, beaming.

The dividends continue!

Top 3 Learnings on Buying Beef

• Don't just gun for the expensive cuts, equating them with quality. Focus on what you're planning to cook. Cheaper cuts may end up being more appropriate (e.g. for slow-cook stews, meat loafs, burgers and pies).
• If you're the kind that is particular about how the cow is raised, dig deep past the label on the packaging. A simple organic label may still mean the animals are fed organic corn (difficult for their digestive systems) and are kept indoors. Free-range may still mean that the grass is sprayed with all sorts of chemicals.
• It's ok to practise age discrimination with hung beef. Less than 21 days probably means the seller (whether it's a butcher or a supermarket) wants to maximise the weight of the moisture in the beef he sells you. More than 45 days requires too much end-trimming and wastage.

Perry and Borut were recommending John Torode's Beef book at the end of class. Melf picked up a copy but alas I will have to wait until I'm done with the road trip.

Epilogue

• The joint: A roast beef dinner as a farewell to friends from work
  
• The castaways from a French-trimming: A slow cook stew
• The lovely bones: A 1-hour roast that yielded 2 jars of beef fat, passed on to Melf and Jas after we moved out. A 6-hour slow boil that resulted in a vat of stock that served as foundation for soups, stews and gravys for weeks after.
  
  

Besides beef, The Ginger Pig also conducts classes on pork, lamb and sausages at 8-10 Moxon Street in Marylebone, London, W1U 4EW.