Dinner parties with contentious food

I never liked it.
It was pink looking and slightly sweet.

I used to make rabbit stew regularly at one time, years ago, it was delicious.

Tripe?

My mum used to like cow’s stomach. It was creamy and curly?
?
Think she shook vinegar over it before she picked up her knife and fork....
Can’t think what it was known as.
I never ate any.

Until we retired we did go to many dinner parties and mainly enjoyed them very much, with good hosts and food.
I do remember one though, where the starter was escargots....and I simply had to say that I couldn’t eat them.
Neither can I eat any shellfish and have had to say so on occasion.
Another starter was never offered, but that was ok I just drank some wine and chatted, but it isn’t hard to find out beforehand
If dinner guests have dislikes or allergies, is it?

My mum used to make rabbit stew, and I wasn't allowed to say a word.
Nor when she served stuffed hearts.

its own blood

Grrr

grannyrebel7

I have never eaten rabbit or hare in my life! And to think of it cooked in its own blood! Yuk!!!

All meat bleeds. It's hard not to notice this if you ever buy raw meat. You don't cook meat only in it's own blood. Even fried steak needs some fat or oil as well. Things like hare and rabbit are cooked as stews on the whole with loads of other ingredients (see recipe above for jugged hare).

What's all this eeeuw about the blood of meat? Get real!

Ditto kitty and Baggs.
I adore this old recipe. Plain, simple & delicious with mash. In fact I made it earlier this week.
Cheap too.
The lamb’s liver was £1.19 from Sainsbury’s.
Maybe I should organise a dinner party ...
?

In a jug.
With the lid on it's head like a hat.

I have never eaten rabbit or hare in my life! And to think of it cooked in its own blood! Yuk!!!

Fish roe is good stuff, very nutritious. Don't think I've ever had caviar but I have eaten other fish roe.

Perhaps your vegan host didn't know what caviar was, redhead.

My dad did it the second way baggs.

I love liver with bacon and onions, served with mash (only lambs) and kidneys.

Not so keen on whale or horse.

I don't mind liver but it has to be trimmed properly, same with kidneys. Kidneys need to be slow cooked too otherwise they are really tough

We still have people for dinner and we serve 3 or 4 courses but not as often as we did. My husband likes to do the whole works when we invite people. More often now though we go out for lunch with friends much more relaxing.
That menu was awful Yammy no thought for the guests at all which is surely the point of inviting people.

I've twice been invited to a friend who always cooks lamb. She carves huge chunks with the blood visible in the juice. I pass it onto my sons plate.

I was served with a salad which looked nice until I had something pop in my mouth. It was salmon caviar disgusting stuff even more annoying it was served by a vegan. Why would someone who ate no meat or fish or dairy give guests caviar without even asking if they would like it? I eat meat and fish both in small quantities but would never consider eating fish eggs.

I have the same feelings about liver, urms.

Actually that does sound delicious Baggs.
And I like liver.
Lamb’s though. Pig liver has tubes in it.

If you got served hare vertebrae, yammy, you were short changed and you host(ess) did not know how to do jugged hare properly. The 'inferior joints' are supposed to be used to make stock and soup.

By the way, meat is always "in its own blood". Who or what else's blood would it be in? Blood is good food too.

We can only be so picky (and 'precious') about food because we have access to an over abundance of choice. When people ate whatever they could get enough of they weren't so fussy.

In A Taste of History by Maggie Black (English Heritage 1993) meat cooked in a jug. She says this: “…poultry, game or small quantities of meat could be placed in an earthenware vessel with butter, herbs and spices, a lid sealed in place with a strip of pastry, and the vessel immersed in the cauldron for a few hours. In this way, richly flavoured and tender dishes were produced, including jugged hare, in which the jointed animal was cooked in a jug.”

Sounds fine to me.

Elisabeth Ayrton in The Cookery of England (Penguin Books 1974) a recipe for jugged hare is given which, as well as hare meat includes bacon, onions, carrots, herbs and spices, port, red wine and redcurrant jelly. Looks delicious! All I need is a cauldron and some hare meat.

I cooked all manner of game during the seventies. It was free for a start!

Nobody complained and I was a very considerate hostess because whenever I served pike I provided eyebrow tweezers to pick out the Y bones.

I didn't know kidneys were an acquired taste. I thought kate and sidney pie was a British basic.

I've made devilled kidneys on toast a few times (just for husb and me) though not for a long while. And I've eaten sheep's heart a few times in Yorkshire. It's good food.

Now off to look up jugged hare which I've heard of but know nothing about.

We have cooked and eaten road kill.
I’ve cooked horse once without knowing.
I was asked to be cook/ crew to deliver a a yacht to Oostende.
I bought what I thought was a very good buy for a beef casserole.
The crew thought I’d broken the budget until someone asked how much it was. I didn’t know ?

Yes, twice. Friends who cooked horse, and then teased. They are still friends as we have been so since we were kids- but it took me a while to get over the fact they thought it was 'funny ahaha'.

And another time when we were served kidneys, which everyone knows is a very special and acquired taste. I could not eat anything, not even the gratin and veg served on same plate.

I always ask guests well in advance if there is anything they can't or won't eat- I invite them so they can enjoy their evening, not to test or torture them. I won't cook halal meat, so if we have Muslim friends, I'll cook vegetarian or fish.