WHERE;S THE BEEF?

WHERE'S THE BEEF? When I was a youngster, we lived in a trailer in Emmett. We did not have a freezer. Once a year or so, Dad would go the the sale barn and buy a steer. Which was then transported to the local butcher shop. We always got hamburger, steaks and roasts. We also got the liver and the brains. Mom fried up the brains and urged us to eat it. Nope, tasted like fried nothing. Disgusting, thereafter we youngsters had hamburgers and left the questionable delicacy to the parental units. The butcher shop rented freezer space and Mom would go there and withdraw what ever she felt like cooking for dinner. Now there may be some confusion between supper and dinner. When your people come from Missouri the meal terms are breakfast, supper (lunch) and dinner. The hamburger was made into burgers, spaghetti with meat sauce, chili, sloppy joes and meatloaf. The steaks were fried up, we had no outdoor grilling, the steaks were WELL DONE. There was no such thing as rare, medium rare, etc. The roasts went into the roasting pan and the left overs were sliced up and cooke in a frying pan with potatoes and a few onions, salt and pepper. This dish was known as Thousand Mile Stew. It was delicious. No garlic sadly. No carrots which Dad did not like. Mom learned to sneak them into a lovely bean dish later on in life. THE ORGAN MEAT consisted of liver and tongue. We never saw the heart or kidneys, not sure why. Beef heart is delilcious if cooked properly. Also the liver. I have never liked Mom's version of liver and onions because it was baked until tougher than whang leather. (No idea what this.) It smelled good. I am a non-taster and should LOVE the taste of liver. I would soak the liver slices in milk overnight, coat in bread crumbs, fry in butter until pink in the middle and set aside. I would fry the onions until translucent with garlic, salt, pepper and red pepper flakes. Yummy!!! The tongue only appeared once. Mom boiled it, peeled abd ground it up. It was mixed with mayo, chopped onions and made a tasty sandwich spread. I have had a delicious venison liver one hunting season on Grandma LaVann's ranch. It was sliced and cooked for breakfast, gently fried quickly in a hot skillet with bacon grease. It was fabulous!! Dad was strictly a meat, potatoes and dessert guy. I have Mom's recipe box and it is loaded with jello recipes, cake recipes, candy recipes. We never had hot dogs, or pork chops or pork roast. Grandma Berglund pressure cooked pork roast and Mom said it was too greasy. I liked it. Big Grandma also hustled about the table taking bites from peoples plates. That really disturbed my mother.