Spanish Cow Tongue Recipe

Due to the request from Uncle Steve, I present to you the recipe for cow tongue, as prepared by Marga and her family...

Ingredients

• 1 cow tongue
• 1 large or 2 small leeks
• 1/2 an onion
• 3 carrots
• 1/2 red bell pepper
• 1 tomato
• flour
• 2-3 eggs
• salt
• white wine (optional)

Instructions

1. Coarsely chop up all the veggies and place them in a pot with just enough water to cover them.
2. Place tongue in pot (the cow's, not yours). It's not that important that it be completely covered by the water, because you can turn it a few times while its boiling.
3. Add a few pinches of salt (2-3 teaspoons?)
4. You can optionally add about a glass of white wine, as well
5. Boil for 60-90 minutes, depending on the thickness of the tongue.
6. Allow to cool
7. While it's still warm (it's easier when warm), remove the skin from the tongue.
8. Cut into thin cross-section slices. The thinner the better.
9. Purée the vegetables in the pot. We use a handheld mixer (see photo below).
10. Bread and fry each slice
    1. Heat oil in frying pan (we use sunflower oil)
    2. Pour some flour on a plate
    3. Beat 2 or 3 eggs in a bowl
    4. Cover each slice of tongue in flour
    5. Dip each slice in egg
    6. Place each slice in hot oil until golden brown
11. Place each breaded and fried slice in the pot with the sauce
12. Simmer on low heat for a few minutes to let the flavors mingle
13. Serve with a healthy serving of silly tongue jokes.

Photos

The tongue slices look pretty similar to sliced roast beef. Well, it is sliced roast beef, if you think about it.

Marga's mother has one of those circular-saw-like meat slicers like the butchers and deli chefs have. Use one of those if you can.

The boiled veggies. You can see some of the beef fat on the surface. Mmm!

Puréeing the veggies into a thick orange sauce. No Spanish household is without one of these mixers. Many, many recipes call for turning veggies into sauce like this.

The slices moving from plate to flour to egg to frying pan, and eventually....

...to pot with sauce.

I sprinkled mine with dried parsley to make it look like a photo from a real recipe book.

Serve with good bread and a fine Rioja. The Spanish eat bread with every meal, and the best part of this dish is mopping up all the sauce on the plate with fresh bread.

¡Que aproveche!