SC - There are no old world grapes.

[Decker, Terry D.]

>Date: Sat, 20 Dec 1997 17:52:49 EST
>From: Kimi b 2 <Kimib2 at aol.com>
>Subject: Re: SC - Mutton and thanks
>
>In a message dated 97-12-19 21:55:05 EST, you write:
>
><< Mutton is a meat I would like to serve sometime but I have never bee able
>to
> get it. ;-) Whenever I ask my butcher about he just laughs and shakes his
> head. The supermarket meat cutter's are , of course, absolutely worthless
>when
> it comes to 'requests'. Where does one get mutton in N. Central Pa.? Is it
> necessary to go to the livestock auction and buy it on hoof? Any tho'ts would
> be most welcome
>  >>
>at least that way you can be sure of getting LAMB! Rumours here in Illinois
>are that if you order lamb, you'll get goat...and its legal to sell it that
>way...
>

This brings me to a point in the thread I have been wondering about. As a
youngster, I was horribly allergiv to the smell of roasting/cooking lamb. My
mother, a good Brit, and sure I was imagining it, served lamb whenever
possible, but I could never manage to force down more than a bite (although
the eating didn't hurt me any----just the smell made me want to faint). In
High School I ran across a friend whose father couldn't have the smell of
Lamb in the house----he really would faint! That was the last person I ever
heard of who had this problem until a few years ago, when a teenager in the
shire actually did faint from the smell of roasting lamb. I still do not
care--not always--for the smell of lamb, but have no trouble eating it now.
It seems since I can tolerate the smell in order to get a chance to eat it.
For a long time I was unable to eat any but New Zeland lamb, however. The
American variety invariably made me sick from the smell before I got to
taste it.

A friend told me once that it all has to do with the castration (yes, back
to that topic, again). It seems the Americans were slow to catch on to
"castration while extremely young", and so the hormonal development of the
animal affected the taste and smell of the meat. Now I am careful to get
young lamb (Ras, try Sam's Club! I can get a deal on bulk legs there), and
the American lamb market has opened up and the farmers are better at
preparing the animals. I have not had the "odor" problem in some years.

Has anyone else run across this situation? I have a hard time tolerating
mutton, but can manage if pressed (stewed isn't too bad). That's a woeful
thing for someone of my ancestry!

============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================