On The Range is a weekly exploration of the history and lore of Texas menu items.
Nobody gets tongue tied when the subject is, um, tongue.
Writing in the Weekly Volcano (Tacoma and Olympia Washington's "only edgy,
irreverent, and thought-provoking alternative newsweekly") Jake and Jason de
Paul relate their encounter with lengua at Taqueria La Carreta much like
sixteen-year old boys describing their Friday night success stories:
"Jason: Eating an animal's tongue seems to me the highest level of
carnivorous consumption imaginable. I ordered cuatro lengua tacos. Beef and
pork were also available, but that's like choosing the mild-mannered
brunette over the fiery-eyed redhead. Cradled along with chopped raw onion
and cilantro in corn tortillas, it beheld the most tender, juicy, fatty meat
I have ever had the pleasure of noshing. It rivaled slow-cooked pot roast at
Grandma's. My tongue hit that tongue, and it just surrendered, falling
apart."
"Jake: Hmmmm, that sounds like how you acted on your first date with your
wife."
Yeah. And besides, it's hard to imagine anyone "noshing" tongue. Chewing, gnawing, eating, yes--but not noshing.
Beef tongue is popular around the world: Belgium, England, Germany, Portugal, Russia, and Romania, and so on.
{eople in Latin American countries love to eat lengua as well, and some preparations
can be quite extensive.
In The Complete Book of Caribbean Cooking, Elisabeth
Lambert Ortiz provides a Dominican recipe for Lengua Rellena, or stuffed
tongue, which involves boiling the beef for five minutes, then slowly
simmering for two hours. She then stuffs the tongue with garlic, finely
chopped onion, ham, carrot, salt, pepper, capers, tomato, raisins, "and
enough bread crumbs to hold the mixture together." Finally, she sautes the
meat, adds vinegar, onion, tomato paste, oregano, bay leaf, and reserved
stock, and simmers for one hour, adding potatoes during the last thirty
minutes.
This recipe serves six to eight, depending on how many guests have
grown tired of the lengthy preparation time and taken their leave without
dining.
In Mexico, of course, lengua is often employed as a filling for tacos and
burritos. In The Tex-Mex Cookbook, Robb Walsh bypasses the stove in favor of
the much more convenient crockpot. He notes, "Lengua is much easier to make
than barbacoa and the flavor is just as good. Just put the tongue in a
crockpot on Saturday night and you'll have lengua tacos on Sunday morning."
Or better still, have a restaurant like Taqueria La Paloma make them and
save yourself the trouble. Just order a taco plate with three tacos of your
choice, including pastor, chorizo, bistek, chicken, or lengua, and you'll be
all set. Served with rice and beans and two very good salsas, La Palomas
tacos might not be quite as memorable as that first date, but they are certainly good enough to speak for
themselves.
