Roasted corn and a cow head

Written Thursday, 13 September 2007

 

 

Since I have come back from Thies, the corn has started becoming ripe, so we have been eating ears of corn roasted in the fire for a snack.   The corn here is denser, starchier, and less sweet than American corn – and not so good for American-style corn on the cob.  We tried making it at the Peace Corps house in Tamba recently, and despite boiling it for over an hour, the corn was still hard.   Of course we ate it anyway.  The village roasted corn isn't buttered or salted because they don't have the money for that, so we just eat it plain.   But it's still pretty delicious.

 

And now on to the part of the story you're really waiting for: the cow's head.   I walked over to my host family's compound today for lunch, and I saw what looked like a cow's head sitting in the fire.  But I thought it must be a piece of wood that was shaped like a cow's head.   I looked more closely, and saw that sure enough, it's a cow's head.  To double check, I asked one of the little kids running around: "Is that a cow's head?"   "Yep," he says, as if we have cow heads in the fire every day.  So I asked my sister, "What's the cow head for?", hoping that the answer wasn't what I was thinking.   But it is.  "To eat," she says.  Duh.

 

So I might be having cow head with dinner tonight.   I just hope it's cut up into small enough pieces that I can tell myself it's the usual mystery meat and no big deal.  I don't think I'm up for reaching into the skull and scooping out a spoonful of brains.