Recipes, Crafts and More
I was bending and contorting every which way taking photos of these lengua tacos when G crept behind me and commented wistfully, “Boy! Those look good, wish they were beef.” Ha? Say what? Ox tongue=beef, right? But of course, I understood what he meant. For him, beef=recognizable parts of the cow. Poor guy. He just can’t wrap his head around this Asian woman’s ability to consume and enjoy an animal from nose to tail.
I bought a reasonably-sized ox tongue from a Mexican market a few days ago and spent a good few hours today simmering it on the stove with aromatics. Half of it I prepared as lengua in mushroom sauce and the remaining half I planned to turn into tacos. G was pretty stoked when I mentioned we were having tacos for lunch but when he saw the gargantuan cooked tongue on the kitchen counter and realized what was going into the anticipated tacos, he miserably dug into a cup-a-noodle instead.
Who can blame him? I have been eating tongue for years and have developed a special affinity for it but even I can’t look at that picture above and go, hmmmm, tongue. The looks of this offal is enough to make the sturdiest of stomachs turn but if you dare step outside of your culinary boundaries and get pass the fact that yes, it IS tongue, you will be rewarded with meat that’s far more tender and succulent than any other part or cut of beef. Trust me, you’ve never really had tacos until you’ve had tacos de lengua.
I absolutely loved this! It brings back childhood memories of my
Mother/ Nana’s beef tongue either pickled or roasted (after boiling of course!)
with honey & ketchup. I’d have never thought of this as taco meat but I bet
it’s pretty good.
I’ve never had pickled tongue but sounds interesting enough to try. Does your nana roast it with a honey and ketchup marinade or serve it with honey and ketchup after roasting? It sounds like something we Filipinos will do. We serve ketchup (banana ketchup that is) with everything 🙂