Sins of the Flesh

There are many vegetarians in this world who, despite their pallor and anguished souls, survive and reproduce perfectly well. On the other hand, there are those who believe with all their heart that a piece of meat, to the degree possible dripping blood, is the only reliable nourishment. Peoples whose diets contain very little meat are those who have the highest demographic explosion and those who have most diligently cultivated the art of the erotic, which is why I have serious doubts about the true aphrodisiac powers of the flesh of mammals. But I must speak of it, in view of the fact that so many serious texts prove my doubts unjustified. In any case, meat dishes are heavy, and with a full stomach and in the grip of the digestive process, few can boast of amatory prowess. If you do include meat in your menu, serve small portions.

Game animals (deer, boar, hares, and others) In Nairobi there is a famous restaurant where every kind of game is served, including some nearing extinction. Favorites on the menu are fillets of buffalo, elephant, and ostrich. Unless you can count on a hunter in your family, someone who wakes up with a shotgun over his shoulder, skip this part, it isn’t for you. If you do have a hunter, try to get him to stop, it’s a fiendish sport. But if it can’t be avoided, and a beast riddled with shot lands on your kitchen table, begin by hanging it by the feet for a couple of days in a cool, dry place, because the meat is most savory and tender when it is just at the point of turning bad, right before the neighborhood birds start pecking at it and the first worms appear (that is, faisandé, as the French say with more delicacy). I have also heard that you should use rubber gloves when you skin game, because the carcasses of wild animals can carry diseases, and besides that, you have to cook them to death to avoid trichinosis. With all these drawbacks, I wonder whether it’s worth sampling one of these beasts unless it’s been refrigerated. Better to get your game in the market, cleaned and ready for the pot. Have you ever watched anyone skin a hare? It’s a depressing spectacle.

Beef The most delicate and easily digested cut is a fillet. Italians maintain that raw meat is erotic and often serve it cut in very fine, nearly transparent, slices called carpaccio. Raw meat has been eaten since ancient times, except that its erotic properties were not recognized then. The Tartar hordes who invaded Europe in the era of the Roman Empire had a unique way of preparing it: they put chunks of meat between horse and saddle and galloped all day long, until their dinner had been reduced to a bruised and black pulp salty with sweat. That gave rise to what today we call steak tartare (ground raw meat skillfully seasoned and topped with a raw egg), which lends itself to being presented in naughty forms on the plate, as well as to other sensual games.

Goat The ram symbolizes male sexual energy, but its flesh is tough and strong-smelling. This animal has the curious habit of rolling in its urine to attract the female (a typically male idea!). In view of all these things, we humans prefer eating the more tender kids in the full bloom of their charm and innocence, but I will not dwell on this subject because Robert Shekter is looking over my shoulder. (Robert loves these creatures so much that he has a farm in the Alps where he gives refuge to old and mistreated nanny goats. At his death I’m planning to have a great barbecue and invite all my editors.)

Rabbit A silly brother to the hare, a fluffy and timid animal who when alive evokes immediate sympathy but cooked can be mistaken for the family cat. It has a very strong odor, which is why it must be washed inside and out with vinegar water, then rinsed, dried, and perfumed with lemon before cooking.

Pig and sheep Forget them, they’re not aphrodisiac.

Testicles (Are we women fascinated by orchids because they get their name from the Greek word for these body parts, orkhis?) From time immemorial, the organs of certain animals have had a reputation for having erotic properties. Women don’t eat them. Men do, but it gives them the shivers when they relate what’s on the plate with their own anatomy. Freud has a name for this complex, but I’ve forgotten it. In Asia they prefer monkey testicles, in America, the bull’s, in other parts of the world, those of sheep and rams. In the United States, animal testes are called Rocky Mountain oysters. Chopped and cooked, they don’t look like what they are, but even so, don’t give it away until your guests are through gorging on them.

Liver and kidney Beef or sheep kidneys are a common item on menus in French and Spanish restaurants and save English cuisine from total disaster served up in the form of their famous steak-and-kidney pie, one of the few indigenous recipes of Great Britain that can be eaten with pleasure and not out of sheer necessity. In older days, it was believed that the center of energy and life was the liver, not the heart as we now suppose, which is why power as a sexual stimulant was attributed to this organ. Not everyone likes liver. Liver extract in pill form is sold in health-food stores for anyone who desires the benefits without having to go through the disgusting process of chewing the meat. In Philip Roth’s famous novel Portnoy’s Complaint, the young protagonist masturbates with the raw liver his mother had planned on using for dinner. There’s no cause to go to such extremes; there are other ways to season it.