Tripe

[SobaAddict70]

Oh, god, I love tripe. I think it's right up there as Favorite Organ Meat, Ever.

People either love or hate tripe. It inspires either unconditional foodie love or total revulsion and disgust. I remember going to a place in the East Village, Little Poland I think it was, with friends many many years ago for an impromptu lunch. I had tripe soup as an appetizer much to the disgust of my friends, something we talk about still, lo these many years later. (The waitress paused for a second, just to confirm that I ordered what I ordered. )

Campagna used to serve tripe bolognese, which is pretty much a version of bolognese sauce with tripe and pork chunks over either paparadelle or polenta. I haven't seen very many restaurant offerings with tripe on the menu, but when it's present, I'll be the first in line for an order.

In home cooking, tripe plays a starring role in a diverse and varied selection of ethnic cuisines. It shares center stage for example, with oxtails, in the Filipino stew known as kari-kari (oxtail and tripe stew with ground nut sauce), and in certain Mexican specialties such as menudo.

What are your favorite tripe dishes? And if you don't like or revile tripe, share your disgust as well.

Soba

[Anna N]

I recall a dish, tripe and onions, from my childhood in Britain. I know I liked it. I don't have a clue how it was made but it seems to me it was a creamy dish with large chunks of onion, unbrowned, and meltingly good. This was long before I knew what tripe actually was!

I have seen it occasionally here in the supermarkets. The honeycomb tripe is the one I recall. But I can't bring myself to buy it or to attempt to recreate the dish. I suspect I would no longer like it and yet I can't give you any kind of logical reason why this should be so. I also recall a sort of pickled tripe which I also liked but again have no idea how it was made.

[jackal10]

New World, chinese restaurant in London's Chinatown serves a remarkable dimsum steamed tripe, with chillis and black beans. Yum!

Tripe a la mode de Caen, long (10 hours+) slow braise with onions, carrots, cloves,leeks, parsley, thyme, cider, calvados, and a trotter for gelatine.

[slkinsey]

I love tripe. I had a special of tripa alla parmigiana at Babbo once that was one of the best dishes of any kind I've ever had.

[curlywurlyfi]

I recall a dish, tripe and onions, from my childhood in Britain. I know I liked it. I don't have a clue how it was made but it seems to me it was a creamy dish with large chunks of onion, unbrowned, and meltingly good. This was long before I knew what tripe actually was!

My esteemed mama makes this - it's just tripe + peeled onions, simmered long and slow in milk - I think she bakes it in the oven. Maybe some black pepper (very avant garde). Eat with buttered brown bread. She and dad LOVE it, but then, they are war children. "So digestible!" they always say brightly, as if that phrase has ever in the history of the world made a dish more attractive. Personally, the smell of it cooking (I think it smells like kerosene) makes me feel so grim I have to leave and not come back till Tripe Club is over.

But I do like tripe - just not this way! The Maltese have a very nice way - slightly curried with tomato sauce and some peas for colour. mmmm.

[Anna N]

...My esteemed mama makes this - it's just tripe + peeled onions, simmered long and slow in milk - I think she bakes it in the oven. Maybe some black pepper (very avant garde). Eat with buttered brown bread. She and dad LOVE it, but then, they are war children. "So digestible!" they always say brightly, as if that phrase has ever in the history of the world made a dish more attractive. Personally, the smell of it cooking (I think it smells like kerosene) makes me feel so grim I have to leave and not come back till Tripe Club is over.

But I do like tripe - just not this way! The Maltese have a very nice way - slightly curried with tomato sauce and some peas for colour. mmmm.

Sounds about right... us war children have some odd tastes!

[Jinmyo]

I love tripe. I had a special of tripa alla parmigiana at Babbo once that was one of the best dishes of any kind I've ever had.

Oooh aar. Don't like tripe. Rubber bathing cap someone urinated into.

But I've always said I'd eat a tripe dish made by St. Mario. And so I will. When he brings it to me door.

[slkinsey]

Oooh aar. Don't like tripe. Rubber bathing cap someone urinated into.

You know, of all the ways people can say they don't like a certain food, I always like yours best.

[Huevos del Toro]

Menudo is the only way I've had tripe. Never made it myself but I like it and eat it every chance I get. I HAVE heard that making menudo smells up the house but after it becomes soup it smells just fine. Gotta chop up some cilantro to put in it.

Question;

Is what I've heard referred to as "lace tripe" the same as "honeycomb tripe"? Isn't that the layer that's supposed to be the most tender?

[Mudpuppie]

I'm not a tripe eater, so I won't comment on how much I like or don't like it. But there's a great essay on the stuff in Best Food Writing 2003, where the author describes it as smelling like cow's breath, or something similar. Really fun article. Sorry, can't remember the author or source.

[tryska]

"So digestible!" they always say brightly, as if that phrase has ever in the history of the world made a dish more attractive.

this is the funniest line ever.

i've read it like 3 times and i'm still giggling.

[ludja]

Oooh aar. Don't like tripe. Rubber bathing cap someone urinated into.

this description may single-handedly stymie my cautious foray into the world of tripe... but here's my story anywasy...

A good experience was actually my first meal in France... off the plane in Paris we were on our way to a stay in Brittany and had lunch at a bistro in Chartres. I had a great salad plate consisting of andouillette sausages served with frisee and other bitter greens with a mustard sauce. I think there might be veal also in the sausage so it is less 'full frontal' experience. it was very nice...

maybe it helped that I didn't know there was tripe in it until afterwards...

[badthings]

I don't love or hate tripe -- I like it just fine, but I could live without it.

Best tripe ever was an andouillette in Lyon -- no veal or anything else (except, I'm assuming, fat) to dilute the experience.

[Mudpuppie]

"So digestible!" they always say brightly, as if that phrase has ever in the history of the world made a dish more attractive.

Anyone else see a big irony here? If tripe is inherently digestible, why doesn't the cow's stomach digest itself?

Ooh, I think I just got dizzy.

[tryska]

"So digestible!" they always say brightly, as if that phrase has ever in the history of the world made a dish more attractive.

Anyone else see a big irony here? If tripe is inherently digestible, why doesn't the cow's stomach digest itself?

Ooh, I think I just got dizzy.

cows don't eat meat, silly.

[Mistinguett]

I love tripe a la mode de Caen and a tripe soup that I have at the romanian restaurants in my 'hood - heavy on sour cream, served with crushed garlic and hot peppers, fixed with vinegar. It's a strange but delightful dish if made right. It's richer than the turkish version and, I find it, more flavorful.

I find that with tripe (especially) it's very important that the preparation is a careful one. Tripe can be tough if slightly uncooked or stringy if overcooked. A mediocre dish can be a total turn off for a first timer.

[Pan]

Oooh aar. Don't like tripe. Rubber bathing cap someone urinated into.

Jinmyo, you're so hilarious!!!!!

[Pan]

The best tripe dish I ever had was Tripa alla Romana at a trattoria in Trastevere in 1994. When I went back to the same place in 1998, unfortunately, the restaurant had gone to Hell and sucked.

[BJL]

My father is infamous in our town for his tripe - which to me is like rubber bands. But I do love the flavor of the sauce/broth he makes.

However, the tripe preparation at Cesca, the new Tom Valenti restaurant on the UWS is amazing.

[Shiewie]

Chinese pork tripe soup with lots of crushed peppercorns and ginger from this tiny dingy shop in the outskirts of KL that only serves 5 types of dishes. There's also pieces of free-range chicken, pork, pork liver, pork intestines, tung choy and cilantro in the soup. The soup's served piping hot in a claypot with a dip of soy sauce with fresh birds-eye chillies and chopped garlic.

My stomach feels all warm and comfy after eating the peppery soup.

[jo-mel]

My dear Mother tried to make tripe, that we kids would like. I remember she used egg and flour and sauteed it in butter. Smelled good, but oh--- the texture! Not a success!

I had a Chinese teacher who said that tripe was his favorite food. I looked at him differently, after he said that.

Only once, have I eaten it -- in a Chinese style. I was polite and served myself a portion, but it still is not something I would order or cook on my own. Am I missing something??

[Pan]

Are you missing something? Probably not. If you don't like the texture, you don't.

[mrbigjas]

To me, tripe tastes kinda like old dishwater. And the chewiness of it all sometimes really gets to me.

And yet I get it (and tendon) every sunday morning that we go for pho. And I order menudo for lunches in Mexican places. And I ask for patsa when I go to Greek restaurants, even when it's not on the menu.

I just keep eating it and eating it even though I don't think I really like it that much. I don't know why. It's kind of a compulsion. Sometimes a stringy piece kinda makes me gag, and yet I keep on eating it.

When I was in Paris last month I didn't get an andouillette plate anywhere, for fear that I just wouldn't be able to handle it like that.

The best tripe I've ever had, though, was in a little bar off the main square in Cordoba, Spain. The bartenders spoke no english, our book didn't have a translation of "callos," but they assured us it was deliciosa, and it was only about $2.50 for a serving so we ordered it. Now that was some great tripe--it wasn't too chewy/stringy; it was cut into small enough pieces that even if it were, you could kinda swallow it anyway; it was served in a small crock in a slightly greasy, spicy, long-simmered deeply flavored sauce... man oh man that was good.

(Now that I'm looking around for a recipe, which for some reason I've never done before, it looks like it might have been plain ol' callos a la madrilena. Damn that was good stuff.)

Edited December 16, 2003 by mrbigjas (log)

[dankphishin]

I don't have much experience with with tripe, aside from campbell's pepper pot soup, though i love that. There is an armenian(turkish/greek?) soup that's eaten on new years that we call pacha which is loaded with tripe and garlic and whatnot that i loved. all my old-school armenian-canadian relatives were suprised that i enjoyed it, me being the half-armenian american inhabitant that could never get enough of every bit of armenian cooking, even "hoof soup". I'm welcome to try anything though

[Pan]

There's a Campbell's soup that has tripe in it?

Also, you like a Campbell's soup?