{"id":4197,"date":"2016-06-07T06:24:54","date_gmt":"2016-06-06T22:24:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/?p=4197"},"modified":"2016-06-07T06:32:01","modified_gmt":"2016-06-06T22:32:01","slug":"i-dont-have-a-fridge-for-my-ostrich","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/2016\/06\/07\/i-dont-have-a-fridge-for-my-ostrich\/","title":{"rendered":"I don’t have a fridge for my ostrich…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not a dilemma that I ever thought I would have.<\/p>\n

\n

I\u2019m a reformed vegetarian.<\/p>\n

I elected to have a \u201cwhite meat only\u2019 diet when I was in college and was in a relationship with a vegetarian for over 20 years. My children are vegetarian. I am only just learning to cook meat and really have issues with anything that is a little\u00a0like entrails or resembles too much something that was once alive rather than looking more like a lump of tofu.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

So I thought.<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Yesterday I ate ox liver.<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

\"2016-06-05<\/p>\n

\n

Today I ate at a restaurant that had told our host that it guaranteed at least two South African dishes.<\/p>\n

This one I spotted immediately:<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a0OSTRICH FILLET:<\/div>\n
Red wine and black pepper marinated ostrich fillet served with butternut fondant. Grilled brown mushrooms, marinated beetroot, and creme de cassis jus.<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

However I did not immediately spot the South African animal in the one below. It is a little like the Monty Python \u201cCrunchy Frog<\/a>\u201d Sketch, where the lark\u2019s vomit was in the very fine print\u2026 I don\u2019t know about you, but I don\u2019t immediately associate Umbria with Springbok…<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

UMBRIAN DELIGHT:<\/div>\n
\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Marinated Aubergine and black mushroom layered with grilled peppers, springbok carpaccio, parmesan & rocket, topped with basil pesto and pine kernels \u00a0*contains nuts<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

So, I ordered the ostrich fillet, but of course without the beetroot, because one really needs to draw the line at something that creates evil purple ooze.<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

\u00a0\"2016-06-06<\/p>\n

The special, which was not on the menu, was a piece of gemsbok. Yes, something that looks like this in the wild. (Something I had not seen on photo-safari yesterday, so somehow more acceptable to be eating..).<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a0\"Gembok\"<\/a><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Greg<\/a> ordered this and I agree with his judgment that it was amazingly tender meat. The texture was like the difference between a rough clay pot of a steak compared to a very fine porcelain. I am sure that it was not flavoured with lavender, but it certainly seemed to be, or some kind of sage. Yes, one of the most delicious meats I have eaten in my life.<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

The ostrich? OK. Bland. Beautifully cooked and flavoured with a lovely sweet sauce. If you can imagine a chop or steak where there was all texture but not taste, but not in an unpleasant way, then you would get an idea. Certainly it did not taste like a large chicken or turkey.<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Anyhow, it seems to be customary in South Africa for dishes, where there is more than a certain proportion left over, to be presented in a leftovers container on leaving. So – here I am at 11:45pm at night, leftover container in hand, in a hotel room without a fridge, wondering where I should put my ostrich.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not a dilemma that I ever thought I would have. I\u2019m a reformed vegetarian. I elected to have a \u201cwhite meat only\u2019 diet when I was in college and was in a relationship with a vegetarian for over 20 years. My children are vegetarian. I am only just learning to cook meat and really have…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogjune-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3BXdd-15H","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4197"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4210,"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4197\/revisions\/4210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/librariansmatter.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}