Sweet memories...

My father was a butcher when I was growing up, until I was 14 and my folks bought a furniture store. I would visit Dad and he would give me a cold weinie from the case, which I always ate, but never liked. Sometimes he would bring home brains, and scramble them with eggs. I tried them, didn't find much to like. But I loved liver, and kidneys, and sweetbreads. For the uninitiated, sweetbreads are glands (no, not those glands), and they are a bitch to cook, because they have to be blanched and peeled (membranes, you know). But man, are they good. So when the family went out last night to celebrate Dad's 86th birthday at our local French bistro, all three of us "kids" ordered ris de veau, veal sweetbreads in a creamy marsala sauce. It was heaven on earth, even better when followed with a birthday chocolate mousse that we all shared. OK, the diet kind of went into a holding pattern for a few hours. But if I was going to sin, it might as well have been with those ambrosial glands.