Year of the Cow

by Jared Stone

  The white-hot singularity at the core of the Machine is—ultimately—a fear of death. It’s the inevitability of journey’s end and the threat of a question nobody can honestly answer: What does it mean to make the most of a life? How can you tell that you’ve spent your time well? There is no metric, no answer key at the back of the book. It’s a question that I think everyone has to answer for themselves and hold tight to that answer with both hands. But that’s hard.

  Through the proxy of this steer, in some tiny way, I’ve interviewed death. I wanted to make the most of a life that died to support my own. In doing so, I’ve had to ask what it even means to make the most of a life. And although I haven’t yet found a definitive answer to this ultimate question, it’s led to other, smaller ones, dealing with how I spend my days and what I hope to gain from them. I’ve learned, above all, that it’s okay to slow down. It’s okay to remain taskless for a time. It’s okay to not want something—to not have a plan. Sometimes, it’s okay to just sit. To inhabit the moment, smile, and let the future be whatever the hell it’s going to be. As a result, I’m no longer completely willing to sacrifice the present to an imagined future. I want to live in present tense.

  Some years ago, a steer from a small herd in Northern California walked into a nondescript building and, in an instant, lost consciousness, never to regain it. As a direct result, my family gained years of quality meals, lovingly prepared, shared, laughed over, celebrated, and deeply appreciated. We gained better health, new skills, and myriad opportunities to come together as a family and enjoy the simple pleasures of one another’s company.

  In making the most of this steer’s death, I’ve accidentally made more of my own life. And I’m indescribably grateful for it.

  * * *

  It’s a bright summer day. I’m sitting in my backyard, reading a book and smoking a pastrami in my kettle grill. Like people do.

  “Daddy…” A tiny voice calls out from behind me. I turn, to find my daughter, Nora, standing barefoot holding one of her dolls. Gold ringlets frame her face, just like they sometimes frame Summer’s after a long day in the sun.

  “What’s up, sweetie?”

  “Daddy. Can we go on an adventure?”

  Yes, my dear. Yes, we can.

  Stock

  Time: 7 to 8 hours

  Makes about 3 quarts

  Stock makes every good thing better. It’s kitchen alchemy, a simple, borderline-magical way to turn humble ingredients and culinary detritus into something approaching the divine.

  This isn’t the only way to make stock, but it’s a good one.

  3 to 4 pounds beef knuckle bones

  3 to 4 pounds beef marrow bones (or some combination thereof)

  Olive oil

  4 carrots, peeled and chopped

  4 ribs celery, chopped

  1 head garlic, separated into cloves and lightly smashed but unpeeled

  2 white or yellow onions, peeled and quartered

  ½ bunch fresh flat-leaf parsley

  4 sprigs fresh thyme

  2 bay leaves

  ¼ teaspoon whole black peppercorns

  Juice of 1 lemon

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F.

  2. Rub the bones with oil, put on a sheet pan, and roast for 30 minutes.

  3. Toss the carrots, celery, garlic, and onion in oil and place on another sheet pan. Roast along with the bones for another 20 to 30 minutes, until the bones are appropriately golden brown and lovely.

  4. Transfer the bones and vegetables to a large stockpot in the 12-quart-capacity range. Deglaze the roasting pan with ½ cup water, scraping to dislodge the bits stuck to the bottom, and add this water to the pot as well.

  5. Add the parsley, thyme, bay leaves, peppercorns, and lemon juice to the pot, along with enough cold water to cover the bones by several inches. Don’t add salt! Stock is not a stand-alone food; it’s prefood. You’ll salt whatever dish you eventually use it in.

  6. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer for 6 hours. Don’t let the liquid remain at a rolling boil or it will result in a cloudy stock. If the water evaporates too quickly, partially cover the pot to slow evaporation. Add water, if necessary, to keep the bones covered.

  7. As the liquid simmers, use a wide spoon to skim off any frothy impurities that rise to the top of the stock. Don’t stir, or you’ll disperse these impurities back into the liquid.

  8. Strain the stock through a fine-mesh sieve lined with several layers of cheesecloth, then place the pot in a sink filled with ice to cool to room temperature.

  9. Once cooled, stash the stock in the fridge, and remove any fat that rises to the top. Working in batches if necessary, pour into ice cube trays and freeze, then transfer the cubes to a freezer bag for long-term storage. It’ll keep for about six months—longer if stored in an airtight package in a deep freeze. Freezing stock in ice cube trays will allow you to control how much you thaw for use at any given time. Each cube is about 1 tablespoon.

  Epilogue

  “Is that what I think it is?” Summer asks.

  “That depends what you think it is.” She is referring to a tapering tube of meat about the length of my arm. It’s roughly segmented, notches made more pronounced by a butcher’s knife.

  “It looks like a tail.”

  “Then, yes. It is what you think it is.”

  “Gross.” She moves toward the door.

  “It’s just a tail! You ate raw beef heart, for Pete’s sake. This is no scarier than short ribs.”

  “Okay. Call me when you’ve cooked it.”

  “I’m gonna braise it in red wine and stock.”

  “Our stock?”

  I nod. “With herbs and celery root.”

  “Have I had celery root?”

  “Maybe. It’s like celery. But … more so.”

  Her eyes narrow, considering. Finally, she speaks. “Whatever. I know it’ll be good.” She resumes her trajectory out of the kitchen. “Just let me know when dinner’s ready.”

  “I’ll call you when the tail is on the table.”

  The oxtail is the tail of the beef critter. As far as function is concerned, it swishes. It does not move the beast. It does not perform any structural purpose other than swatting the occasional fly. It does have a lot of fat and connective tissue, necessitating a braise. But otherwise, it just hangs at the end of the animal. And swishes.

  Similarly, I’ve reached the tail end of my beef project. My freezer, once full nearly to overflowing with beef and countless promises of adventurous meals, is now filled mostly with water, in case the Big One comes and California slides off into the ocean.

  So that’s it. It’s finished. An entire grass-fed steer provided nutrition and sustenance for my family for years. During that time, my son has grown from a baby to a boy. My daughter was born. My wife left her job to stay home with the kids, and I took a new position as well. I tried to climb the highest mountain in the Lower 48 twice, succeeded once. Got in possibly the best shape of my life. Cooked dishes from England to Vietnam to France to Argentina to Peru to Italy to Germany to the good old United States. Shared those meals with friends and loved ones on holidays and weeknights, quickly and slowly, for the most spectacular and mundane of reasons.

  I slice the tail and drop the pieces into my Dutch oven to sear, and the meat hits the enamel with a satisfying hiss. New at the beginning of this project, the pot now looks as if it’s been to war. Blackened by licks of flame and the scorches of meals gone wrong. Scratched by metal implements and momentary bouts of stupidity. The project and the meals it’s engendered have changed it.

  Similarly, I think of how this project has changed me. I once contemplated terroir and a life lived at a slower pace. Well, a slower pace is a relative thing. I am, however, considerably calmer. If I, like a grass-fed steer, have come to more perfectly reflect my surroundings, I take some comfort in the changes this project has wrought. Every night, I set aside my phone, kick off my shoes, and get down on the floor with my k
ids. It’s an ongoing process, but I let go of whatever’s going on in the wider world and focus on what’s in front of me. Kids. Food. My lovely wife. And beautiful weather. Next step, next breath.

  This project has also made me consider the cataclysmic change that occurred in the middle of the last century—the heyday of my grandparents’ generation. Society as we think of it today, with all its abundance of food and comfort and information and demands, is a relatively recent development. We tend to think of however the world is right now as how it’s always been—or we romanticize an invented, idealized past that never really existed—but the fact remains that our current moment in history is a blink in the entirety of human experience. A lot of good has come out of the mechanization and innovation of the middle of last century, and I don’t mean to denigrate it. But those innovations have come at a high price, in the form of greater fossil fuel dependence and the resulting pollution. But it’s very easy to consider how things happen to be right now, the accidents of history and the efforts of people who’ve come before us, as an eternal normal. It’s the default option.

  Cooking with this steer has taught me, if nothing else, not to accept the default option. In cooking, in eating, in running, in working, in playing—other options exist and have their own benefits and shortcomings. And in some cases, I’ve found them preferable to their more recently developed defaults.

  The slices of oxtail in my Dutch oven are a deep golden brown. I add sliced shallots, along with diced carrots and celery root. Soon the air is filled with the smell of good things. I add wine and stock to the pot, along with some herbs plucked fresh from my backyard garden. Then I lid the pot and slide it into the oven.

  Summer slips back in from the other room, drawn by the scent of my handiwork. She peeks into the oven. “So that’s it? The last of the beef?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Wow.” She thinks. “This is the first time in years we haven’t had an ungodly amount of beef in the freezer. It’s weird.”

  “I know.”

  “I’ve gotten used to just having it on hand. It’s been so convenient.”

  “It has.”

  “Huh,” she says. Then, acknowledging the end of an era, she nods. “Well. Good job, Stone.” She rubs my back briefly, then turns to leave. Over her shoulder, she calls out, “So what’s next?”

  I smile. “I need to see a man about a buffalo.”

  About the Author

  JARED STONE is an award-winning television producer who won an Emmy in 2013 for his work on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. He has worked with several major television networks including ABC, NBC, Fox, The CW, National Geographic, and many others. Stone lives with his family in LA. You can sign up for email updates here.

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  1 Meet the Meat

  Recipe: The Simplest Strip Steak

  2 Grind

  Recipe: Red Wine–Braised Chuck Roast

  3 Heritage

  Recipe: The Best Burger on the Face of the Earth (Seriously)

  4 New Heights

  Recipe: Killer Jerky

  5 New Frontiers

  Recipe: Pho

  6 Ancestral Foodways

  Recipe: Chicken-Fried Steak and Onion Rings

  7 Go Big

  Recipe: Christmafestikwanzikkuh Feast

  8 One Step Back, One Step Forward

  Recipe: Meatza

  9 Heart

  Recipe: Lengua Tacos

  10 Around the Fire

  Recipe: Steak au Poivre

  11 I Am an Animal

  Recipe: Steak Frites

  12 Bones

  Recipe: Stock

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Copyright

  YEAR OF THE COW. Copyright © 2015 by Jared Stone. All rights reserved. For information, address Flatiron Books, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  www.flatironbooks.com

  eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:

  Stone, Jared.

  Year of the cow: how 420 pounds of beef built a better life for one American family / Jared Stone.

  pages cm

  ISBN 978-1-250-05258-2 (hardcover)

  ISBN 978-1-250-05379-4 (e-book)

  1. Cooking (Beef) 2. Meat cuts. I. Title.

  TX749.5.B43S76 2015

  641.6'62—dc23

  2014042130

  e-ISBN 9781250053794

  First Edition: April 2015