Sweetbreads

In the early 1970s, I lived in Caswell, a village near the small town of Limestone, in northern Maine. In those days before GPS, maps of Maine showed the top part of Aroostook County in an offset because the state is way longer (taller?) than the ordinary map could cover. My little village was in that inset. It was so far north that the most convenient way to get into Canada was to drive south to Limestone then turn east.

I was recently divorced, 28 years old, and ready to sample the sweets available in the Pine Tree State, the Maritime Provinces and, "Oui monsieur, certainement la ville de Québec."   The latter, that magic capitol of Quebec Province was but a four hour drive from my home, so one weekend, a fellow I worked with and I drove there.

We found a small hotel in the old city, with no elevator, wooden stairs with the treads showing a century or more of wear, and beds nearly as old and worn as the rest of the place, but looking out onto a small park and a parking place where I left my car until we went back to Maine.

Old Quebec is a walking city.  There are narrow little streets with cafés and taverns, fancy restaurants, and the huge Hotel Frontenac that dominates the skyline.   We walked up and down through the city, toured the old fort, drank a beer or two and acted like the tourists we were.  As the afternoon turned to evening, we began looking for a French restaurant, which is not a lot like looking for a fast food restaurant in the US - there's one on every corner and more in-between.  We settled on one with sidewalk seating and began looking at the menu which, in Quebec tradition, was in French.  My friend, a midwesterner with little imagination when it came to food, ordered a filet.

I wanted something French.  Steaks I could get in Caribou or Fort Fairfield.  About halfway down the page, between the Coq au Vin  and Tornedos Rossini, I spotted  Ris de Veau aux Champignons.  My high school French teacher once told my mother that I was easily his most frustrating student, and in the twelve or so years since that time, my skill in the language had deteriorated to remembering just a few words.  I remembered the veau was veal, champignons was mushrooms, and with all the logic of a barely passing French student, determined in my mind that ris must be rice.  I like all three, rice, veal and mushrooms,  so I ordered it by pointing at it on the menu and barely mumbling something that may have sounded like, "ree de view o sham pi nons."  The waiter, to his credit, didn't sneer at my attempt to speak French, but he did confirm my order by pronouncing it his way.  

The meal was served and I was a bit surprised at the absence of rice, but rather than act like an American oaf on his first trip to a French restaurant, which it was, I held my tongue and began eating.  The meat was beige in color, in appearance not unlike pan-fried chicken,  and had been cut into nearly bite size pieces and served with a pale sauce (gravy) with mushrooms as I'd anticipated.   The first bite was a surprise.  How could veal be smooth, tender, juicy and rich flavored all at once?  It didn't matter - I was hooked.  Whatever Ris de Veau was, I liked it.  It was delicious.  

Back in northern Maine that next week, I went to the library and looked up Ris de Veau.  I'd been eating the thymus or thyroid of a calf.  I also learned that rather than call it that, restaurants in America would either use the French name or use a strange name for any meat product - sweetbreads. 

For readers who live near me in Georgia, Chef José Zambrano of Girasoles in Watkinsville will make a delicious sweetbreads dish if you ask him a day or so in advance.