This week’s Foodie Friday features.. wiener schnitzel. While this is technically an Austrian (Viennese) dish, I ate it in Germany (I was close to the Austrian border, okay?). This was my first foray into the world of schnitzels, and more poignantly, into the world of veal (more on this later).
I’m admitting a lot of ignorance on my blog lately, but I’m gonna go ahead and do it again: I had no idea that wiener schnitzel was veal. Not even after I’d eaten it. I wouldn’t categorize myself as a picky eater–I’ve eaten a lot of (by my standards) weird shit, including ostrich, whale, biltong, kudu, etc.–but there are a lot of things I don’t really like. One of those things is most cuts of pork, so when I ate the wiener schnitzel, I just sort of assumed that it was a cut of pork that I wasn’t accustomed to and didn’t really like. It was fine–not gag-inducing–but wasn’t something I’d eat on the regular.
About four days later, my friend and trusty travel companion mentioned to me that it was veal. I realize this isn’t a big deal to some people, but if you grew up in my family, it would be. My mom has always been vehemently opposed to eating veal, so it was almost a sin to eat it. I texted her when I returned home from my trip to tell her that I’d eaten it and this is a direct quote response from her: “A lot of people love it. I just don’t like that they [baby cows] are taken from their mothers and raised in little igloos.” It’s funny that this was the first time in my 20-something years that I finally found out why my mom was so against it. (It’s also funny that she’ll eat things I won’t touch with a 10-foot pole, but she won’t try veal.)
In any case, I ate the veal. And I didn’t feel sick afterward. And I didn’t even feel as guilty as I’d thought. I also tried the traditional fries-with-mayonnaise thing.
I also ate veal unknowingly while in Europe. Like you, I thought it was pork… nope!