Tonight Taylor and I sat down for a nice dinner of Pot Roast for Daddy and Chicken nuggets for Taylor. Being the curious soul she is she asked me what I was eating, thinking we were both eating different kinds of chicken. So I explained that pot roast is cow while chicken nuggets are chicken. She got a very quizzical look on her face and asked, "Dad, why when you cook chicken is it still called chicken, but when you cook cow it's not called cow?" Being the honest daddy I am I said, "Well, that is a great question, something I've never thought about. I actually have no idea."
So I thought I put it out there ... any ideas? Why don't we call cow, cow when we cook it?
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
A good question from Taylor
Posted by Aaron at Tuesday, February 05, 2008
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8 comments:
Cow is not an appetizing word. Beef sounds more appetizing. Actually, there are 2 kinds of cows: beef cattle (what we eat) and dairy cattle (where we get milk from). They are apparently bred and fed specifically for their intended purpose. Would you rather eat "cow" or "beef"?? If we didn't have the word "beef", then when we see a beefy guy on your beach, we'd call him "cow-y". DUMB. Can you tell I'm tired??
Our kids have asked this question too and Josh had a great answer for it...but I can't remember it, so I'll let him post it when he gets home later today. It has something to do with the many contributors to the English language, you know, all that history stuff. Anyway, tell Taylor she's cute. We make up our own names here, especially when it's game. I'd eat cow.
When Anglo/Saxon England was invaded by the Norman Conqueror William, he and his nobles superimposed their culture & language on their new subjects. This was only partially successful. For example, Norman knights and nobles were forbidden to speak Saxon (Old English... from German) even if they were married to Anglo/Saxon women. Servants were mostly Anglo/Saxon as well. So French was spoken at court. This dichotomy didn't last long; French was really only spoken there for a couple hundred years. But as it was disappearing from the island, it left a lot of conglomerations; servants out in the field called their animals pigs, cows, sheep, deer, & chickens. The folks eating it in the dining room - because so often they were Normans - called it pork, beef, mutton, venison and poultry. This mixture was perpetuated by the gentry which survived right down to Jane Austen's day and beyond. One more layer from another language was added to English, and a step was taken away from its German roots. This is a good reason why, when you look at a page written in Old English, you think to yourself "Holy Cow, (beef) what is that?!"
I had an inane and useless comment, but it was deleted when I tried to sign in. So, out of principle I refuse to type it again. However, since I am NOW logged in I shall leave this inane and useless comment. Take that computer type people who deleted my psuedo-pithy tripe! I have triumphed yet again. Bed.
Now that it's twelve hours later and I'm a wee more senient... Cow, beef, bovine, moomeat. Call it what you want, just don't let anything white and globular near it and I'm on it like jealousy on a one-year old big brother.
Gabe,
your son is jealous?
You've both been tagged in my Meme. :)
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