A note from Mecca (Med) Howe, PhD: This blog article was written for an undergraduate class assignment for my Food, Culture, and Nutrition class (Spring 2026) at UNC Charlotte. The course explores food and nutritional anthropology through a biocultural lens to understand why we eat what we eat and how food makes us human. For their final project, students were asked to write a blog article on a topic from the course that resonated with them. The assignment encouraged them to combine lived experiences and self-reflection with evidence-based research to tell a compelling story, ultimately building skills in writing for public audiences. I hope you enjoy this piece as much as I did!
Madison Dittmar
UNC Charlotte
The consumption of beef tongue has long persisted in various cultures. My father has described his childhood in Western Germany with eating beef tongue, called “Zunge.” It was a delicacy both he and his father would always look forward to. The tongue is first boiled, then sliced thinly, accompanied with a sauce of its own juices and can be served with white rice or potatoes. This dish is categorized as offal, which refers to the non-prime yet still edible parts of meat. While once widely consumed, offal consumption has declined in the West due to urbanization and industrialization, which have reshaped food systems and distanced consumers from whole animal consumption. ¹ These shifts, along with food neophobia, a fear or reluctance to eat unfamiliar foods, have narrowed what may be defined as edible.
In the prehistoric and ancient world, the tongue was utilized, as was every edible part of the animal. In the Mediterranean, the tongue has even been described in ancient feasts, signaling it was eaten by the nobility. Fast forward to Medieval Europe, tongue continued to be eaten by the elite class, often smothered in expensive spices, herbs, and other luxury ingredients. Tongue was also common among the peasantry, along with other offal, as it was affordable and accessible, and even pickled to store long-term. In Victorian Europe, tongue consumption continued and began appearing in cookbooks; however, due to the standardization of meat cuts, offal consumption began to decline. ²
The past couple of centuries have brought tremendous changes to the meat industry, changing what we consider ideal meat cuts. In the early 20th-century, butchers went through extensive schooling and training and utilized new inventions such as the coolant systems, which allowed for meat to be cooled in large cooling rooms, extending the raw meat’s shelf life. Butchers would not only slaughter the animal, but would also dissect it, cutting into particular meat cuts, including offal, and processing parts into sausages and minces. While meat had formerly been sold over the counter, the self-service method of selecting meat at a grocery store became increasingly common. Large-scale meat production was more affordable and convenient than the butcher, who had higher prices due to the labor and education that were needed to perform such duties. Before the Second World War, specialized stores for each need were common: the dry goods store, the greengrocer, the butcher, the baker, the general store, and the fishmonger. In the US, private companies led the way for the standardization of goods, increasing the items per store and allowing the customer to browse and then select their pre-packaged goods. The pre-packaging of meat and self-service goods allowed meat to become more affordable and easily available.
Minced meat became increasingly common due to the low costs, as well as the ease and convenience of cooking it. During this shift, pork was even rebranded to be in the same category as poultry, despite its nutritional value aligning itself as a red meat, showing the changes in the meat industry to make items seem more appealing. Meat itself became not part of an animal, but a product to shop for. It was intended to look attractive and even enticing, to catch the consumer’s attention, and then to be bought, removing the idea of a slaughtered animal to be eaten into a product to be consumed. ³ Alongside this shift, the amount of at-home and from-scratch cooking decreased tremendously. The cooking of offal, including tongue, was tedious and time-consuming, and preparing prime-cut meats was much quicker and more convenient. A significant reason for the idea of food neophobia was linked to people’s ideas of offal and its association with “poor food.” This is largely because farmers were not compensated for offal. Instead, animals were sold to slaughterhouses, and the offal was retained by processors and distributors as part of the payment for slaughtering and processing the animal rather than being considered part of the meat purchased from farmers. Many people also had fears when it came to the animal head, including the tongue, more than any other offal part. ⁴ My Oma, my father’s mother, avoided eating beef tongue despite preparing it herself, due to seeing it raw and uncooked, sparking disgust or fear despite the final product being appetizing.
Across various cultures, the consumption of tongue is seen not only as normal but also as a delicacy. During the Second World War, prime cut meats were rationed while offal was commonplace, which led to prime cut meats being associated with “victory,” thus increasing in popularity. In Post-War Japan, the Japanese faced extreme food shortages, and fortunately, US troops left behind a large amount of offal and tongue meat, which was then utilized by the Japanese. This began the Japanese consumption of beef tongue, also known as Gyūtan, which was once rare, to now regularly consumed in various styles such as Hot Pot, Korean-Style BBQ, and in stews. ⁶ The city of Sendai, Japan, is even regarded as the city of Gyūtan. Moving West, various central asian cultures value the entire head of the animal, serving it whole or cutting the tongue out for consumption⁷. While beef is consumed in central and western Asia, lamb and sheep meat are much more common. When cooking the entire head, it typically takes ~8 hours and is cooked overnight and then served for breakfast. In Western Asia, tongue is often braised or boiled and used in salads or sandwiches.⁸ In Latin American Cuisine, tongue is often consumed in tacos, burritos, stews, and more, and is known as “lengua.” ⁹
The history of beef tongue has shown that changes in society have influenced what we may find acceptable to consume. With industrialization and urbanization, food and the shopping experience became standardized, which contributed to the decline of offal consumption overall. At the same time, the prevalence of food neophobia has contributed to people’s limited willingness to try new or unfamiliar foods. However, as seen through my own father’s experiences as well as meat consumption outside of the West, offal consumption has not disappeared entirely. The following recipe, taken from a cookbook in my Oma’s house, reflects the exact preparation and traditions that have been preserved, even while broader, modern eating habits have changed.
Zungenragout
Place the tongue in boiling water with soup vegetables and onions. Cook for three to four hours, then rinse in cold water, peel the tongue, and cut it into neat slices. Prepare one liter of sauce from dark roux and broth. Season with wine, sugar, and salt. Add the sliced tongue to the sauce. Arrange on a large platter with mushrooms or bread dumplings, or served with mashed potatoes and spinach.
Ingredients:
One beef tongue
Soup vegetables of choice
One onion
Four tablespoons butter
150 mL or 10 tablespoons flour
One liter or 4.2 cups broth
75 mL or 5 tablespoons red wine
Two tablespoons lemon juice
Sugar as needed
Salt as needed
FoodAnthropology 