Tripe is not often available in the US supermarkets. When we saw some at our local Stop & Shop we had to get it.
Tripe is the stomach of a cow. It is normally washed, boiled and bleached before sale. In this case we found the reticulum honeycomb and pocket tripe.
Tripe can have a very unpleasant taste. Iin the UK it is often cooked in milk and served with onions giving it a ‘barnyard’ aftertaste. We had eaten tripe at Per Se in NYC and I remember being served it in South Africa.
For our pressure cooker tripe we began by placing the tripe in salted water and then we washed it well.
Next we sliced the tripe into thick strips.
We sliced up some carrots, onion, leeks and cherry tomatoes.
Added a bay leaf and then sweated the vegetables for a few minutes.
We added a little red wine and some beef stock (or better still veal stock).
Next we added the sliced tripe then covered and cooked on high pressure in our pressure cooker for an hour.
We strained and reduced the sauce after cooking. Then we recombined all the ingredients and blitzed in our food processor.
This is quite a rich dish, but we love it served with a little splash of good balsamic vinegar.
It is a taste that is very clearly tripe and we would not recommend serving it to a novice on the first date!
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