Years ago, I lived in Buenos Aires with an Argentine couple. I remember that they always had an entire cow tongue in the refrigerator. It had taste buds and everything. They would cut it up and eat it on bread as a sandwich. At the time, I was young and could not imagine eating tongue. I never tried the tongue and that was a mistake. Things have certainly changed.

I believe that it is unethical to kill an animal and not use as much of it as possible. My husband and I do not believe in sport hunting, or even slaughtering an animal and only taking choice pieces. If you kill it, you eat it.

Every year, we work with a local rancher to purchase a cow. We pick up the live cow from the rancher and drive it to the processor. We discuss how we want the animal to be processed, in detail, with the processor. Throughout the years, we have stopped using numerous processors who steal bones or did not provide us with our entire animal. If we pay for it, we expect to receive the animal.
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While this is a very principled position, it also leads to a lot of interesting cuts of meat, including cow tongue.

​I am sure there a lot of ways to prepare cow tongue (aka “lengua”), but here is what we recently did. We placed the entire tongue into a crockpot while it was still frozen. Then, we strained stewed tomatoes that I had canned in the fall and put the tomatoes on top of the tongue. You could substitute store-bought stewed tomatoes. We seasoned it with salt, pepper, oregano, rosemary, and fresh chopped garlic. We cooked it on low for the day.

It is important to remove the taste buds after the tongue is completely cooked. Leaving the taste buds and skin on the tongue will create a rubbery texture that is unappetizing. You can easily slice the taste buds off using a knife and it will peel in large sections.

Cut the tongue into pieces similar to a pork tenderloin. Serve the tongue on polenta or couscous with a salad. Be sure to scoop the tomatoes on top of the tongue as it has an amazing flavor.

With the left-over tongue (because there is sure to be some), we have made lengua street tacos. Cut the tongue into small pieces and sautéed it in oil. This allows the tongue to have a charred or crunchy edge. Heat two corn tortillas per taco on the gas stove. Place the lengua on the tortilla, add pinto beans, freshly cut white onion, and cilantro. Serve with a lime wedge.
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It is uncommon for American households to serve tongue, but it is truly a delicacy. A cow tongue produces at least two meals and is often discarded. In a time when people are hoarding toilet paper, should we really be throwing away deliciously edible parts of animals?

This was my first year elk hunting. I have been on elk hunts with my husband in the past, but this was my first year carrying a gun. I did not draw a tag, so I bought an over-the-counter second season bull tag. (Translation: “I have to kill a male and can only do it between October 24-November 1”).  My husband bought a third season bull tag (Translation: “He has to kill a male between November 7-13”).

Before our hunts, we spent days scouting and driving remote high mountain roads looking for elk habitat. We marked areas that had water and south facing meadows using On X. 

My season was interrupted constantly by work obligations. Apparently, judges do not fully appreciate the implications of having a second season bull tag. We were able to hunt four days during my season, one of which it snowed the entire time.
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During my husband’s season, I went with him for four days as well. He did additional days, but that work thing had me going back into the office. In total, I was in the Rocky Mountains searching for an elusive bull elk for eight days in three weeks.

Then my husband's season started.  On day one, we woke up at 3:30 a.m. and we were on the road by 4 a.m. We drove for 2 hours to a mountain that stretched well over 12,000 feet in elevation. We hit a pretty brutal snow storm at about 9,000 feet. By that time, it was about 5:30 a.m. and still pitch-black outside. The road leading to the hunting spot was not maintained and therefore was not plowed. Here is a view from the windshield:

​We arrived to our parking spot at 6 a.m., only to realize that it was still too dark to leave the truck. We waited in the truck for 30 minutes, packed up our stuff, and headed out into the wilderness. For hours, we climbed to the top of a mountain through thick trees. We climbed over dozens of downed trees as the snow piled up. Throughout the morning, the wind picked up and so did the snow.

We hiked for about 4 hours in the blizzard and then returned to the truck to take a break. When I unzipped my “waterproof” Marmot Goretex jacket, copious amounts of water ran down the inside of the jacket. I was completely soaked. My base layers were wet too. I also realized, thanks to my observant husband, that the snow hit my jacket and ran down to my pants, creating a large wet spot in my crotch. It looked like I had peed my pants. That ended our morning hunt.

Later in the week, we decided to hike a local spot about an hour from our house. My husband alleged that the trail was about 2 miles uphill and then would open up to large meadows where elk might be. Again, it was puking snow and pretty cold. Despite that, I was feeling pretty optimistic as we left the truck and started up the trail.

The trail was single-track, exclusively up hill, and extremely difficult. Later, I Googled it and learned that it is rated as a black diamond, difficult trail. My husband left that part out.

We hiked for hours, silently, uphill, in the snow. At about hour 2, my husband turned around to check in on me. I whisper-yelled that I was starving. He looked me in the eye and said he was too. He then turned on his heel and continued up the mountain. To me, that seemed like a good time to stop and eat our sandwiches, but it was not my hunt.

We continued to hike for at least another half an hour and we finally made it to the meadow. I was so happy that we could finally have a drink of water and eat our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in silence (talking is not allowed). But, oh no, that did not happen. Husband Hunter spotted another meadow on top of another mountain that he wanted to check out. So, we continued climbing.

At this point, I strongly considered pushing him off the mountain, if only I could have caught up with him. Instead, I was limping along in the snow using a bipod as a hiking pole and cursing elk season. When we talked about this later, he claims that my chin was quivering around this time. That sounds about right.

We got to the top of the second mountain with the alleged "better meadow" and the wind was howling. I convinced Husband Hunter to get into the trees so we could eat our sandwiches. We ate, had a little water, and my desire to murder him subsided.

Then, we started on the return. However, we did not return down the same trail. Instead, we circled more meadows and ended up cutting our own trail for hours. We were sliding down steep, muddy, snow covered sides of the mountain and catching ourselves on aspens. Eventually, we found the trail and continued sliding all the way to the bottom.

The hike was 9 miles, took 5 hours, and was in 12 inches of snow. The trail started at 8,000 feet in elevation and we hiked over 1,000 feet up.

When we got back to our truck, we ran into a friend who is an experienced elk hunting guide. When we told him what we had done, he responded that “hiking is for the birds.” He obviously only goes up that trail with his horses.
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For my last day of elk hunting, we checked out a new area in the National Forest. Using On X, it appeared that there were many meadows where the elk might hang out. We started hiking and were really blown away by the beauty of the “meadows.”

​You see, those are actually massive rock piles covered in snow, and we had to hike through it. We fell numerous times and the snow was up passed our knees.

​At one point, Hunter Husband crashed really hard onto his tail bone and got his leg stuck between the rocks. I thought we were going to need a med evac, which would have been impossible. 

​Our elk seasons were a bust, as far as elk are concerned. We hiked, scouted, fell, climbed, cursed, and I might have whimpered a little. In total, we saw about 12 cow elk, but we had bull tags; cows don't count.  Elk hunting on public land in Colorado, by foot, is really challenging. It physically (and emotionally) pushed me more than I have been pushed in quite some time. It was disheartening, funny, and absolutely exhausting. I am glad that Hunter Husband and I got the opportunity to go on our elk hunts together, but I am not sure I am going to do it again next year. At the very least, I am only putting in for a fourth season cow tag (Translation: “I want an easier hunt”).