On reading J.P. Devine’s column about eating pony, I remembered back to grad school days in Tucson, Ariz., in the 1960s, when horse meat was available at the local supermarket.

Everyone advised adding fat to the frying pan because horse meat was very lean. I’ve eaten it and it wasn’t bad.

The problem, I believe, is that we don’t have a good word for dead horse.

Dead cow is called beef, from the French word boef and dead pig is called pork from the French, porc. Dead sheep we call mutton from the Old French word for a ram.

Maybe if we called dead horse, cheval, we’d be more likely to order up a cheval steak.

 

Forrest Meader, Skowhegan

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