Pigeons

Ever since I bit into a nasty piece of tendon or connective tissue at a Boston Market while trying to cut my own chicken, I’ve been a little picky when it comes to eating chicken wings. After spending 2 months in Senegal you could say I’ve moved to the other end of the spectrum. When you’re served rice and fish everyday, chicken starts to look really delicious and it’s totally worth scrounging and probing for every last piece of meat. Gone are the days when I complained about having too much chicken from the Hub (my cafeteria). Last night, I went one step further. We had pigeon for dinner – when I saw them for the first time in the kitchen I thought we were eating large rats for dinner. Luckily I was wrong. I thought I was doing a pretty good job taking the meat off my little pigeon when my aunt explained that I could eat the bones. The bones? My uncle chimed in that the bones were tender and rich in iron. I guess my face was still skeptical because she asked me to pass her one of the pigeon skeletons and proceeded to eat the wing. So without thinking about it any longer I ripped the wing off the carcass and chomped down. A little crunchy but I guess I could agree that in comparison with wings from B-Dubs it could be considered tender. A big bite of white baguette helped it go down and to get full marks of approval from my family I even ate the other wing.