Cross-Examining the Official Gelatin Story

A few weeks ago, in the car, Daniel was inquiring as to how to make jello. I really didn't want to get into the core facts the origins of gelatin, but, with my tendency toward candor conspiring with Daniel's natural curiosity and persistence, we eventually ended up on that very subject. I had told Daniel that you take gelatin powder, mix it in with boiling hot water (I know this from my own early childhood, when my Irish-American great-aunts would make it in their kitchen, upstairs from our own apartment, and I always liked drinking the "drink" of hot gelatin more than eating the cold, jiggly stuff that emerged at the end of the process.) I had tried to gloss over the provenance of the core ingredient, by focusing on the fact that it was mixed with flavoring and sugar, but of course Daniel wanted to know more about gelatin itself.

Finally, I explained what I knew about gelatin (although I still don't entirely understand it, and I have no real inclination to dig into the details): gelatin comes out of a cow's hoof. Ewwwww.

But Daniel had an extremely logical question about how the product could safely and reliably be extracted from its source:

"But the cow would bite you before you could get its foot."

(December, 2011)