Humble Pie

(This photo was supposed to be in Interesting People above. John is considerably younger than this gentleman and is an interesting person in his own right, just not this person. The photo is of Rocco, owner of our favorite neighborhood restaurant downtown Glasgow, Piazza Italia, just off George’s Square. This was our going away party. Rocco gave us mini babas au rhum in limoncello, and we gave him my favorite CD, Frank Sinatra’s Come Fly With Me.)

The following story was submitted via a personal email today from my Brother-in-Law John. Thanks John! He wants our dog Zoe to accompany him Bambi-hunting this fall. I may send her along because she’ll make so much racket running around in the woods that he’ll never even see a deer, much less kill one!

“Speaking of venison, I read this crazy article recently in the Texas
Parks & Wildlife magazine that stated the origins of “humble pie” to
have initially been “umble pie” — referencing “umbles” as the variety
meats of the deer in the King’s forests. The author claimed that
commoners substituted the variety meats of their common livestock, and
called their own version an ignominious “humble” pie, and thus the
expression, “eating my humble pie” has been passed along to us. The
author explained that the flavor of wild game at that time was believed
far superior to beef or lamb, and that is why the nobles prohibited
commoners from enjoying the spoils. He went on to suggest that the
reason native Americans wasted no part of the game they harvested was
due not to necessity, but because of the enjoyment derived from these
various internal organs. It’s an interesting perspective, but I am
dubious.”