[BigOlChiefsfan]

Buttermilk is a 'byproduct' of making butter - basically everything that doesn't turn to butter in the churn. Before good roads/milk trucks, farmers who couldn't sell milk made butter and sold that. They were left with a LOT of buttermilk, it was the drink of choice for farm-folk. The traditional crackers or cornbread in buttermilk (sometimes called 'clabber') was an affordable snack, when I was a kid in the ozarks this was what the old country folks offered children like me. It's nothing to write home about, but for po' folks it beats the hell out of going hungry. For those who haven't had it, buttermilk is not unlike plain yoghurt or kefir. It's pretty good for you, so far as dairy goes, and is more digestible than 'sweet' milk (as opposed to buttermilk). I like it mixed 40-60 w/OJ, tastes kind of like an Orange Julius - YMMV, of course. On our farm, extra buttermilk was mixed w/ground corn and fed to pigs, who fattened up on it until autumn when they magically turned into hams, bacon and sausages. Carrying the 5 gallon buckets of 'hog slop' (grain + milk + vegetable scraps from the kitchen and anything else semi-edible') was pretty hard work...and for you weight lifters, this is the origin of 'the Farmer's walk' that you'll sometimes see strength athletes working on. Just pick up 50lbs - 100 lbs or so in each hand and walk as far as you can.

Fried brains were a staple in the corner bars of St. Louis when I was a kid - I always assumed this was a germanic slaughterhouse-town treat, as everyone we knew back then was a German hillbilly who'd escaped to the big city. Fried Brain sandwiches or fried brains w/scrambled eggs are no big deal - think 'unseasoned sausage' and you're pretty close in taste/texture.

Coffee in the saucer is old-skool. In the olden days, coffee was a boiled product, and often came to the table too hot to drink. You add cream/sweetening to your saucer and pour some coffee in/slop some over. The wider circum/shallow depth let the coffee cool quickly. You drank this while your cup cooled off. No need to do this w/coffee-maker java as it's never boiled, never really all that hot.

Pickled herring/roll mops were traditional 'free lunch' bar food, as were pickled pigs feet, deviled eggs/pickled eggs. A lot of fellows my grandpa's age had lived thru the pre-prohibition era when the free lunch or nickel lunch was a good reason for a guy to go to the bar, buy a beer and gossip. If you've never gotten a free lunch (TANSTAAFL = There ain't no such thing as a free lunch/Missouri's own Robert Heinlein) then you may never have tasted these freebies, but there was a time when we had skinny, hungry worker bees in this country instead of obese cubicle rats. Eh, it could happen again. My Grandpa ate 'roll mops' and sardines every chance he got. I keep up the sardines tradition, but never really liked the rollmops.

Head cheese...if you carry those heavy buckets of slop every day to feed them damn pigs (and dodge getting eaten by the pigs your own self) then when the time comes you eat every bit, including the tail. Everything but the squeal. Headcheese is not half bad if it's well made. Likewise, beef tongue makes a great roast beef sandwich. But I'll admit you had to grow up on most of this to really enjoy 'em. Which reminds me of one of my favorite quotes...

"What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child?" ~Lin Yutang