When I was young I took a Chinese class … I tried to learn mandarin …. some words I remember real well … a good example of this is the words for chicken guts …. It sounds just like you would expect …. Chicken is JI and entrails or guts is dzar …. So Ji dzar is chicken guts ….  to me sounds like gi zzard

Well I discovered something I haven’t noticed down at Wal-Mart …. Packages of chicken hearts and gizzards ….  and for a reasonable price …. For me that means cheap ….  A buck 26 a pound ….  and 94 cents a pound marked down ….  They mark them down for a fast sale when the expiration date is looming.

I love gizzards and hearts …. I still remember when I was young … my mother taught me how to clean a chicken … then I became the family chicken cleaner … that was better than being the family chicken …. Cleaning a chicken is a lot like cleaning a turkey only smaller  …. You had to be real careful when cleaning the gizzard  … if you cut into the inner bag lots of digestive juices and etc came out onto the gizzard  … kind of like cleaning the liver … you had to be careful to cut the gall bladder off of the liver without squeezing the gall of bitterness onto anything you planned on eating.

These hearts and gizzards came from California …. I would really like to see the processing plant … I am curious as to whether a machine or a human cleans the gizzards and livers and hearts …. Hmmm ….  That would be a good question for some locals … there is a turkey processing plant near here … I’m sure someone I know has seen the gizzard reclamation facility.

If any readers know of a gizzard cleaning machine please comment   … I beg you … there is a comment place at the bottom of this post.

The first time I  bought the gizzards … about a month ago …  I tried several different ways of cooking them  …. now I have perfected a recipe that I really like …. It delivers a delicious product and it is easy ….. so here it is …

1. Get a big enough pan …. I have tried it other ways and don’t recommend the skimpy pan method …. It stinks … you see when you stir the giblets there is always a free thinking giblet that wants to escape …. When it jumps it is scared and mysterious juices also follow it out of the pan … these juices dribble down the outside of the pan and end up on the burner of the stove … sometimes there is flame but there is always stench …. As the acrid fumes arrive at other parts of the house certain individuals run to the kitchen to correct the problem …. Comments are made about banning people from the stove, Not using the good pans and other unfair things like that ….. there have also been other things that have happened as a result of not having a big enough pan.  … the pan I used today was 12 inches in diameter and 3 inches deep
2. Put the giblets in the pan ….this part is easy if you are reasonably coordinated …. Make sure that you remove the gizzard diaper …. Under the gizzards is a diaper that is put there to absorb the juices that come out of the giblets ….. this is a merchandising trick … it makes the product more appealing …. I repeat  … remove the diaper …. There is one in each package …. Make sure you have as many gizzard diapers in the garbage as there are gizzard packages … today I had seven packages  … each package was touted to weigh approximately a pound    … I didn’t weigh any … I apologize for the oversight …
3. Put enough water in the pan …. Not enough water leads to more bad smells and bans ….. today I had gizzards 3 inches deep and heaped in the middle … the water started out 2 inches deep
4. cook giblets a long time …. I put a lid on the pan ….  I got the stuff boiling then turned the heat down and let them simmer for about two and a half hours  … without supervision  …. That made them real tender  … the cooking  made them tender …. the lack of supervision does not affect tenderness but it does simplify the process …. I took the lid off and turned the heat up … this is to boil the excess water off   … this requires supervision …. This is very critical  …wild boiling is the step in the process most likely to destroy pans and kitchen privileges …. I mean it  …. you have to watch it  … you need to turn the stove off when the water is almost gone ….
5. add butter … in my case I use Imperial margarine …. With seven pounds of gizzards I used a half pound of imperial   …. A little stirring and the margarine mixes with the remaining juice  … this creates a delicious sauce … the Ji dzar juice appears to contain natural emulsifiers …

I put the giblets in little bags and put the little bags in the little freezer…. Now I can heat up a little snack whenever I want a little innard peace.

If any of you are proficient mandarin speakers I apologize for my bad pronunciation

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Ji Dzar ….. Fact checker

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