There is no longer quite this much difference between the local people and the English people, I find.

hi PN,
i remember them cows, i think i had one of them for dinner tonight. tough as a piece of naugahyde and probably as old. brrrrrrrrrrpppppp. yep, definitely a tan couch.
later gators,
cajunsr.

They're not cows, they're oxen.

hi PN,
skin 'em, cook 'em, and see if you can tell the difference? of course, unless your making OXTAIL soup.
later gators,
cajunsr.

The point is, though, that these are pulling a cart, and then you can tell the difference from cows or indeed bulls ! For ploughing (US plowing) or any draught (US draft) application you need oxen !

Above all, this is almost the only Anglo-Saxon plural we've got left (another one is louse, lice, and of course children), so it's important to keep this word alive !

For our French readers if any, oxen means boeufs, but boeufs includes bullocks (which you do eat, US steers), so it's a very special word. Oxford means Gué pour boeuf de trait.

hi PN,
where the hell you been man? in america, we got these animals called mules. they is a whole lot better than cows or oxen to pull things. and the army used them a lot too. some even talked, remember 'francis' the talking mule? never saw a movie with a talking ox, well maybe disney's paul bunyan and babe the big blue ox, but i didn't see him talk. did see some talking moose in 'brother bear'. and that steak is still talking to me, brrrrrrrrrppppp. maybe i'll have some oxtail soup and see if the other end will talk to me too.
later gators,
cajunsr.

Oxen are no longer used in the UK, in fact I don't think they have been for centuries. They were still in use in parts of France certainly as late as the 50s, and parts of Italy certainly as late as the 60s. The Italian working oxren were said to be beautiful animals exactly the same as in Roman times. In England, we tended to use Shire Horses, also impressive, still used by some breweries and the Queen.

I have never seen a mule. I don't know of them ever having been used in the UK. But they were used in mountainous parts of France certainly as late as the 19th century (e.g. in Carmen), and in Italy the army used them a lot in the last war. I have been in the Valle d'Aosta in Italy and walked up a mule-track to a mountain village. It is very noticeable that the modern road for cars keeps zig-zagging across it, in other words the poor mules used to climb much more steeply !

I don't want to upset you, but if there is any possibility of Mad Cow Disease, oxtail soup is not a good idea. The spine is the part which is discarded in slaughterhouses to minimise any risk.

hi PN,
most of the 'mad' cow disease haven't made it into the food chain, but then i have felt a little extra nuts lately. could it be the 'napoleon' complex perhaps? as for mules, they are a good creature for plowing, or packing equipment. that is why the army used them in ww2. and when times were tough, you can eat them, like a horse. haven't heard of 'mad' horse disease yet. but you do bring up a good point. but i don't know if the tail includes any of the spinal column, i don't think so. if it did, it wouldn't be sold to the american public, but don't quote me on that. i haven't been shopping lately for calves brains or stuff like that. and i'm not a veternarian, but we humans don't have tails. and i do know human anatomy and physiology being an ex-army medic. just not sure about cows. besides donna can make it without oxtails, we just use some other type of beef. and we pressure cook it to make it tender. comes out very tasty. i even sent the recipe to one of my customers and he raved over it. i even sent him some of my local seasonings we have to make it better. we have some very good local spanish/cuban stores for those things. one of the good things about tampa, except no cajun store for good andouille or community coffee, or fresh crawfish. maybe someday, when bush ain't president no mo.
later gators,
cajunsr.

Get a cat, and investigate its tail. (They like this if you don't pull it).

Cows are constructed the same way.

If you carefully remove the brains and the spinal chord, this helps a lot to stop Mad Cow Disease getting into the food chain. It should really be done by hand, because power tools scatter bits of bone and nerve all over the place.

Poor old Macdonalds went to a lot of trouble trying to establish that they used British beef not South American beef, and then they must have wondered if it was quite such a good idea ...... You can't win em all !

I believe the Itallians took a lot more mules to war than they ever brought back, and I suspect that a lot of them ended up enriching pasta.The British Army used very large numbers of horses in the First World War, by the way. Horses were called up, like men.

hi PN,
well, being as i got an italian veternarian in the stamp club, i'll ask him about them oxtails, and the mules in the pasta. might get a nasty look from him, or a horse's head in my bed later in the night, maybe a mule's.
later gator,
cajunsr.