Edible Antics - Having Fun With Food: When Is Playing With Food An Extreme Sport?

Monday, May 26, Jeanne Carpenter of the Cheese Underground reported on the Gloucestershire, England race in which adults run down an extremely steep hill trying to catch a rolling wheel of Double Gloucester cheese. The winner gets to keep the cheese. This year's winner also got a new neck brace before he was carried away on a stretcher. 19 other contestants suffered injuries. No reports indicated harm to the cheese. Jeanne suggests we take up this sport in Wisconsin. That's because Jeanne LOVES cheese.

Perhaps Wisconsinites will adopt cheese rolling as a new extreme sport, but we already have fun playing with food. We wrestle hogs. The game is conceptually simple. A hog is let loose in a large, muddy pen and teams of four people compete to see which team can catch and carry the hog to a padded barrel fastest. Don't believe me? See the pictures at the Eldorado, WI Community Website, or the Caldron Falls Bar and Grill in Twin Bridge, WI.

We also just chase pigs. Throughout the summer, in various locales, Wisconsinites, young and old, will run around a pen trying to catch a pig smeared in lard or olive oil. To check it out, visit the festivals in Elmwood, WI in July or El Paso, WI in August.

But we Wisconsinites are not unusual in this sport. Enthusiasts can attend greased pig contests in other states: Pinedale, WY and North Dakota State Fair for example. Brandon Frank, winner of Draper, Utah's greased pig contest described his winning strategy.

Of course controversy clouds the sport. Opponents claim greased pig contests injure the pigs. Last summer, the Animal Rights Foundation of Florida pressured the organizers of the Pioneer Days Festival in Dade City, FL to cancel their contest.

Pig farmers disagree that the contests harm the pigs. "We're always chasing pigs." said a woman who grew up on an Iowa pig farm and wishes to remain anonymous. "The only way to get them from one pen to another is to catch them. They don't get hurt." I asked her if she had ever participated in a greased pig contest. "No," she admitted, "but when I was 10 I guessed a hog's weight at the fair and won the hog! It was the only thing I've ever won in my life. I suppose I was good at guessing hog weights because I used to help my dad decide when the hogs were ready for market."

So, there are more passive, less controversial ways for Wisconsinites to play with their pigs. Previously on this blog, I reported Wisconsin and Illinois children playing hide-and-seek with a pig. No harm came to either the children or the pig. However, the pig had already met its demise,- the children were playing find-the-ham.

Keep reading for the answer to Wednesday's song lyric question.

"Drink your big, black cow, and get out of here!" naturally comes from the song 'Black Cow' on Steely Dan's album: Citizen, Disc 3, 1972-1980.

If you would rather play with pigs after they're cooked, here are some fun, festive foods that all will enjoy:

Pepper Coated Spiral Sliced Ham