Just last week, I learned about a special goat dinner at Woodberry Kitchen, where they serve the whole animal, head and all.
Then this morning, I heard about plans to serve cow's head at Cuadrado, the Mexican barbecue restaurant scheduled to open this fall on North Avenue, across the street from Joe Squared Pizza.
"Everything but the brain," is how Joe Edwardsen described the future menu item. Edwardsen is the Joe in Joe Squared and will also own the barbacoa joint.
"It's all that face meat, which is the most delicious meat on the cow," he said.
The cow's head will be smoked whole, but the meat will be served off the bone in deference to those "nothing-with-a-face meat-type people," he said.
"We'll tear it off so you'll just get the meat," he said.
Meats of all kind -- goat, pig, chicken, turkey -- will be available at the restaurant, slow-cooked in banana and agave leaves. The restaurant will seat about 116.
I asked Edwardsen about the name, which means square in Spanish. At Joe Squared, the pizzas are square. How will the square theme play out at Cuadrado?
"I'll have some square plates," he said, "but we're not serving square tacos."
Photo courtesy of The Art Institute of Chicago