When I was young I refused to entertain the idea that I might eat kidneys. It just seemed completely ‘gross’. The more I learnt about the body the more I decided that kidneys just shouldn’t be eaten, but my parents happily had them every now and then and I scrunched up my nose and grimaced at the sight…until I tasted the sauce!

One day I concentrated on how my mum was making the sauce and decided to try it. Just the sauce, mind you. I was NOT going to eat the kidneys. The sauce was so yummy that I started having it on toast. There was always some leftover anyway and I didn’t want it ‘going to waste’.

Finally I succumbed and tasted my first kidney and I’ve never looked back. Admittedly I probably wont order something in a restaurant that has kidneys, but I am certainly more open to the idea.

The reason for this information now is that I made them for the first time on Wednesday evening. You see, I try to donate blood as often as possible and usually everything is fine, but this time they told me that my iron was too low. Not dangerously low for normal life, but not high enough to give blood. In my almost 10 years of donating, I have only had such low iron twice. Bearing in mind that I have been on holiday and haven’t been taking my normal vitamins and extra iron this is probably not a major surprise, but it gave me an excuse to have kidneys.

My husband never experienced this sauce as a child and has never eaten kidneys so I was on my own…more for me!

Not many supermarkets have kidneys in their meat section, but you ask at the butchers they are generally happy to rip them out of the nearest sheep’s carcass and package them for you. A little macabre for some, but you don’t have to watch.

The sauce makes enough for a panfull of kidneys, but I only had 4. Extra sauce is no problem!

Kidneys in super yummy sauce

Ingredients

• lambs or sheep’s kidneys (as many as you require)
• butter
• 1 Tbsp flour
• 2 Tbsp HP brown sauce
• 2 Tbsp Worcester sauce
• 1 cup of milk

Cut kidneys in half and remove the fatty white bits. You can also cut them into smaller pieces. Fry the kidneys in some butter until slightly browned.

Mix the rest of the ingredients with a whisk or fork to break up the flour lumps.

Pour the sauce over the kidneys and simmer until kidneys are cooked through. Stirring often.

Serve on toast for breakfast or with any other starch you like. I had them just like that in a bowl for supper.