I've only had it once, and I actually thought it was pretty good. I just sliced it kind of thin and fried it in bacon grease as well. But there is that "farmy" smell and after taste. My new tactic for all offal is to grind it up, mix with ground muscle meat and lots of spice for offal sausage. And that's good stuff! There's a little prep in the beginning, but quick and easy to fry up later.

As far as micro-nutrients, the only thing that I might be concerned about is selenium.

Hi PersonMan, I have only recently tried beef kidney, myself. After many years as a lover of liver, I'd say, in short, that kidney is not the new liver and I rate it only as "all right". Although it could be my lack of experience in preparing it, I did find the consistency a little different from liver, in the bad way. Still, I have tried it a couple of more times and found that, unlike liver which is best not cooked too much, the kidney didn't seem to suffer from a longer cooking time and, in fact, tasted better for it. Further, I enjoyed lamb kidney more than beef, but perhaps that was only because I prepared it better.

In either case, the kidney was sauteed over medium heat with some salt, pepper, and onion, Worchestershire sauce and mushrooms, all in butter or coconut oil. Eventually, a bit of red wine was added to create a sauce and it all came out just fine.

As regards nutrients, either macro or micro, I'm not too familiar with kidney and would appreciate illumination on that issue, too.

Juan

I made it for the first time this week. I soaked it in salt water for 30 minutes, trimmed it of its membrane (the white part in the middle), and quickly fried it in butter with some seasonings, fresh garlic and caramelized onions. It definitely was a quick and easy way to cook it. You could easy expand, adding vegetables of your choice... It didn't have any funk in the smell or the taste, which I was very worried about. Overall, I'm definitely having it again. You should buy it at that price.

If you soak the chopped kidney in either milk or bak,ing powder mixed with water for 20 - 30 minutes, the urine smell reduces to vanishing point.

If you like curry, try this

About 1 tablespoon lard and an ounce of butter. Around 1 lb kidneys, sliced in half, the cores removed, any membrane on the outside removed, and cut into bite sized cubes. 2 small onions, chopped. 2 cloves garlic, crushed, inch piece of ginger scrubbed and chopped, quarter teaspoon chili powder, teaspoon turmeric, teaspoon ground coriander, half teaspoon ground cumin, half teaspoon salt, half teaspoon ground black pepper, tablespoon coconut milk (add more at end of cooking if it seems too dry - it is meant to be a fairly dry curry), tablespoon chopped coriander leaves (cilantro).

Heat lard and butter until melted. Add onions and cook until softened and golden. Stir in garlic and ginger, fry for one minute, then add the spices and fry for one minute more. Now add the kidneys, salt, pepper and coconut milk and cook about 15 - 20 minutes until the kidneys are tender. Stir in the chopped coriander and serve.

beef kidney is one of the strongest kidney flavors there is. Lamb kidney is much more desirable. Veal kidneys are also excellent! beef kidney is an older kidney and it will, indeed taste of the barnyard. I like to make mine with lots of mushrooms and parsley and embrace the barnyard flavor with a nice bottle of appropriate red wine. (I'd go with a mineral driven medium bodied red) My husband thought it tasted like we were mucking the stalls. I loved it. But lamb and veal kidneys are much much lighter flavoured and an absolute delight! they should not be overcooked, they should be a bit pink inside.

Sometimes it's good, if you eat dairy, to soak your liver or kidneys in milk for a few hours to mellow it out a bit.

hmmm, i tried my first grass fed beef kidney about 2 weeks ago. it was pretty brutal taste wise... and the rest of my family hated me for cooking it in the house haha. it tastes very similar to liver but has a 'farmy' aspect to it. kind of like the way a barn full of animals smells haha. i got pretty turned off while cooking it because it smelled so awful, but thought i'd try it anyway. i had one little piece and couldn't get past the farmy barnyard taste. thankfully my dad ate the rest, so it wasn't wasted. i pan fried it in bacon grease which helped the flavor a little, but all in all i think i'll stick with liver haha. good luck man. since you don't care about taste then i say go for it since it's super cheap!

It looks like they have over 100% RDA - for a 3 oz serving - in selenium, b12, riboflavin, protein, and cholesterol. They are also high in a diverse array of several other vitamins and minerals. Check it out:

http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/beef-products/3467/2

Smells and tastes like piss; no getting around that. Really nutrient dense however. I was eating 1-2 kidneys a day for a while there on non-liver days, but I think I'd rather just eat more liver and take my chances with hypervitaminosis A.

My husband whines for steak and kidney pie from time to time- my friend Jean said to cook the kidneys in good red wine not water, and another friend said to just put them in a pot and cook the piss out of them!

Kidneys are delicious and have a great texture! They're like a milder version of liver. Just soak it in a brine for a few hours beforehand, that's what I do.

Here is how I make it not be awful: broil pieces of bacon with chopped shallots, then put the (pasture fed) slices of beef kidney on top. Broil briefly (for medium rare) and the broiled bacon and shallots will fuse onto the underside. Flip the whole thing over and give it a brief broiling on the other side- bacon and shallot side up now- lets the yummy juices seep down- then I take it out of the broiler, add a little salt and black pepper, and eat! I did not used to like it, but this tastes good. Probably all that bacon and shallot.

I got my kidneys with my Jersey steer. I have butchered before, but never had the kidneys. I de-fatted them & soaked them whole in cold milk for a day. Then I split them, removed all the white part inside, which required cutting them into smaller sections. Basically, I had just the red & red-brown meat lobes left. I soaked all the lobes in fresh milk for 3 days. Tonight, I took some seasoned flour, dredged 2 lobes and lightly sauteed them in bacon fat. They were delicious. No piss flavor/smell at all. I went ahead and did the same with about 10 ounces of lobes. I threw them onto a mesclun salad topped with fresh tomatoes & raw onion. It was spectacular. They reminded me & my wife of chicken gizzards without the toothy crunch of the cartilage. The flavor was really quite mild when we were expecting something strong. The texture was unusual, but I preferred it to gizzards because of the tenderness. We were needless to say WAY IMPRESSED. So, my suggestion, soak your kids, clean & remove all the white (which I believe is the vessel for the pee) and soak again. It works & We will eat them again!

I don't know much about this, but I'd definitely look at lots of old world recipes for answers. As someone mentioned, the French have ways of reducing the odor. Check out some Indian and Thai curries. The problem, of course, is that most Americans don't touch offal and so these recipes might be hard to find in English. If you have friends/relatives of friends from other countries, you could try hitting them up. I remember a Pakistani classmate of mine back in college who suggested making goat brain curry from the goat's head we had left over after a bbq. Never got around to doing that, and I ended up throwing the head away after it went bad. I still feel bad about that.

I soaked veal kidneys in salted water, sliced, dried, cut out the membrane (saved that nice organ fat for my tallow bucket), fried in bacon fat, with onions. Crumbled the bacon on top. Ate pretty much all of it. Will never do it again (I only finished it because I'm a frugal caveman).

Bacon + Onions + Liver + Urine = Beef Kidneys