Editor’s note: The following is a reprint of a December 2011 Through My Kitchen Window column.

My husband is a hunter. He enjoys sitting, or walking, or hanging from trees in the freezing cold. I am a hunter’s wife. I enjoy staying under my warm covers on freezing mornings. We have a simple arrangement. He shoots, guts and chops. I bag, freeze, and cook. It’s easy enough.

After half a decade of this process, I’m comfortable with my assorted venison steaks, stroganoffs, chilies, broths, and ragús. But certain parts of the white-tailed quadruped still unnerve me. Call them what you like, (offal parts, variety meats, internal organs, entrails) I’m just not comfortable cooking them.