Bull! Tradition isn’t actually that hard to swallow
Staff writer
Dana Gayle dropped a handful of breaded nuggets into a vat of boiling oil.
They looked like chicken but weren’t.
What was in the propane-fueled and bubbling batter Saturday at Picnic on the Lawn in Florence were mountain oysters — a longtime Flint Hills delicacy and an even longer-running local tradition.
For generations, the dish has found its way onto tables across ranching country. At Harvey House, it’s become a yearly reminder of Marion County’s ranching roots, served next to a piece of local history.
“It’s just what somebody [did],” Florence Historical Society president Iva Britton said. “The fish was always donated, and the mountain oysters used to be donated, but nowadays you just have to buy everything. But we still keep up with our traditions.”
In plain English, mountain oysters are bull testicles. Depending on where you’re from, they’re also called Rocky Mountain oysters or prairie balls.
Most come from cattle, though lamb and pig varieties can be found, too.
The unusual food has become as much a part of Picnic on the Lawn as the fish fry itself.
Harvey House, businessman and restaurateur Fred Harvey’s first hotel, was built in 1876 to serve passengers traveling on the Santa Fe railroad. Today, the building stands as a reminder of Florence’s past.
Mountain oysters dished on the lawn next door also tell a different part of that story.
Flint Hills have long been cattle country, and ranchers historically have found ways to make use of nearly every part of cattle. Mountain oysters, which might otherwise have been discarded, became a dish at the local table.
“It’s ranching country,” Judy Mills said. “Ranchers had plenty of mountain oysters when it first started. I think that’s how it got started. It was Flint Hills ranching. And the ranchers loved to have mountain oysters.”
This year marked the 26th picnic, according to the event flyer. Organizers say the tradition goes back further.
The recipe and appetite have remained relatively unchanged.
Preparing mountain oysters is a little more involved than dropping them into hot oil.
Before the picnic, they were skinned, cleaned, and cut into pieces roughly the size of a dollar coin. At the picnic, chunks were coated and battered with fish fry batter before being dropped into oil heated to 350 degrees.
About five minutes later, they were ready.
Crispy on the outside, tender in the middle, and according to diners, better than expected.
This year was Gayle’s third working the fryer, although she wasn’t always willing to sample what she cooked.
“It’s a hot job,” she said. “I’ve been coming here for years, but I never would eat the nuts.”
Eventually, “no thanks” turned into “sure.”
“I finally tried one though,” she said, “and I’m like, ‘That’s not so bad.’”
Phil Baldwin, who has sampled everything from fried crickets to skunk, came to a similar conclusion.
The biggest obstacle, he said, is the name.
“Somebody finally tells them they’re eating either pig nuts or cow nuts, and they go, ‘Eww.’” Baldwin said. “But when they try them, they go, ‘Hmm, that’s not bad.’”
For Kenny Rogers and Joan Berg, who have been together for 21 years, mountain oysters are the reason they come. Others come for the fish, salads, fruit, and homemade desserts.
Shirley Steap knows the dish from a different perspective. She lived on a family farm for 17 years and spent a lot of that time cleaning and cooking the oddity herself.
Steap preferred the fish Saturday and doesn’t miss the work involved.
“It was just the whole process,” she said. “I helped with the cattle and everything. Then I cleaned the mountain oysters and I cooked them — from the cutting to the picking.”
For all the jokes and curiosity surrounding the dish, mountain oysters at Picnic on the Lawn are perhaps less about novelty than continuity.
They connect a present-day gathering in Florence to ranching culture that helped shape the Flint Hills. All the while, they sit alongside the Harvey House as another reminder of a time when Florence played a larger role in the region’s history.
The food may be unconventional, but the tradition isn’t.
“Fred Harvey always was the type of guy that everything … he did was for the public,” Britton said. “He wanted to serve, and that’s what we do. That’s our goal: to serve the public.”