I'm no June Cleaver, but...

I have never owned a meat cleaver in my life. Big kitchen knives? Sure. Pearing knives? Of course. Steak Knives? Naturally. But meat cleavers, no. Probably because I didn't really have the need to chop through bones, dismember heads and cut off feet. Pre packadged chicken breasts don't really call for any of the above. But in China, suddenly I find myself owning not one, not two, but three meat cleavers!

In Shenzhen, there is hardly a chicken breast in sight. Everyone butchers things themselves. They buy it live (or whole) at the market and do the chopping themselves. These large unwieldy knives are a kitchen staple here, like a wok and rice cooker. It can hardly be called a kitchen without them.

Meat cleavers also seem to be a frequent giveaway. We acquired the first one in conjunction with a chopping board. And today we bought a knife block which was stocked with not one but two identical cleavers. His 'n hers? All I know is it makes me feel a bit strange to see these murderous weapons so readily available in our house. And of course, it really changes your relationship to your food when you see it so, well, intact.

When I was telling my Grandma about all this during our visit home, she laughed at me. Growing up on a farm she was no stranger to butchering things. I did not grow up on a farm, and this is still taking some getting used to. I chopped the head and feet off a chicken the other day and almost had to close my eyes while I did it. (I decided to keep them open at the last minute, because a blog entry about my adventure to a Chinese emergency room seems like one I'd rather not write...)