When I came into the kitchen, Ward was using a knife to help his wife, Irene, peel the skin from two buffalo tongues. The skin was discarded in a small heap along with the glutinous veins cut from the undersides, then Ward left it to Irene to cut the meat into cubes. He pulled out a chair opposite me at the table in the dining area and opened up a John Deere repair manual, which was my reason for being there, and began thumbing through it. Meanwhile, Irene put the cubes into a cast-iron Dutch oven and seared them.…