Has Anyone Here Ever Eaten Squirrel?

Cecil56

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I'm a country hick and admit that! LOL Grew up hunting and eating wild game all my life.

Got a day off today due to Covid at my work and deep cleaning. Granddaughter was out of school for the same thing. Decided to take her squirrel hunting. Bought her a BB gun at about (age removed), progressed to a pellet gun a few years later. Then got her into shooting a .22 cal rifle of mine. She shoots pretty well! Took her out hunting maybe 5 years ago, (she did not carry a gun) and she was too hyper to sit 15 or 20 minutes, so we got nothing.

Fast forward to today: I let her carry one of my .22 rifles, and she shot her first squirrel! She first off apologized to the squirrel for taking it's life. Was over that 20 minutes later and shot another one. From my position, I picked off two more before we quit.

Showed her how to clean them, though she did not do one herself yet. I love teaching kid's shooting and hunting.
They were young squirrels and tender, so no need for parboiling them. We did an egg wash, flour and seasonings, then the same again. Had a nice and crispy crust and were delicious! She ended up eating a whole one by herself, plus mashed potatoe's, squirrel gravy and roasted brussell sprouts. Great day for Grandpa and Granddaughter.

Pretty sure I will get "scolded" by some on here, but I don't really care. Family tradition, and I am happy to pass it on to her. Some people just don't understand.

Couple weeks ago around here, there was a Facebook post about someone wanting to put a chicken farm a few miles outside of my town. A few bitched it might stink. (understood) The some idiot lady posted: Why would we need a chicken farm, when we can buy them at the local grocery store! Some people are so out of touch with reality.
 
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Cecil56

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Understood on not wanting a chicken raising place by your house. I would not either!

I was MORE making fun on her suggestion of grocery stores have plenty of chickens, so why would a farmer have to raise them?

I think she had a low brow, but I did not pursue the issue.
 

Scarletbegonia

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I was around, but not in, hunting culture into early teens.

my view, as a plant based vegetarian, is those who hunt to eat are honest and aware of where meat comes from (in contract to your Facebook example) and they are aware they take life. Indeed, they witness it.

I’ve not had squirrel, but in covering an event, I was told it is profoundly rude to refuse food in the ceremony.
I was, unfortunately, offered stew. I was mentally prepared to have meat. I ate a couple bites.
But I made the mistake of asking the cook later.
He looked me full in the face and said, “bark.”
 

rbkwp

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no
but would try,depending on how its prepared
be like Aus/now our,plentiful opposum i geuss
good on your parents/family for bringing you up on subsistence food

hasd dog,horse,tasteless,too lean for me
croc/kangaroos


common_brushtail_possum2.jpg


cant really blame those critters for eating us occasionally,to be fair huh

thanks,for your honesty
 

DiamondJoe

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I've eaten a lot of animals in my time - kangaroo is gamey, crocodile tastes like chicken. Guinea pig does taste like pork... but I've never bothered with squirrel.

I don't imagine there's good eating on a squirrel.
 

Cecil56

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Actually, squirrel meat is very tasty, if done right! Younger ones are good to fry up. Older need parboiled first
before they hit the fry pan.

My Daughter was about (really, do not talk about minors). (no talking about minors here, so I might get banned,,,LOL) Anyway, she was a picky eater and would hardly touch meat. Now she loves it! At that age, wife and I would always put a little on her plate. She would take a bite and eat no more.

One day I had went hunting and fried up some fresh squirrel. Put a leg quarter on her plate along with the other goodies. Be damned if she did not eat it all, but also grabbed a second piece and ate it all!

Fast forward to her at 19 years old and attending college: I cooked squirrel on Sunday, before she headed back to college. She asked me about the left-over's and if she could take them with her, for her room mate to try!
 
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MickeyLee

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Same lettuce boat as @Scarletbegonia

Unlike Ms Scarletbegonia I would still be on probation for felonious assault with intent to harm if someone fed me dog/cat.

My family are hunters. I am a long time veg head. I fished and went crabbing/shrimping and crawdad scooping in my youth. I never had an interest in killing anything *my parents took care of dispatching crustaceans.* I do know how to clean/butcher game. Even how to process hides for leather work.

I have munched squirrel, rabbit, nutria rat.. And who knows what else.

To folks who hunt ethically and respect the lives taken, much love. That animal lives a better life and dies with more dignity than any critter unfortunate enough to be born into the industrial livestock production * talk about a sunshine sticker a gravestone*
 

Scarletbegonia

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Same lettuce boat as @Scarletbegonia

Unlike Ms Scarletbegonia I would still be on probation for felonious assault with intent to harm if someone fed me dog/cat.

My family are hunters. I am a long time veg head. I fished and went crabbing/shrimping and crawdad scooping in my youth. I never had an interest in killing anything *my parents took care of dispatching crustaceans.* I do know how to clean/butcher game. Even how to process hides for leather work.

I have munched squirrel, rabbit, nutria rat.. And who knows what else.

To folks who hunt ethically and respect the lives taken, much love. That animal lives a better life and dies with more dignity than any critter unfortunate enough to be born into the industrial livestock production * talk about a sunshine sticker a gravestone*


I don’t have cuteatarian issues.
Animals killed for food is always an animal killed for good, hog or dog.
My ex worked in a Hilton in Orlando many years ago.
A very special dinner was held for some businessmen. Non American.
The main dish was dog (this story came out when I was telling him of my day at the SunDance), and it is legal. So long as it is imported. Yeeaaahhhh.....
The Haitian cooks were fighting over leftovers (which, due to most attendees being American, was plenty). When questioned by American kitchen crew, they replied that the Americans ate pigs, and pointed out that pigs are intelligent, affectionate animals.
Exactly how the Americans viewed dogs.

that said, my childhood was framed in an interesting sense of kosher. No pig. Never have tasted it.
But I had shrimp, and I have tossed nets, and crayfish/mud bugs.

My journey to not eating meat started with animals with accepted sentience. Fish dropped off a year or so later. (This was also a deal made with my parents. I’m 52 now, I went veg in December 1980]
 

Player_01

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My uncle hunted a squirrel when he was little, my grandma cooked it for them and none of them liked it :laughing:

I've had deer a couple times, MI has a lot of hunters, but I don't really think it tastes that good. I feel like there's a reason our ancestors settled on the meats we eat, they tried them all and settled on the best ones. LOL.
 

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I don't hunt because I don't *need* to to get my meat. The meat I consume is either locally, or family raised. I know how they were treated before becoming food for me.

Squirrels in my area are safe.

Animals I consume are appreciated in a way I wish all humans could relate to.

If I was hungry, and it was all I had available I wouldn't flinch at the idea.. but I've never eaten a squirrel before.
 

halcyondays

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There's a quality to fresh kill meat that's missing from agrimeats. Dad liked to hunt and fish and taught my brothers and I. We took squirrel, rabbit, quail, pheasant, duck, geese, turkey, deer and elk. A friend of his trapped snapping turtles and shared some which was delicious.

Squirrel and rabbit taste alike. So do most of the birds except waterfowl. Elk tastes like beef. Like many I think venison (deer) tastes gamey but for those who had it as a primary meat source I imagine it tasted great.

My favorite was fresh fish. Catch it, fillet it and cook it right on the boat! Fill the freezer with flounder, perch, bass, walleye and others. Freshwater or saltwater, yum-yum.

That said I've been a lactovegetarian since my early twenties sometimes going full on vegan in various dietary experiments. Did it really make a difference eliminating dairy from my diet? Yes. I stopped drinking milk decades ago but cheese has me hooked in its delicious claws.

We never took bats.:bomb: Sorry. Couldn't let that one go. Zoonosis is a risk with any meat based diet. Most of our infectious diseases have jumped from other animal species to ours. Covid19 is only the most recent example. HIV jumped from primates hunted and eaten in Africa where it was SIV (Simian Immunodeficiency Virus). HIV still ravages us with 650,000 deaths worldwide in 2019.:broken_heart:
 

DiamondJoe

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I suddenly feel quite unsafe being on this site. Members drooling and licking their lips, eying me up for the meatiest sections.......
Surely Misses Squirrel has, on occasion, eaten squirrel?

:kissing_heart:
 
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Absolutely! They're an acquired taste, since they're very gamy in flavor. But God, they taste great as dumplings. I've sniped a lot of of squirrels in my yard with a .22 when I get the hankering for them.
 

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I am a very picky eater, so no. My late, great Aunt however ate squirrel, raccoon, and who knows what else.

I went over one day and saw what I thought was chicken. I said to her, that's the smallest chicken I've ever seen. That's the day I found out she ate squirrel.