Rabbit/squirrel... Soup\stew

[pugslee]

Catch, kill or trap one squirrel,or rabbit, or both, dress and quarter up. place into boiling water. Boil until completely done about 1 hour. Add wild onion or garlic, dandelion(whole plants cut into bite size pieces), if available some elk horn, bearded tooth, or morel mushrooms, planton, any other edible plant or mushroom you can find. For stew add the brown part of a cattail plant. BE REALLY SPARRING WITH THE WILD ONION AND GARLIC, ALSO DO NOT PUT IN TO MUCH CATTAIL FLOWER OR IT WILL GET TO THICK.

[LowKey]

Have you tried this?

[rwc1969]

The brown part of a cattail plant?

[LowKey]

Exactly.
And if I boil anything in water until it's done, a few other things are going in there at the start. Like the garlic for instance.

[MaineBear]

Forget squirrel stew, the thing will be tough as hell and full of bones. Best bet use for squirrel (IMHO) is to dust it with flour or corn starch and pan fry. An adult man would need 3 red squirrels or 2 gray; red are considerably less gamey during the summer. Both taste like turpentine come late winter, since they're living off evergreens.

Maine Bear

[Edz]

Catch, kill or trap one squirrel,or rabbit, or both, dress and quarter up. place into boiling water. Boil until completely done about 1 hour. Add wild onion or garlic, dandelion(whole plants cut into bite size pieces), if available some elk horn, bearded tooth, or morel mushrooms, planton, any other edible plant or mushroom you can find. For stew add the brown part of a cattail plant. BE REALLY SPARRING WITH THE WILD ONION AND GARLIC, ALSO DO NOT PUT IN TO MUCH CATTAIL FLOWER OR IT WILL GET TO THICK.

I boil the dandelion first in a few waters. otherwise it makes the stew way too bitter IMO.

edz

[Edz]

Forget squirrel stew, the thing will be tough as hell and full of bones. Best bet use for squirrel (IMHO) is to dust it with flour or corn starch and pan fry. An adult man would need 3 red squirrels or 2 gray; red are considerably less gamey during the summer. Both taste like turpentine come late winter, since they're living off evergreens.

Maine Bear

Not if ya cook it long enough. Also, add a little wood ash to the stew it will tenderize the meat a little.

edz

[Rick]

Yeah, nothing like a little lye to soften up an old squirrel.

[sh4d0wm4573ri7]

lmao oops sorry

[Rick]

I do two shows nightly. 7:00 and 10:00. Get your tickets early.

[vahtryn]

The best use for the many thousands of squirrels I relentlessly slaughtered as a child was to make enchilladas

[coloradopilgrim]

You use the bottom green parts of the cattail correct? It acts as almost a celery subtitute

[kyratshooter]

Forget squirrel stew, the thing will be tough as hell and full of bones. Best bet use for squirrel (IMHO) is to dust it with flour or corn starch and pan fry. An adult man would need 3 red squirrels or 2 gray; red are considerably less gamey during the summer. Both taste like turpentine come late winter, since they're living off evergreens.

Maine Bear

Things must be slightly backwards in Maine! Squirrel smaller or people bigger I suppose.

Here in KY the grays are small and yield a little over a pound of dressed out meat. Reds are big bruisers and produce 2-3 pounds of meat. When I fry up a gray I usualy have leftovers even though only the front and hind legs are worth cooking.

Thing about a survival situation is that you almost never have frying pan, flour and oil handy while you may be able to cobble together something in which to boil up a stew even if it is just stomping a piece of metal into a pan shaped object.

[Sparky93]

Things must be slightly backwards in Maine! Squirrel smaller or people bigger I suppose.

Here in KY the grays are small and yield a little over a pound of dressed out meat. Reds are big bruisers and produce 2-3 pounds of meat. When I fry up a gray I usualy have leftovers even though only the front and hind legs are worth cooking.

Thing about a survival situation is that you almost never have frying pan, flour and oil handy while you may be able to cobble together something in which to boil up a stew even if it is just stomping a piece of metal into a pan shaped object.

That's how all the squirrels I killed here have been, red bigger, grey smaller.

[Rick]

We don't have many grays around here. They've just about all been bred to reds. You might see a mostly gray one now and then but reds rule the roost around here. And man are they fat boogers. They live on bird seed and cracked corn year 'round. Oh, and cables. They seem to like cable tv more so than telephone but will eat either given the chance.

[intothenew]

Red Squirrel, I call em' Boomers and it takes three.

Gray Squirrel, tough for me to finish two.

Fox Squirrel, No way I could finish two in one setting.

[tipacanoe]

I'm with MaineBear on this one, the red squirrels are lucky to be even half as big as most of the gray's.

[LowKey]

yep, in New England the red squirrels are half again as big as a chipmunk or half the size of the grays, but the birdfeeder grays can get as bit as a small cat.
In MA, it's always open season on reds. Little buggers breed like rabbits. Grays have a closed season except in fall when they are nice and fat.

Cattails, you eat the roots. Sorta like potatoes. The can be dried and pounded into a flour for a thickener if you want. Be sure to plant back some of your harvest so you have some for next season.
You can also eat the white pulp inside the shoots. Young shoots though.
Some people say you can eat the flower steamed like corn but it has to be green. Never tried that myself.

[Rick]

Problem with definitions I think. Foxes and reds around here are the same thing. Yes, I know they are different but we don't have reds so that's just how folks refer to them.

[intothenew]

"What we've got here is.......... failure to communicate"


I just couldn't resist.