Racoon for Thanksgiving!

[masraum]

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/raccoon-was-once-thanksgiving-feast-fit-president-180973665/
Not me, but some folks.

Turkey, ham, and even a bit of venison or elk would pass muster on most modern Thanksgiving tables. But a century ago, many diners would have been just as happy to see some raccoon sitting next to the gravy boat.

As Luke Fater reports for Atlas Obscura, Native Americans and early American settlers relied on small game like raccoon and squirrels to supplement their diets. In the American South especially, raccoons were an important staple for enslaved individuals.

“After they’d finish their workday, they were permitted to hunt in the middle of the night to get some extra protein in their diet,” Hank Shaw, author of Hunt, Gather, Cook, tells Fater.

Archaeological digs show that enslaved people even stewed whole raccoons in a manner similar to a West African cooking technique.

Over time, raccoon became an essential food for settlers moving West, as well as underprivileged white and African-American people living across the country. The meat was so prevalent that Mark Twain included it on a famous list of American foods he missed while traveling in Europe during the 1870s.

At the turn of the 20th century, raccoon, possum and squirrel had become so popular that they were sold in city game markets and featured on the menus of many urban restaurants.

And during the 1920s, a craze for raccoon fur coats among college men, middle class African-Americans and even movie stars led to a boom in raccoon trapping and hunting—a trend that likely made the meat more readily available.

In November 1926, Vinnie Joyce of Nitta Yuma, Mississippi, sent President Calvin Coolidge an unsolicited plump raccoon for his Thanksgiving dinner. The gift wasn’t particularly notable or funny: In fact, Christopher Klein writes for History.com, the Washington Evening Star reported that the oddest aspect of the story was the first family’s decision to let the critter—which the paper described as tasting like a combination of chicken and suckling pig—live.

Instead of stewing the animal or releasing it into the wild, the Coolidges adopted the raccoon as a family pet. The family named the animal Rebecca and even gave her a nice collar at Christmas. (The president’s son John received his own trendy raccoon coat that same year.)

Rebecca was an essential member of the Coolidge administration for the remainder of the president’s term. She enjoyed walks on the lawn, attended the White House’s annual Easter egg roll and even accompanied the first family on a vacation to the Black Hills of South Dakota. Known to make daring breaks from her Washington, D.C. home, Rebecca was caught rummaging around local garbage cans multiple times.

According to Klein, one incident found the president, his wrist bandaged for reasons kept under wraps (the press speculated Rebecca “might have bitten the hand that fed her”), sending his pet to the zoo for a days-long exile.

After leaving the White House in 1928, the Coolidge family donated Rebecca to the same zoo where she had once been exiled. Sadly, she failed to adapt to zoo life and died shortly thereafter.

Americans’ appetite for raccoon and small game began to diminish as meat produced in factory farms became cheaper and more widely available. As Matthew L. Miller writes for the Nature Conservancy, perceptions of the charismatic critter shifted over the decades, with raccoons gaining a reputation as mischievous nighttime pests (and rabies carriers) rather than delectable delicacies.

Still, raccoon meat’s culinary legacy remains apparent in many areas of the country. The animals are sold in some markets, including by vendors in the Soulard Market in St. Louis, and directly to the public by hunters and trappers. For the past 93 years, the American Legion in Delafield, Wisconsin, has hosted a “Coon Feed” in January; the event feeds guests about 350 plates of raccoon meat. Gillett, Arkansas, has hosted a “Coon Supper” for 76 years.

The exact number of raccoons set to appear on Thanksgiving tables this year is difficult to pinpoint, but at least one notable celebrity—Anthony Mackie, an actor who portrays Falcon in the Marvel Cinematic Universe—has gone on record as a fan of the practice. As he tells “Entertainment Tonight,” raccoon is “honestly the best meat you’ll ever have.”

[Arizona_928]

Pictures or it didn't happen....

[masraum]

[stevej37]

As a young kid, my older brother was fox hunting and instead shot a raccoon and brought it home.
I helped skin it and my mother roasted it for dinner.
I remember the meat being very oily and of course tasted gamey. I wouldn't recommend it.

I wonder why they left the feet on the one above?

[id10t]

Originally Posted by stevej37

As a young kid, my older brother was fox hunting and instead shot a raccoon and brought it home.
I helped skin it and my mother roasted it for dinner.
I remember the meat being very oily and of coarse tasted gamey. I wouldn't recommend it.

I wonder why they left the feet on the one above?

Having shot a few coons to sell to some old country black folk, they said "leave the foot on so we knows it aint dog or cat"

[Arizona_928]

So...

How does it taste?

[masraum]

Originally Posted by Arizona_928

So...

How does it taste?

don't ask me. I've never had it, and I'm not planning to have it.

[Arizona_928]

[GH85Carrera]

I worked with a old black man at my first job. He regularly at possum, and he said coon tastes bad, and he only ate it if he was really hungry, and there was nothing else. He invited me over to eat possum with him a few time but I was always busy somehow.

He had worked for that family since he was a teen age boy. He would catch a sunfish the size of your hand in the Alabama river. Of course clean it, and batter it and fry it up. It was chock full of tiny bones. Most people don't eat them as there are too many bones. He would put his fish between two pieces of day old bread, (cheaper) and chew very slow, and take small bones out of his mouth and put them in a pile. When he was done there was just a small pile of tiny fish bones.

[fanaudical]

I have had 'possum gravy on biscuits and thought it was OK. Have not had racoon.

I think this is a great history lesson about making do with what's available. Lots of stuff becomes food when one is hungry enough...

[stevej37]

^^^ Very true.

[aigel]

It is probably a lot better than its reputation if cooked right. I have also heard you can't eat bear or jackrabbit. I eat both on a regular basis and it is quite excellent indeed. Most people in the US have forgotten how to cook and dislike anything that doesn't taste like beef or chicken. Liver flavor is also frowned upon, and yes, "gamy" often has that profile.

If I get to shoot a wild coon (in the woods, not in the neighborhood eating trash) you bet I will eat it.

G

[MBAtarga]

When I had raccoon a few years ago it tasted like dark Turkey meat.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[flatbutt]

With enough hot sauce one could eat anything. I pray that I'm never hungry enough to test that.

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by fanaudical

I have had 'possum gravy on biscuits and thought it was OK. Have not had racoon.

I think this is a great history lesson about making do with what's available. Lots of stuff becomes food when one is hungry enough...

No doubt after a few days of physical work and no food, racoon would be delicious. I heard one survival "expert" state that after days of no food, the only truly unpalatable nasty tasting thing he ate was a seagull, he said it was a last resort meal that beat total starvation.

[Tobra]

I like rabbit better than raccoon.

Trash panda is like duck, only more gamey.

I suspect if you soak it in milk it would help with that, but if you are eating that, you probably are not wasting milk

[stevej37]

Originally Posted by MBAtarga

When I had raccoon a few years ago it tasted like dark Turkey meat.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

Dark turkey meat is my favorite...and the raccoon I ate was nowheres close to that!

I think when we skinned it out..we didn't pay attention to removing the fat and scent glands as described in Arizona's book above.


A raccoon is edible to me....an opossum is no way.

[fintstone]

When I was young, we hunted Racoons and Opossums with dogs at night in the fall and winter. Strangely enough, it was great fun. We hunted squirrels and rabbits in the fall and winter and ground hogs in the spring and fall. We trapped muskrats and rabbits in the winter. We sold the pelts of all along with the occasional fox skin. Trout all summer. My family ate them all, but they were delicacies to the older folks and there really was not a lot so youngsters like me happily found some leftovers. I really had a hard time eating things I killed, skinned and gutted (and it was my job). I only remember eating ground hog and racoon myself...and neither was greasy or foul. A cross between dark turkey and pork to me. Pretty darned good at the time. I trapped a lot of muskrats and killed a lot of opossums and squirrels. My parents ate them gladly (liked them better than beef) ...and I had a PB sandwich. The same with the trout. After catching and cleaning them...just not appetizing. They floured and fried squirrels and fish...and baked the rest.

[Aurel]

As I was reading the OPs post, I told my wife about it:

‘Dear, did you know people used to have racoon for thanksgiving dinner?’

Her answer:

‘That is not true, and I don’t want to hear about it. You are going to make me throw up.’

I did not get a chance to explain it tasted like a mix of chicken and pork, or show her the pictures .

[masraum]

Originally Posted by Arizona_928

I've had squirrel once. My dad went hunting in the early/mid 70s, I think I was 4 or maybe 5. Dad came home with one or two squirrels. I don't remember anything about the taste. I think they just fried up the little pieces in a skillet.