Cooking small game

K

kr1

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Has anyone cooked an animal out in the field without gutting it first? I often wondered if you can cook a squirrel or any animal that size or smaller without gutting it first. I don't know if you would need to at least make an opening in the abdominal cavity so it doesn't burst. Anyone have any hands on details?

KR
 
Gut it and peel it and then you can cook all that is left. Otherwise you are going to cook thinks into the flesh you dont want such as feces, stomach acid, urine, bile, blood and other toxins. It will taste bad and may be bad for you.
 
I don't have any hands on details, but I can tell you a second-hand story, for what that's worth. A friend of mine, a Vietnam vet, says he worked with the Montagnards. They would kill a pig, throw the whole thing onto a bed of coals. No gutting, burned the hair off. When they decided it was done, they would eat it. He said it was the best, delicious. (However, I'm inclined to agree with what ashtxsniper says...gut and peel the sucker first)
 
I have heard of this to. I still would want to see it first. Logic makes me go with my previous comment. Come to think of it a lot of people cook fish whole and they are ok plus the fish is really good I have been told.
 
Well I've eaten sardines with all the guts and heads and tails, also fried smelt and grunions.
 
Yeah those are tasty, but I think fish don't qualify as "Game". I figure this because your local regulators call themselves the "Fish and Game" Commission or something simular.

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I've cooked whole fish with the guts in and the scales on. I just drop them in the glowing embers, then turn them over and do the other side for a while. The scales help to protect the flesh. The skin and scales turn black, but when you peel this off the flesh underneath is beautiful. The gut shrivels up a bit and you can discard it along with the bones. It is particularly satisfying to do this on a fire that you have lit by primitive means, and any visitors or kids you may have with you might find the experience to be particularly memorable.

I've never cooked a whole animal without gutting it. But cooking one with the guts in wouldn't concern me too much in general.

I have a book called "How to Survive in the Bush, On the Coast, In the Mountains of New Zealand" by Lieutenant B. Hildreth. He describes a method of cooking hedgehogs where you don't gut it or skin it. You just cover it with a decent layer of clay, lay it in the fire and pile burning material over the clay. "When the clay ball is broken open the spines will be found to adhere to it and the gut will be shrivelled into a ball". I've never eaten hedgehog, but I see a lot of them.

I think this method could also be applied to birds...feathers on.

Dogs and other predators eat an animal's guts with relish....sometimes it might be the first thing eaten.

I don't eat guts as a rule (except for natural sausage casings and tripe). But I do like to eat the offal when I think it is safe - the heart, liver and kidneys. In the last few years I have stopped eating the liver of possums and pigs where I think there may be a danger that people have been using poison in the area in the last year or so. I understand that the liver is probably the part of the body that stores most of any poison built up in the body.

When I do eat a liver, I cut out the bile gland first (if that's what it's called... the green looking gunky thing), taking care not to spill its contents over the rest of the liver.
 
Guts can contain things like bacteria. If you cooked an animal with the guts in, but didn't cook the guts thoroughly...and the gut content burst over the rest of the meat....and you ate it.... you could have a problem. Thus the wisdom of gutting an animal and making sure it is thoroughly cooked.

Bacteria and parasites are a problem even when there are no guts in an animal. Meat needs to be thoroughly cooked if there is any danger of these things. Chicken is bad for bacteria so it needs plenty of heat right through it. Pork and bear can host parasites that people shouldn't consume in a live state, so this meat should be cooked thoroughly too... although I have heard that a long period of freezing can kill some parasites... so if you like rare pork, it would be best to at least freeze it for a month first.

I would have no worries about eating raw venison, and some other meats (in New Zealand anyway). It would pay to research game animals in your area if you are thinking about eating them raw (half-dried jerky for instance).
 
With small game, like squirrels, there is no reason to expose yourself to any more than the minimum amount of risk. It is easy enough to clean them properly, and on squirrels the best eating meat is on the legs anyway.
 
I dang near tempted to give it a try....:eek:


I can't find any info against it (online sources)...

on larger game, it definitely spoils the meat. but perhaps squirrel (or similar size) is most like fish? I've always gutted everything I've hunted/fished/etc. So I don't know why you wouldn't want to do it.
 
I worked in Arnhem Land in Northern Australia and in Central Australia and saw traditional Aboriginal people kill and cook all sorts of wild game. Never once saw anything skinned or gutted before it was cooked and eaten. The health risks appear to be minimal. I have tried kangaroo, buffalo, turtle, many types of fish as well as magpie geese cooked this way. To be honest, it doesn't taste the best to western sensitised palates but I don't think it is a safety issue.
 
Another friend of mine got trichinosis from eating rare bear meat (this is in New York's Adirondack Mountains) he was pretty sick for awhile. As long as I had a knife or something, I think I would at least gut the critter, wash it if possible, and cook the meat medium to well done.
 
The Pima Indians around here traditionally cooked their rabbits (which seem to have been the majority of their game; deer were harder to get, and tended to require dangerous expeditions nearer to the Apache-held mountainous areas) with skins on, but guts removed. They'd gut the animal, build a fire in a small hole, maybe re-seal the incision, and bury the animal in the coals. Supposed to be very good, with the skin keeping in all the juices, if my memory serves. See George Webb, _A Pima Remembers_, which I think was the source of this.
 
Coldwood said:
Another friend of mine got trichinosis from eating rare bear meat (this is in New York's Adirondack Mountains) he was pretty sick for awhile. As long as I had a knife or something, I think I would at least gut the critter, wash it if possible, and cook the meat medium to well done.
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Bear meat is a lot like pig meat, in that it needs to be cooked well before consuming.

One thing that I've always been told, is to never eat an animal with a spotted liver. Only one way to find out if it has a spotted liver and that's to gut the mother. Yep, I'm in the gut them, then cook them camp.
 
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