The Rural Voice, 1980-10, Page 13EXOTIC M EATS
Food for
Thought
BY ADRIAN VOS
Camel meat anyone? Or is it pickled
rattlesnake that's preferred? Or would
you rather have high protein earth
worms?
Anyone really wanting these foods can,
with a lot of searching, find them. But,
don't expect to find them on the shelves
of our supermarkets, yet.
Nevertheless, the tastes of Canadians
are slowly changing. One of the reasons
is the post-war influx of immigrants with
different eating habits than native
Canadians.
An early change in eating habits
caused by immigrants was that some
Indian tribes, who had been used to
eating dog meat, were persuaded by the
Europ,ean's abhorrence of eating the
meat of pets, to put an end to that part of
their diet.
Most of our modern supermarkets, and
many of the stores in our towns and
villages, have a counter where they carry
exotic food, demanded by the ethnic_
tastes of the majority of post-war
immigrants. Who hasn't seen the "Dutch
Stores" in our towns, where the
entrepreneurs sell anything, from woollen -
underwear, made in Holland, to smoked
horsemeat.
Horsemeat, like other pet meats, or
dog or monkey meat, is still repugnant to
most Canadians, but more and more
people are reported to have bought a
small package of the thinly sliced, salty
meat, to try it.
Every boy, and most rls, growing up_
on the farm have raised rabbits, but a
surprising number have never eaten
rabbit meat themselves, mainly because
their rabbit was considered a pet, like a
horse or dog.
Since World War 11, however, soma._
entrepreneurs found that France provid-
ed a ready market for rabbit meat and for
rabbit fur. The fur, in French called
"Lapin", was often sold back to us in our
fur stores, many people not realizing that
their "Lapin" coat was really a "rabbit"
coat.
The meat trade for rabbit was
profitable enough to induce some of the
rabbitries to build an abbatoir and
develop an export business. They bought
suitable rabbits from the farm boys and
girls and sold them breeding stock for
fast maturing animals, ready as roasters
in about six weeks.
Today, several of these special
abbatoirs, government inspected, are
strategically distributed across Ontario,
with collectors in between -who will, for a
small fee, buy small numbers of rabbits,
to assemble them in truckload lots for
shipping to the abbatoirs.
Most of the rabbits raised in Ontario
now go to the large _concentrations of
immigrants of Europeanorigin in the big
cities. Government inspected rabbit meat
is available at most meat counters in city
supermarts. More and more native born
Canadians are discovering the special
flavor of these grain -fed bunnies.
While some consumers complain bit-
terly about high meat prices, if they were
willing to set aside their prejudice. they
could have grass-fed meat for the taking.
provided they were not afraid of a little
effort. The meat referred to is from the
groundhog, or woodchuck, as the Ameri-
cans call him.
The groundhog is a vegetarian and old
recipes are still easily available. All one
has to do is take a .22 rifle to any farm,
and the farmer usually will be happy to
show where the dens of the chubby
animals are located.
While people of the Jewish or Moslem
religion are not allowed to eat pork,
animals that slither or fish with no scales,
They, together with most Mediteranean
peoples, are often great consumers of
Iamb and goat meat. Particularly on feast
days like Passover Easter and Christmas,
a specially prepared young kid or lamb is
a tradition.
Mutton and meat from older goats is
eaten throughout the year.
Goat raising, except as pets, has been
stimulated by the back -to -the -land move-
ment. The struggling, mostly young,
couples with their little children .needed
the nutrition the milk can provide. And
the ability of goats to thrive where few
other grazing animals can, made it the
ideal "poor man's cow."
Today some stores carry goat cheese,
goat yogurt and goat ice-cream, made in
special goat dairies.
In pioneer times, the plentiful squirrel
was a welcome addition to the diet, if
there was someone in the household able
to shoot or trap the little fellow. His meat
also is a healthy source of meat produced
by an eater of seeds and nuts. It is not
hard to find people who have eaten
squirrel and declare it to be delicious.
Our habit of eating beef comes mainly
from Britain. Most beef eaten on the
European continent came from dual
purpose cattle, who combined an ability
to produce large amounts of milk, with a
large body. so that for dairying useles
bull calves brought a good price as veal.
A hundred years ago in Canada and the
USA, the main source of beef came from
the American bison, more commonly,
though erroneously, called the buffalo.
Now that the future of the bison is
secured through protection in national
parks, some farmers have made it a
business to raise enough buffalo and
beefalo, a cross with domestic cattle, to
vrovide restaurants occasional) with
buffalo steaks. The once so Plentiful
meat, so plentiful that often only the hide
and the tongue were taken, is now a
luxury item on a menu.
Sometimes a restaurant has frog legs
on the menu. Anyone who hasn't eaten it
doesn't know the delicate taste, some-
what resembling perfect chicken.
The flying creatures we eat are usually
the feathered variety, like ducks and
geese, but what about pigeon pie and
wild swan? In fuedal times birds like the
peacock and the great heron were
reserved for the nobility. They are out of
fashion on today's table.
The Moluccans of Indonesia consider
the flying dog, a large bat, as the best
thing to be had on the table, while our
thoughts turn to vampires and wooden
stakes.
When an Ontario fisherman gets an eel
on his hook, he shudders in disgust, but
most Europeans enjoy the soft, almost
textureless meat, either stewed, baked
or smoked.
There are many more foods that are
repugnant to us, like insects and crawly
things, but other people eat them and
enjoy them. On the other side are the
foods we eat that are repugant to others.
It is only lately that north Europeans have
begun to eat corn. Not long ago they
considered it only good for pig or chicken
feed. A Hindu can't understand us eating
beef, or a Moslem or Jew us eating pork.
West Saharans are frequently starving to
death while some of the best fishing can
be done off their coast.
Maybe we are prisoners of our
upbringing.
THE RURAL VOICE/OCTOBER 1980 PG. 11
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