Not annoying at all. Good advice. I’ve enjoyed this book, and have used it, though sparingly.
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Up where I am, venison is a treat, as in not an everyday thing, but not unusual. Family holiday meals generally include a plate of the deer hearts, liver, etc. Back in grade school and middle school when we learned about native cultures we’d always have a big buffet including venison, moose, and other stuff.
Roger that. I’m into foraging, and even make some little zines about different “weeds” to hand out on guided nature walks, but putting those zines together really illustrated how much garbage someone might find on the internet. I really like using common wood sorrel to make a nice lemony sauce for fish, but if you go overboard with that stuff, you won’t die but you could give yourself kidney stones.
Not necessarily unusual, but I also enjoy making the “original” pink lemonade this time of year by soaking the berries of stag horn sumac then straining the little hairs out and sweetening. It’s been cool learning how many of our local/native plants can bring that citrus flavor to a meal, since we’re too cold a climate to grow lemons or limes.
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In Macau I had snake that was killed in the restaurant (cracked like a whip). In Saudi Arabia all the supermarkets sold camel meat (which I didn’t try because I was veggie by then) which I suppose means that it wasn’t unusual for Saudis only for the ex-pats.
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Where I used to work, the owner was a deer hunter, and he always brought deer heart stew during the season… my BFFs also hunts and she always has a deep freeze full of deer… I don’t know if it’s unusual if I’ve had it?
I have never had chitlins, tho.
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I spent a semester in Germany as an undergraduate. We USians would eat together at the Uni cafeteria and every Tuesday there would be a meat dish that we couldn’t identify. We called it mystery meat and for whatever reason none of us ever bothered to ask a local what the meat was.
At some point, two of took a weekend trip to Czechia and went to a Czech restaurant. The menu was fortunately translated into German and I noticed that one of the items was “Pferdefleisch”. I hadn’t eaten it before (or so I thought) and I decided to try it. When we went back it was a bit amusing to see how nauseated some of the USians were when they learned they had been eating horse every Tuesday.
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I’ve had venison, here in suburban Melbourne, Australia! The first time I knowingly had it was about 30 years ago at a Chinese restaurant with family friends, who are Hong Kong Chinese. It was delicious.
Much like @anon67050589, @anon61221983 and @ClutchLinkey, I’ve had it occasionally since then and knew hunters or had them in the family (don’t think I’ve ever had free range venison though). A quick google shows there’s a few ‘speciality’ suppliers of venison but I get the feeling they supply to restaurants etc. There’s also an over-population of wild deer here in some areas and a culling program and not surprisingly the Australian Deer Association has been pushing for years to get meat from the deer cull on menus. I’ve never specifically gone searching for venison in supermarkets but suspect it would be available in speciality supermarkets and butchers. In summary, I think it’s not an ‘everyday’ meat but wouldn’t be too hard to find if you really wanted it.
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Here in the UK venison is widely farmed. It’s commonplace on restaurant menus and in supermarkets. Back in the before times the best lasagna I’ve ever eaten was billed as venison. I don’t think I’ve ever eaten it when the same person killed and cooked it. Wild warthog, on the other hand, in a mustard sauce, is completely delicious. Would recommend.
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The best reindeer I ever had was at a midtsommer barbecue at my uncle’s in Finmark.
One of the neighbours brought it over, but he is a lastebil sjåfør, and I don’t know whether he shot it or ran it over.
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Might be different species,.or different parts of the whale? All whale meat I’ve seen (in Iceland and Norway) has always looked like that. Dark like beef with maybe a tinge of the purple you see in Tuna.
Which, incidentally, also describes its taste.
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The first time I had Kangaroo was when I was in the Netherlands. I went to an all-you-can-eat restaurant and there was various meats being grilled. I pointed at a piece and asked what it was. The cook smirked and was told it was Kangaroo. “Fine,” I said, “don’t tell me what it is”.
He then pointed to the chalkboard behind him where all the meats were listed, including Kangaroo.
I thought it tasted similar to venison but not as “gamey”
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While visiting Hawaii, my family fell in love with poke - a raw fish salad of sorts. All well and fine till I saw the raw rock crab poke in the supermarket, made from the same guys that skitter on the rocks at the shore.
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my papi lives in Oaxaca and on my visits to him there, we like the chapulines, seasoned fried locusts (grasshoppers, lubbers) crushed up with dried chiles and sprinkled on fresh guacamole. also, chicitanas a certain type of ant that is ground up in a tangy, spicy salsa (ok, a whole bunch of ants) that is great on scrambled eggs and rolled up in tortillas!
damn, I love the food down there!
edit to weigh in on the venison question: growing up in Texas, my family from great grampa down to me and little brother hunted and venison was a regular part of our diet (as was other game). my favorite was grandaddy’s deer sausages and spicy deer jerky! we also ate goat regularly and I much prefer that to straight up venison
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My dad’s family used to go to the rattlesnake hunts. I’m not sure if they ate it, though. I’ll have to ask.
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we lived on rocky limestone escarpment over the upper Brazos. land suited for raising goats not cattle.
rattlesnakes and rusty water.
but, yeah, rattlesnake is not bad - like many things, if you fry it up, it tastes pretty good. I did enter a bean cook-off with a recipe of rattlesnake red beans and went to a round up to buy one to cook. that is some wild folk, those rattler wranglers! the beans were worth at least an “honorable mention” for originality. consolation prize a step up from participation trophy. the beans were pretty good, IMO
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That might be the best chili I’ve ever had. (I found out afterward that it was venison.)
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(Spits out the sassafras)
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I was living in Scotland the year that BSE was discovered to be widespread in sheep as well as cows, and venison was practically all I would eat. Even the M&S in Edinburgh had it in their cooler.
Of course, the Norwegians will barbecue all year long, weather notwithstanding.
I can’t say. The supermarkets I frequented didn’t have whale, so I only saw it at the farmer’s market and the Oslo Mathallen, and it was always (to paraphrase Procol Harum) the lighter shade of whale.
A staple here.
All well and fine till I saw the raw rock crab poke in the supermarket, made from the same guys that skitter on the rocks at the shore.
As long as you didn’t have to kill it or crack it, or hadn’t been introduced to it by the Red Queen, I don’t see the problem. (Usually the only food here that tourists object to is the Spam.)
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You committed the unforgivable sin of making a chili that was not at minimum 98% beef. In Texas. What were you thinking? 
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One time, in Bangkok, I tried grilled scorpion on a stick. It was mostly just exoskeleton without much meat, which made it difficult to finish.
At an open-air market in Beijing, I saw grilled tarantulas and centipedes on a stick, but they were surprisingly expensive, so I passed.
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while I absolutely agree that true Texas chili does NOT contain beans (good gawd, I was born in Austin and my fam goes back almost as far as @navarro ), I did stipulate that this was merely a bean cook-off, General Granbury’s Bean Cook-Off.
however, I do appreciate your acknowledging the legitimacy of Texas chili as the true beefy/not beany chili and all others contenders are imposters.
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