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STOCKTON, Calif. - Local diners with adventurous palates have less than two months to try rattlesnake, alligator and other exotic meats.
The restaurant Taboo by the Delta is closing its doors June 1 when its owner retires after 10 years in business.
Along with gators and rattlesnake, Taboo served shark, frog legs and turtle.
The name of the restaurant reflects the hidden allure of "things that are forbidden. Things that would hurt you," owner Jesse "Boo" Burkett said. "People just buy into it."
Burkett said he stopped serving kangaroo and black bear in 2004 after the California Department of Fish and Game told him it was illegal.
There have been other restaurants in CA with those items on the menu, so what's the big deal? A lot of seafood restaurants have shark on their menus. Shark is pretty good. I can't bring myself to eat frog legs, turtle or rattlesnake though! Or snails!!!
I was brought up in the fifties. We were tenant farmers, and didn't have much money for the grocery store. Some of my best bonding memories of home include seeing my dad come from the river with a big turtle. Mom would boil water on a fire outside and he would put the turtle in it. This would loosen the shell. It was delicious!! I remember going with dad after dark to the farm pond during the summer. He had this long pole that he had fastened a "gig" to and he would catch huge frogs with it. We would put them in a gunnysack. I never participated in how he prepared them for cooking! Anyway, Mom would coat them in egg and flour and fry them. Delicious! Especially if Dad had found mushrooms in the woods.Snakes?
No way! However,(fast forward 30 years) When we first moved to the mountains of Eastern Ky. My husband told some of the men he worked with that he would like to try rattlesnake! They brought him a huge one. I don't know how big, because I didn't look. I stayed outside all the time he and our four kids skinned it and cut it up and cooked it! They said it tasted like chicken. I threw away my favorite iron skillet after that dinner!
Last edited by Miss Blue; 04-16-2007 at 07:53 AM..
Reason: spelling
I have eaten all of those things at least once in my life. I actually quite enjoyed the turtle soup, or "cooter stew" as the man who prepared it called it. Serious southern food on that list.
What Evey said. I tried all that stuff a long time ago.
I tasted frogs' legs in France, turtles in Grand Cayman, rattlesnake in Colorado, gator in, where else, Florida.
Now that I have tried them once, I have no desire to repeat the experience.
Tastes like chicken.
As I understand it, shark is full of mercury, being high on the fishie food chain.
My dad worked for the Missouri Dept. of Conservation. Every year, the guys he worked with had a wild game feed of things they had caught during the year. I have eaten:deer,elk,antelope,raccoon,beaver,snapping turtle,copperhead,dove,pheasant,quail,frog,turtle eggs(laid in a barrel before we had a chance to butcher the turtle)alligator,emu,duck,crawdads,wild boar,paddlefish,shark,wild turkey,squirrel,rabbit...
We eat other kinds of fish,meat and fowl, why should these be different? Turtles and snakes are just meat,after all. Although I didn't think the copperhead was worth all the trouble because of the bones.
We also were treated to wild edible plants-paw-paws,mushrooms,sassafrass tea,berries of all kinds,possum grapes,persimmons,wild pears.
Goodness, no! With so many other options, who would?! YUCK!
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