Very OT: woodchuck au vin

[Laurence Horn]

At 7:14 PM -0400 8/13/09, Alison Murie wrote:
>I  can't remember how this happened to come up, but some years ago
>there was a discussion on this list of the table characteristics of
>various wild critters.  At that time I disparaged groundhog, having
>found it disagreeable  the one or two times I had had it.  Now I must
>retract that.  Our neighborhood is overrun with groundhogs; we have
>trapped three since they awakened from their winter sleep.  We
>exported the first two, but decided to eat the third.  It was
>spectacularly good.  If you eat meat, try it  They are not an
>endangered species!
>AM
>

We've had a few in our neighborhood too--some neighbors caught one in
a Hav-a-heart trap but carted it off to some distant woods rather
than throwing it on the griddle, then one turned up on our deck in
the early morning, but we didn't eat it either.  I wouldn't know how
to go about preparing one for the table, but perhaps there are
instructions in Joy of Cooking.  Meanwhile, I wonder if it's kosher
(unlike the non-ground kind).  Maybe it falls into the same category
as aardvark, which has a similar etymology...

LH

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