Vegetarians don't read this post! Yup, we ate rabbit. Rabbit is in every grocery store here right next to the chicken and the pigs. At first the girls were kind of grossed out by it- well, because:
But we've also had a pet chicken and regularly eat chicken. We are an omnivorous family. I've spend years as a vegetarian and most of college as a vegan, but I must say I definitely feel better, don't have anemia and feel more emotionally balanced when I eat meat, so I do.
This was my first time to cook rabbit and it was unusual getting used to seeing such different shapes of animal in the pot. We used this recipe going for a french style rabbit.
We dredged and browned the rabbit, which did have an unusual order.
But once the onions, mushrooms, bacon and garlic were in all was well.
We had it with roast potatoes and lots of roast garlic. I don't know about your kids, but mine absolutely cannot get enough garlic in their lives so I always tuck in a few extra heads around the side of the pan.
It came out of the oven looking like this and smelled incredible.
Seven out of eight people in this house could subside entirely on this concoction- roasted garlic smeared on a fresh out of the oven loaf of 'farmer's bread.' It went exceptionally well with the rabbit
and was heavenly dipped in the sauce. This sauce was so good we saved it and used it over pan fried turkey fillets two days later.
Comments from the peanut gallery:
"Tastes kind of like chicken but a little different."
"Mmmm, I love it."
"When can we have it again?"
"It tastes like frog legs but at least it didn't come with blood pudding." (memories of travels past!)
"It's ok, but I like chicken better."
In all, a successful meal. Everyone ate it and most loved it. I try not to get too wrapped up with ethics of food while traveling and really try to expose my girls to local ways of eating so they can make decisions and their own choices when the time comes.
I often get asked how I 'get my kids to try new foods.' I don't really have a good answer to this other than I have always offered different foods to them and am always trying new things myself. I never used baby food or 'kid food' like boxes of frozen chicken nuggets for my kids. I feed them foods I like to eat and since I have never craved a frozen, breaded reconstituted piece of chicken before it was not something that I was drawn to feed my kids. I've never cooked separate foods for my kids and serve one dinner for everyone. If there is something they do not like I do not make them eat it. There will always be something that they can eat and if they only eat an apple while sitting at the table with us that's fine with me. I do not mind if they go to the fridge and get a bowl of applesauce or yogurt if they're really hungry and something is particularly distasteful to them. I've eaten rattle snack, beef penis, duck webs, pig uterus, bird saliva - but I can't stand peas. They are actually pickier than I'd like but when compared to most American children I suppose I shouldn't complain because they do usually at least try new things.
The flip side is that they are kind of food snobs at this point. When we lived in Cali we lived directly behind a Wendy's. One night when I was particularly pooped I said as we passed, "Let's just go through the drive-thru." Oh, the protest that I heard, "No, that's disgusting!" "I am not eating fast food." "I'll totally get a stomach ache like last time (when a friend took her.)" Then the 8 yr old said, "There's salmon in the freezer and it is not hard to put a little garlic and olive oil on a piece of fish and stick it in the oven." So I was put right into place and fast food was not eaten for dinner!
Our current blessing that I'm really enjoying:
The silver rain,
The golden sun,
The fields where golden poppies run.
And all the ripples of the wheat
are in the bread (they've been substituting whatever wheat is in - pancakes, biscuits, tortillas) we love to eat.
So when we sit for every meal
and give our thanks we always feel
That we are eating rain and sun and fields where golden poppies run.
It took the older girls about 10 minutes to learn it and the 2 and 4 yr old about a week before they knew it completely.