Great Moments in Blather: fried varmint politics- what else has this man eaten?

Original post: January 17, 2008

We gotta say it: Mike Huck-A-Bee is the real deal. If it weren't that he was a damn evangelical Republican, and against everything we hold dear, we'd love to support him. Or at least have a beer with him (despite neither of us drinks alcohol).

Turns out he's squirrelly and endearing in a way that the slinky-sleek mush-mouth Mitt Romney could never imagine.

Huck-A-Bee told Joe Scarborough today: "When I was in college, we used to take a popcorn popper, because that was the only thing they would let us use in the dorm, and we would fry squirrels ... in the dorm room."

As Dave Boze (KVI m-f, 3-6p) took callers on this subject this afternoon, memories of dorm room culinary adventures came, er, flooding back...

In our WWSC (now WWU) dorm, we cooked spaghetti and noodle soup in the popcorn popper and made Hollandaise, flapped tortillas, and seared burgers on a hot plate. In Bellingham in those days, a poultry store on Railroad Avenue sold chicken tails -- yes, the part that goes through the fence last -- for 10 cents a pound!

Two bits bought a dinner party, and every night was a party.

We cooked-up chicken butts for months on end. And there was no end to the innovation: Chicken Butt Ragout-la-la; Chicken Butt Charlie (after Charlie Manson); Chicken-fried Chicken butts; Cassoulet de Chicken Butt; Chicken Butt Tuna Noodle Casserole; Chicken Butt à la Mode de Caen. (Top Ramen in those days was not for students; it was exotic, very expensive, and consumed only by people like Aristotle Onassis at restaurants like "21").

When we put the Chow Yuck left over from the night before in our electric percolator, plugged it in and left for the weekend, and got evicted from the dorm. It was an important turning point in our academic lives for other reasons we won't go into here, but an acrid smell reminiscent of the burning of Shanghai lingered in the dorm for years. And sadly, that turned out to be the only lasting impression we ever made on academia.

Having been raised in rural Washington instead of rural Arkansas, we've never eaten the allegedly tasty rodents. Don't worry, we're not going into a masculine bragging of weird meats we've eaten, but it seems that the native Western Gray Squirrel is protected in Washington, while those ubiquitous, and obnoxious Eastern transplants we see in the city, are presumably fair game.

We're big fans of the squirrel-blasting blog of record, Squirrel Hunting Society where we gleaned this tidbit:

I live in Washington State in the US, and we use a variety of rifles for long range squirrel removal. If you ever come to Washington or Oregon States, email me and I’ll give you a free lesson in long range squirrel removal. I’m sure I could also print up some type of certificate that you could hang in the local pub and tell cool exploding squirrel stories. LOL

(Need to dress a squirrel for the pot? Instructions here).

The subject of urban game is dear (not deer) to us. A chef we languished under -- Francois Kissel, owner of Seattle's long-gone Brasserie Pittsbourg -- used to wax fondly about trapping squab (juvenile pigeons) on the hoof as a student in Paris and broiling them on sticks. (After living in cities, pigeons, are as un-tempting as squirrels, but the truth is in the mouth, as Francois would always say).

A couple of French software engineers we hung with in the '90's used to snare the fat, hand-fed Canadian geese down at Greenlake. These guys were certainly not poverty-stricken, but found great sport in scooping up the big birds as they slept or by luring them with granola and talking them into sticking their formidable necks into the loops of nylon fishing string they'd rigged up.

They were amazed at the bounty of those arrogant, feathered porkers allowed to waddle around pooping on Seattleites' lifestyle. They roasted them up gleefully and served them with purslane or choucroute, quaffed water glasses full of something red and chewy, and laughed, ha-ha! at what the stupid Americans left crapping by the wayside.

That Huck-a-Bee would go on national TV, and talk about frying squirrels -- as endearing as that may be -- signals a candidacy not ready for prime time.

We hear Joe Scarborough's reaction: "Ewwww, too much information!" echoing across the land from the mouths of grossed-out young girls, animal-loving kids, environmentalist suburbanites, and city dwellers who believe squirrels are just rats with a better 'do.

(photo: squirreligami ready for the pot)

Should a man be considered viable for what he considers edible? Romney political operatives have already started the snickering insinuations that Huck-A-Bee, who once weighed over 300 lbs., would eat anything -- even your kitty, if it got between him and supper trough.

They ask in whispers to friendly media: What else has the governor eaten?

In our WWSC (now WWU) dorm, we cooked spaghetti and noodle soup in the popcorn popper and made Hollandaise, flapped tortillas, and seared burgers on a hot plate. In Bellingham in those days, a poultry store on Railroad Avenue sold chicken tails -- yes, the part that goes through the fence last -- for 10 cents a pound!

Two bits bought a dinner party, and every night was a party.

We cooked-up chicken butts for months on end. And there was no end to the innovation: Chicken Butt Ragout-la-la; Chicken Butt Charlie (after Charlie Manson); Chicken-fried Chicken butts; Cassoulet de Chicken Butt; Chicken Butt Tuna Noodle Casserole; Chicken Butt à la Mode de Caen. (Top Ramen in those days was not for students; it was exotic, very expensive, and consumed only by people like Aristotle Onassis at restaurants like "21").

When we put the Chow Yuck left over from the night before in our electric percolator, plugged it in and left for the weekend, and got evicted from the dorm. It was an important turning point in our academic lives for other reasons we won't go into here, but an acrid smell reminiscent of the burning of Shanghai lingered in the dorm for years. And sadly, that turned out to be the only lasting impression we ever made on academia.

Having been raised in rural Washington instead of rural Arkansas, we've never eaten the allegedly tasty rodents. Don't worry, we're not going into a masculine bragging of weird meats we've eaten, but it seems that the native Western Gray Squirrel is protected in Washington, while those ubiquitous, and obnoxious Eastern transplants we see in the city, are presumably fair game.

We're big fans of the squirrel-blasting blog of record, Squirrel Hunting Society where we gleaned this tidbit:

I live in Washington State in the US, and we use a variety of rifles for long range squirrel removal. If you ever come to Washington or Oregon States, email me and I’ll give you a free lesson in long range squirrel removal. I’m sure I could also print up some type of certificate that you could hang in the local pub and tell cool exploding squirrel stories. LOL

(Need to dress a squirrel for the pot? Instructions here).

The subject of urban game is dear (not deer) to us. A chef we languished under -- Francois Kissel, owner of Seattle's long-gone Brasserie Pittsbourg -- used to wax fondly about trapping squab (juvenile pigeons) on the hoof as a student in Paris and broiling them on sticks. (After living in cities, pigeons, are as un-tempting as squirrels, but the truth is in the mouth, as Francois would always say).

A couple of French software engineers we hung with in the '90's used to snare the fat, hand-fed Canadian geese down at Greenlake. These guys were certainly not poverty-stricken, but found great sport in scooping up the big birds as they slept or by luring them with granola and talking them into sticking their formidable necks into the loops of nylon fishing string they'd rigged up.

They were amazed at the bounty of those arrogant, feathered porkers allowed to waddle around pooping on Seattleites' lifestyle. They roasted them up gleefully and served them with purslane or choucroute, quaffed water glasses full of something red and chewy, and laughed, ha-ha! at what the stupid Americans left crapping by the wayside.

That Huck-a-Bee would go on national TV, and talk about frying squirrels -- as endearing as that may be -- signals a candidacy not ready for prime time.

We hear Joe Scarborough's reaction: "Ewwww, too much information!" echoing across the land from the mouths of grossed-out young girls, animal-loving kids, environmentalist suburbanites, and city dwellers who believe squirrels are just rats with a better 'do.

(photo: squirreligami ready for the pot)

Should a man be considered viable for what he considers edible? Romney political operatives have already started the snickering insinuations that Huck-A-Bee, who once weighed over 300 lbs., would eat anything -- even your kitty, if it got between him and supper trough.

They ask in whispers to friendly media: What else has the governor eaten?