Squirrel Stew . . . Really?

Lee Foote
2 min readDec 16, 2023

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First, live out in the country where invasive, exotic gray squirrels are abundant, a nuisance, and where a pellet gun raises no eyebrows.

After months of emptying that birdfeeder behind me it was time to pay the piper

Go shoot one (30 seconds)

Ethics 101 — You kill it, you HAVE to eat it.

Quick skin and quarter (3 minutes)

Fire up the old Instant Pot with a few handfuls of spices, and bay leaves and bouillon; toss in squirrel quarters and back (3 minutes)

(or roll in spices and/or breadcrumbs and brown in olive oil first is so inclined) (4 minutes extra)

Any pressure cooker will do, or a 3 hour braise on stove top.

Cover and set on 23 minutes high-pressure (23 minutes)

Start a pot of rice while old fangy is stewing.

(We are 35 minutes into this now)

Chop up a lettuce, avocado and tomato salad (multi-tasking with 3 meal components at play simultaneously- good efficiency there!)

Serve Mr. Chucklehead over rice with a side salad for lunch.

Notice that there are now two more squirrels assaulting your bird feeder . . . sigh.

Settle down to a pipe full of loose-leaf tobacco and a little banjo music.

Feel your neck getting redder by the minute.

Wonder why your spouse ever married such a bumpkin that reverts to his childhood so readily.

Lee

PS: this meal was delicious but also prepared while wife wonderful was out of the country, it is just . . . better that way.

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Lee Foote

Southerner by birth, Northerner by choice, Casual person by nature.