Dh got one today, a real big one. He says if it tastes good he's going to get his limit(25/day?). So who is familiar with this type of meat, and any hints on how to prepare? He's got a buddy with some land and the turtles are killing his ducks. Ideas anyone?
You didn't say if you have it cleaned already. I can't help you there (DH does that), but I can tell you how to cook it- it's one of my kids' favorites. Fried Turtle Heat some grease in a frying pan. Roll the turtle pieces in a mixture of flour, salt, and pepper. Place in hot grease and fry on med-high, until brown on the bottom. Turn pieces over, lower heat, cover, and cook until tender and browned on bottom. Uncover. Turn heat back up and crisp coating. Serve. (All this takes about an hour) Don't forget to make milk gravy, using the drippings left in the pan. That's the best part IMO.
Hi, How is he catching the turtles? Bank line? jug line?, Trout line? The way we do it is usually by feeling for them in the banks of rivers and ponds. Then pull them out. Lots of turtles can be had in an afternoon wading down a river bank. In preparing the turtle meat make sure you remove all the yellow fat that clings to the meat, it has a bad flavor. Try and remove most of the membrane that is about the meat. Sever the head close to the skull so that u can retain more neck meat, very tasty. On large snappers i usually like to parboil the meat pieces a bit, not much. Also if time allows letting the meat soak in a salt water soultion over night would help take out the sometimes foul flavor., it will help tenderize it a bit as well. To the above flour, salt, cracked fresh pepper, garlic powder,cayane pepper. I like to fry my pieces in bacon drippings. Lightly brown on both sides then place in a casarole dish or iron skillet into the oven untill finished. For a spring feast to compliment the turtle, i would serve wild ramps (a wild garlic with broad leaves) these woild be steamed and tossed in a vinagrete and oil dressing along with real bacon bits and some crushed walnuts. Make a red-eye gravy from the drippins you fried the turtle in. Some jerusalem artichoke, boild and creamed like mashed potatoes, or you could use cattail tubers. A nice creamy morel mushroom soup would be nice too. And a big loaf of corn pone. Wow im getting hungry. Be good Jagger
I know lots of folks liek fried turtle , but her is what i do instead , after cleaning well , and soaking in salt water , I place the pieces in the pressure cooker and cook till done , then bone , and run the meat through the meat grinder, for force meat, use bread crumbs and eggs , and maybe a bit of ground onion(same time as grinder )season as you like and make into meatballs , bake on cookie tray about 350 for 20 or so minutes , and then either use a crock pot or a casserol dish and dump in your favorite bbq sauce .. heat either in crock or oven at 350 ...fun thing to take to pot luck or you could add to spagetti my family loves turtle , we use a trap occasionally , but I really do not like cleaning them , lots of work .. but if folks bring em to me i will this recipe works especially well for those huge grandfather snappers !!!
Here are some sites that have cleaning and cooking instructions.... http://www.backwoodsbound.com/xturtle.html http://www.bertc.com/turtle.htm http://www.conservation.state.mo.us/conmag/1996/jun/jn96john.html
Oh yea....in reply to Jaggers pulling them out of the river bank by hand....I had a guy at work describe how they do that....AAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH......supposedly they take their hand (if they still have one) and keep it flat and keep it up on the roof of the hole as they reach in....well now comes the tricky part.....coming straight down on the shell to tell which way he is pointed.....if his head is pointed toward you then you have to get him turned around before you pull him out....I've seen some bigger snapper I don't believe I'd try that with myself.......but he says he has brought many out that way and has never been bitten...but he did mention snakes and muskrats, seems they don't choose to be pulled out with out a fight.....
Oh wow thanks for the replies and the links. As for catching the turtle, I think dh just went in and picked him up. If he starts doing this a lot he will probably use a different method tho. He gutted him yesterday and it fills about a half of a 5 gallon ice cream bucket. He is used to gutting deer so I just trust that he did it correctly. If not he will know better for next time. He's real excited about this new catch. And the post was right on the money about being hard to cut up. It took quite some time and when he came into the house he was so tired he couldn't lift our dd into her bunk bed. Hes not the type that tires easily, so that was saying a lot. I guess it just will take some getting used to. Thanks again and keep the replies comming!
and took me back like 20 years to my youth. Not much help, but as a kid we had a family friend that fried up snapper (we even watched her slaughter it) and it was SOOOO GOOOOOOOD.
I'd eat turtle if I were hungry enough (after all the tons of fish were gone from my pond). After about a week of eating nothing, anything moving or moving recently becomes attractive. Caution though. Turtles can live a long long time, and like other long lived predators, toxins get accumulated in the body tissues. State wildlife officials have declared even in the best of State of Texas waters, certain species of fish should only be eaten occasionally, and rarely by expecting mothers and young children. Of course, if it comes down to having to eating turtles, I wont care about toxins.
So what does turtle taste like?? If you say "chicken", I will really have to laugh. What's the texture of the cooked meat like?
Well hate to dissapoint everyone...but the turtle did not get cooked. The smell of the raw meat cooking made us gag. Now I don't know if that was supposed to happen, or if we got an old one or if he gutted it wrong. But at any rate, there are posters on here who have said that turtle meat is very good and I will have to take thier word for it. I think dh will think twice next time he brings home "wild meat" we are not used to eating. We found some instructions(thanks for the links) and have some idea of a different way to handle it.
some pieces tasted similar to chicken some similar to beef, not store bought though *which is bland imo*. any "wild game" food is going to have a stronger flavor, some more than others depending on circumstances and how much fat is left on the meat.
