Squirrel!!!

We caught and dispatched our first squirrel of the season. I will not be posting a picture, but he was a big-ol' male. Now Jon wants to skin it and try making stew. I'll just let that sink in for a minute.


I have created a monster. I should have known no good would come of it when he started perusing emergency supplies catalogs in the evenings as his new hobby. I didn't mind when he ordered TVP (that stands for "textured vegetable protein," or soybean curd rendered to look like ground beef, chicken chunks, or what have you). It's not bad in tacos and chili. And the spreadsheet for keeping up with rotating stored food is actually useful. But when he noted, with some enthusiasm, that one could buy real canned squirrel meat - boneless or bone-in, no less! - the alarm bells should have gone off.
On the one hand, it is earth-friendly meat. Squirrels are rodents, and reproduce abundantly. This particular one has, I am fairly certain, been stealing our chicken feed and garden seedlings for some time, so I have some claim to his pound of flesh. But its a mature male (read: extra gamey) whose diet has most likely included a lot of urban trash. Jon is just going to have to consume this one himself and try to convince me to share some other time.