Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Calf fries

Headed to the Red Bluff Roundup yesterday with a buddy. Stopped at his friends annual BBQ before the rodeo and they were passing them around.

Damnit if they weren't really good!

Who knew? LOL

Perfect weather for the Roundup too. 80* with just a little breeze.

Wild horse races were my fav as usual.

They ain’t bad reminds me of fried morels

Y'all can have my portions of those...

Ate a bunch of them in my life. When they are done right they are really good. When they are not done right they are very bad. If you ever find yourself in Severance, Colo stop in Bruce's Bar and get some. That place does them right.

Go for the Record Fahma'... Lamb fries!

Mmmmmm . . . . nutsacks. Do they come with a creamy dipping sauce?

My PT lady came back from a visit to some place down by Reno with some of her coworkers.

They went down there just to try them.

She loved them she said.

In central AZ they are cooked fresh and in high demand at every ranch cuttin/brandin dinner. Sometimes lightly breaded, and maybe some dippin sauce.

More of a chiggun gizzard man myself. But enjoy em all ya want.

X 2

Really delicious with a little Tabasco.

Good stuff.

It's been over 30 years since I had any. The branding 'stove' has a section of pipe trimmed and welded on for frying them up.


No knife now, band 'em when I ear tag or at branding.

Thankfullly I've never been that hungry.

Ate them my whole life, that was my job as a little kid , taking buckets of calf nuts to women cooking during spring round up, the trick is slice them thin and fry them in your special flour and season.

There’s a trick to cleanin em🤢

Used to help out at branding time. Reward was the chow afterwards, including all the Rocky Mountain Oysters we'd "processed" during the day. Damn fine eating.

Never turn my nose up to a good gizzard.
My new S-I-L likes them too, unfortunately.

I’d try nuts in a heartbeat, but it ain’t a thang
Here, and most get strangled by a rubber band.

Sam;
Good afternoon my friend, I trust you and the family are all well and getting decent weather down there today.

While it's been a couple springs now since my rancher buddy sold off his herd, previous to that it had to be at least the last decade and more likely 15 years that we went to banding the calves.

Around the same time we started clipping the fur in combination with an electric iron, then would apply an aloe gel onto the calf.

Again it's been a long, long time since we had the discussion Sam, but I want to say there was a weight gain in the fall calves shipped when those changes were made. Might have been 10 or maybe 15 pounds heavier, but they were heavier.

His theory was less stress helped them bounce back quicker.

Back when we used to cut them, he had a dog that looked like some sort of Spaniel that we all called "Nutsy" because he surely loved them.

For the life of me I can't recall it's real name anymore Sam.

Thanks for the memories that otherwise wouldn't have come back this afternoon Sam, much appreciated.

Of course thanks to Higginez as well for that.

All the best to you all.

Dwayne

PS.

It's sort of a "thing" with the visiting sheep hunters to eat the nuts too.

I kept the sack and had it tanned, still have it and another one. They're huge considering the size of a California ram isn't any bigger than a decent mulie buck.

They'll no doubt go to the first grandson for a show and tell at school.....

All the best once more/still

Once is enough.

I've been going there for years. We would have weigh ins on goose hunting contest there. They would also have duck and goose calling contest there. They shut down for a while when Bruce died but the kids opened it back up. I've been there a bunch of times! I never had even one calf fry! And unless I'm starving, I never will! LOL!

We have always called them Rocky Mountain Oysters! LOL!

You ain’t hadm cooked right 😆

Howdy Dwayne, all good here, good to hear from you on the ol' 'Fire!


When banding you gotta make sure and get both nuts. Sometimes that takes a bit of work, especially when your 75 year old dad is fending off a pissed off cow with an old aluminum scoop shovel while you've got her calf on a rope and on the ground putting a rubber band on junior's nuts.....lol

Sam;
Afternoon once more sir, thanks for the reply.

For sure when they're too small, it's tough to find both of the balls.

The rancher himself was the best at being able to massage them down and get both.

Indeed when one is doing the fresher calves in the field, some of the mamma cows don't believe we had the best interests of their calves in our hearts.

Best to you all.

Dwayne

Still have several nut fry's around here every year, mostly during hunting season. One KoC stag is a man's meal, the menu is nuts, gizzards, ham and beans, and as an appetizer, raw burger. The only vegetable in sight is pickle spears.

G23

Dwayne, Yelloweye Rockfish tonight here in the palace.

My wife fried it up in olive oil and some delicious breading. I like it better than halibut.



We don't have any seafood restaurants here so make do with the traveling fish truck.

I used to get a huge craving for fresh seafood when I lived in the mountains hundreds of miles for the nearest coast...

I tried to hurt myself on large fried Gulf shrimp for a couple years after I moved closer.

Barlow pocket knife’s and brown paper bags bring the flavor

I've seen heeler dogs eat too many nut caps and nuts and puke.

Gotta have it in some form or another or a guy gets hungry!

Same.

Always said......... "I don't eat anything that belongs in a gutpile". I will amend that to also add "nutpile".

Had some last night. Gonna try adding a little cajun twist to them next go round and sprinkle liberally with Tony Chachares seasoning.

Anytime there’s a banquet, picnic, or feed of any description around here that has calf fries they’re always the first thing gone. I’ve literally seen a caterer run out of calf fries and have steaks left over.

I like them fine but but hated cutting calves back in the day, always hot, bloody, dirty, schiet covered work. Of course I like most all the other organ meats too, besides kidneys, I leave them to the local Indians.

Been watching the red bluff roundup on the cowboy channel, we watch rodeo's most of the week,, growing up we cut calves twice a year50-60 head and always had nut fries after,, also lotta pig nuts,,which are more tender,,, But either one better be ate hot,, when they cool they aint that good,,

large shrimp 4.89lb, started to get a couple of lbs to fire up, but opted for fajitas instead.

There is a whole bunch of fish that is better than halibut.


Like pretty much all known fishes.

Right!?

Lamb fries are really good cooked up like bake beans.

I don't understand the attraction personally.

Have you ever heard a fly complain about eating a mouthful of bullshit?

I don’t have to eat something to know I won’t like it…

Oh go microwave a hot pocket city boy....

LMAO!

I loved hog fries, but it has been years since I have had them.

In college my fraternity brothers and I stmbled io7n an Irish bar in Roch Island, Il. Murphy's. Old Murphy, a long time ship's cook, really took a liking to us. Only charged us for every other pitcher.

Our food service was closed Sunday evenings. So Murphy would would whip up fantastic food fo Sunday evening On the house; navy bean and smoked hog hocks .
Racoon"sloppy joes, etc..

After a few months our girlfriends insisted that they come with as women often decided that they Must comrwth us. Females have no appreciation for male bonding

The fare that evening was hog fries. He had them sliced. My girlfriend noticed the odd shape of the delicious ite.

I told her that it pork cutlets.

I maintained the subterfuge and the gals enjoyrd them. Then one of the guys told them what they were. Jim could never keep a secret. Years latter he became deputy attache' in Moscow which always puzzled me.


Once Nom spilled the beans we had a passel of pissef off women on our hands. The good news was that they would never give to Murphy's. Thed downside is that none of us got a piece of ass for a couple of week







.

Very articulate.

Was invited over to a neighbors a few weeks ago, for some hog nuts. They were good, but I already knew they would be. miles

I'll try most things that people eat. But nuts don't interest me.

A co-worker banded another workers dog.
Not sure if it’s because he missed a nut(likely) or the dog chewing the band off, but the dog was sick and acting odd. Bob showed up to check, the sac and one nut was gone, the remaining one was swollen and swinging in the breeze. A razor, some B2 and penicillin, and the amateur farmer/wannabe vet had him in good shape.

Wow, I really fugged that up.

Dunno why or how.

LOL!

I was laughing reading it (or trying to) and thought to myself, this has to be the guy running Wabigoons sock puppet account!

TFF

Had them fried once, the other times, they were just tossed on the branding iron furnace top. I think it's simply the novelty of eating them thats inspires guys to yak about how good they are.
To me, they were like tilapia are to real fish, they taste like what the are cooked with or seasoned with, a big nothing?