Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Food, Cooking, and Game Preparation Possom?

Anyone really eat them?

Not saying I wouldn't but I haven't been that hungry yet.

Greasy suckers. I’ve skinned many but never could talk myself into cooking one of those greasy and stinky creatures. We sold the hides and meat back in the 70’s and 80’s so someone liked them.

No possum consumed here. Had beaver once at a wild game feed and it was good.

Thanks all.

I'd like to know some palatable recipes myself
for when the day comes and if I'm still living
that those garbage eating varmints will be
considered table fare for the masses.

I've had coon on the barbecue grill before,
but never worked up enough hunger to
try a possum

Just finished up a squirrel stew, and had many
a one, plus wabbits and other unlucky animals.

Just sincerely curious about cooking a possum
to where it's tasty ( if it's possible- without sweet
potatoes I should add)

I ate it back when I was young but remember little about it. My Grandmother and most of Her family liked them. My Grandfather would catch them alive and put them in a chicken coop and feed them corn for a while before butchering. miles

Yessir
My folks ate whatever was slow enough back
in the bad ol' days. I had enough sense to listen
and learn how to make soap and pies and tea cake
cookies and ribbon cane syrup and put a hot
patch on a tire tube and kill and cook wabbits
and squirrels and shine and assorted things like that.
Possums as table fare never came up though.
I do know they ate them regularly when my momma
daddy was little since there wasn't a whole lot
besides what they could raise or grow.
There wasn't many wt deer to be had and the
turkey were all gone and the bear were pretty much
gone. By the time I came along and started to
hunt there was still a bear season to the east
the first year I hunted, and the county wt limit
was 1 buck. Does were strictly forbidden and
squirrels were shoot all you want. Fur boom
was still a thing

When I was growing up a lot of the local Blacks considered them to be a delicacy. My grandfather had hounds, and would coon and possum hunt. The possums would be taken live, put in a pen and fattened up, and then sold to one of the local Blacks. I've also heard of other people that ate them, but there is no way I'd eat a possum unless I was starving to death and it was either eat that or die.

I have never had it. I have heard old people that grew up during the depression talk about eating them. They said they were good. I suspect they were hungry for fresh meat and didn't get meat often. I have trapped them and skinned them to sell the fur. They smell funny. Not appetizing at all.

Yessir
That's the way things were back in the late 1920's
and 30's when my folks grew up.
Some something or a varmint molesting your
little bit of livestock or fowl or your vegetable
garden was that many bites of food that weren't
available for the family. I wouldn't eat any myself
unless I couldn't come up with something better.
Way back when, my folks didn't have much to begin
with, then after all the cotton was picked and ginned
and there was a few dollars in hand, they splurged
and had fried salmon patties from canned salmon
along with the usual collards and stuff they'd
put up and canned.
I've had some former coworkers that were
naturalized citizens from Cambodia and
Laos and those places where you got shot
for complaining, and they've talked to me
a bunch about the delicious rats they trapped
in the rice paddies to have something to eat.
That sauce made from rotten fish is something
else if you've never smelled or tasted it.
You sure won't get rid of the aftertaste easily

I've ate a lot of things.

Opossum isn't one of them.

I would though.

Not an appetizing critter to look at

-Jake

I would rather spend the cash and buy a choice ribeye.

I have a Louisiana Cookbook that has a recipe for roasted possum. There's a description of coming into a families house on Christmas and in the center of the table, a rack, with the possum hanging by it tail on the rack.

Whenever I think about a possum, I remember a story this Black fellow who helped me on the farm told. He said this happened in a little old Black country church. The preacher started praying, and looked up and saw a possum hanging by it's tail from a rafter up in the belfry. The preacher supposedly said,"Let us lift thine eyes up to God.....damn what a rat."

Never had to eat one. While in ARNG; we had a Cajun/Dago cook named Tony Barilola. Think Justin Wilson and Emeril combined. He’d cook up just about anything you brought him and make it palatable. We had Kibbi, garfish croquettes, rattlesnake, frog legs, buffalo fish, crappie, bass, venison. 2 true possum stories:

Grandfather loved to coon hunt. Went on a hunt and wound up with 2 coons which he had in a tow sack slung over his shoulder. He worked at the cotton seed oil mill in a small Delta town. Got there at daylight and needed to be at work at 7:00am; didn’t have time to skin and dress the 2 coons. A little black boy ran up to him and asked “Whatcha gots in da bag, Mister Paige”? Grandfather told him: Got coons and if you guess how many, I’ll give you both of em!” The boy felt the bag from all angles and said :”Fo!”

Worked with a guy who’s Dad was a Supt of Ed and a lay pastor. He’d supply a church pulpit when the pastor was absent and would get calls from all over. Said his Dad had preached at a church, and the head deacon had invited his family home for dinner. Said his Dad was very social and the deacon’s wife threw an apron on and was rustling about in the kitchen. There were boilers on the stove and he lifted the lid off one that had turnip greens heating up. He replaced the lid and pulled the lid off the adjacent pot. He said there was a possum clutching a large sweet tater in a rolling boil in that pot! His Dad was a hearty eater but kinda picked around the main course that day. That sure painted a word picture!

No grinners for me.

Ever been to a ‘Beast Feast’?

Didja ever smell a possum? I would have to be a day away from dying of starvation before I ate one and I eat pickled tripe and pigs feet jelly.