Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Trapping How to cook a beaver...?

While up dear hunting, my bud got a beaver from an old timer who still traps. He gave it to me and I need some ideas on how to make it edible. The old guy did not part with the tail. Any suggestions appreciated.

Nail it to a cedar board. Cover in butter and garlic. Bake at 325 for 3 hours.

Throw beaver away and eat the board.

It's wonderful stuffed.

I love stuffing beaver

An added note is to make sure the beaver is hairless before stuffing it.

Sounds to me like you guys are doing a little wishful thinking...

Well you did say you were "dear" hunting.......

Good grief, the loons are coming out of the woodwork..

From an old 1970's era South Dakota Game & Fish cookbook:

"Remove kernels in small of back and under forelegs between rib and shoulder. Hang in cold for several days. Poach in salted water for 1 hour. Braise as for beef until tender."

Mrs. K. L. Harrod
SD

Hey now............

I will go look in some of my other wild game cook books...but you gotta quit calling me a loon....more like an old buzzard

I was hoping for something from the 1870's...

OK!

Had to boot up a computer with a real keyboard, laptops are convenient but I hate the keyboards.

From old NAHC cookbooks........

From the 1985 edition, typed verbatim

Baked Beaver or Raccoon
Serves 2 to 4
Prep Time: 2.5 hours

1 beaver or raccoon, skinned and defatted
salt and pepper
garlic powder
celery top from one rib of celery
1 onion peeled
2 carrots peeled
1/2 cup brandy
2 cups water

Season the meat with salt, pepper and garlic poweder.
Place in a roast pan with celery tops, onion and carrots.
Bake covered at 350� for one hour.
Add the brandy and water.
Bake one hour and 15 minutes longer,
Baste occasionally with the liquid in the pan.

M McKenzie
Yukon Canada


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From the 1986 edition, typed verbatim


Atlanta Special
Serves 4 to 6
Prep Time: 4 hours

1 beaver (8 to 10 lbs)
1 bay leaf
2 medium onions
2 garlic cloves
celery leaves
flour
fat
salt
pepper

Remove all fat from beaver. The meat is dark, fine grained, moist and tender. The fat is objectionable both in flavor and odor and should be removed entirely before cooking. Cut up as you do rabbit. Soak over night in salt water. Parboil until about half cooked in water with the bay leaf, onion and garlic, Celery may or may not be added. Drain, roll in flour and brown in hot fat, season with salt and pepper. Bake in a covered pan in a moderate oven until tender. Gravy may be made from the drippings. Plan the same number of servings as from a similar weight in pork. Beaver is very rich.

C.H. Bishop
Georgia

This is how it was done in 1850

LOL...didn't know they could take a pitcher back then...

Sear floured chunks in grease and build a fantastic stew around it...

Chili is also a very good option. Trapped tons of beaver for many years and it is very, very good.

Back when I trapped, beaver made up a large percent of our meat. It got used in tacos and chili. Once a year we'd load up the pig roaster with beavers and do a slow smoked BBQ. The left overs we canned.

I haven't trapped since the late 70's but I still have my traps. Every once and awhile my wife bugs me to sell em but I've always said, as long as there's critters in the woods and fields a trapper will never starve

Native folk up here regularly eat beaver. The best I've had was half dried for about three days with a little cottonwood smoke, but fruitwood smoke would be okay too. It's then cut into quarters and roasted in the oven for a couple hours or better at 350. Make sure the meat is elevated above the juices and that as much fat has been cut off as possible.

The whiteman method is to trim off all the fat possible, parboil, remove and roast in oven again elevating it above the juices and residual fat that cooks out of it.

No matter what, you better remove the scent glands on the hind feet and back or it will never taste right. It's kinda like opossum. It's good if you can cook the grin off his face!

Good comments. Thanks.

I bone the meat out into cubes, mix with 20% by weight with bacon ends, and grind it into burger. Much better meat than venison in my opinion.

Here's a post on my blog about processing beaver into burger.

I've heard it makes real good bait....just what I would do with it.

Make's the best bear, coyote, bobcat bait. If they ever let us shoot wolves in Michigan, wolf bait.

I cooked some for the first time yestersday. It was a 14# kit, I got maybe 1.5 lbs of meat off the legs and back strap. Cut it small pieces, I shaked in flower with pepper and salt, lightly browned, then simmered a few hours in red wine and bullion with carrots and onion. This is how I cook the tougher cuts of venison. It had a unique sweet taste to it. Did not like as much as venison. Not sure if I will cook again. I usually use it for bait.

baste in White Zinfandel, simmer in Hottub for 45mins, then stuff?



but in all seriousness, had "Sweet Pickled Beaver" once, and it was amazing. would love to find the recipe.

Well, our game dinner is tomorrow, so I prepared the beaver last night, which was cut in small cubes to go in green chile sauce (in addition to pork).

After defrosting, took it out to have a look. The front haunches were somewhat mangled and bloodied, so I discarded that portion. The rear, quite large and with claws still attached, didn't look too bad. Fair bit of meat. Had a fragrance that I would not call 'pleasing'. I brined it over night and took it over to the kitchen.

Rinsed in cold water several times, then began trimming everything that didn't look good. Put a rack in a roasting pan, put in a turkey bag and covered the bottom with sliced onion and celery. Put in the beaver, meat side up and seasoned with salt and pepper. Put in the oven for 2 hours at 325 deg. Didn't smell too bad while roasting. The roasting time was fine, then removed from the bag and deboned as much as I could, and cubed. The odor still wasn't what I would call terribly appetizing, though one guy disagreed. I tasted a couple chunks and it wasn't too bad. Few other guys tried it and liked it. Who knew?

There is a fairly stout grease that cooked out of it that was not easy to clean off the equipment. In spite of the ingredients in sauce, I think the beaver will lend a flavor, though I doubt it will over power the dish. All in all, not a bad deal.

I report on the result of the dish.

SSE
those glands mentioned earlier are a huge item to take care of. If it was frozen with them intact that may be your smell issue.
We have had it twice at our game dinner. First time with out knowing about the glands. WOW!
Second was prepped properly and there was none left at the end...
Go Beavers.


Bob

Really?! man we really gotta start watching our titles around here, lol.

Didn't end up with too much of the cubed beaver meat, but it was a nice addition the green chile sauce, which included about 3 times as much pork. When it was cooking everybody who stirred it thought it was fine, but I could detect that beaver fragrance. When it went out on the serving table to go over rice, most of the nearly 100 in attendance gobbled it up.

As an aside, the full menu:

Venison live pate�
Walleye Chowder
Green chile sauce with beaver (hot and spicy)
Duck breast Marsala
Goose Pad Ped (Thai stir-fry with coconut milk and red curry)
Pheasant/squirrel/rabbit crust-less potpie
Raccoon Swedish meatballs in mushroom sauce
Corned Venison
Stuffed Rolled Venison
Stew containing big horn sheep, mountain goat, fallow deer and mouflon
Roast turkey
Cole Slaw
White Rice
Hard crusted Italian dinner rolls

I just lick it all night

Let this be a lesson to ya...

I guess I'm pretty much screwed.
Because I smoke durin' it!

That would'a been OK...

like mine nice and moist and stuffed with a juicy johnsonville brat thats ready to explode.

One of the clubs I belong to was given 5 large beaver by F&G that had been trapped.... The guys boned it all out, cubed it, marinated it in I am not sure what, put it on shish-ka-bob squiers and put them on a charcoal grill.

There was everything from squirrel to caribou but the only thing better than the grilled beaver was one of the moose dishes. I went back for thirds as few people even tried it because it was listed as BEAVER....

Bob

beaver - the other dark meat.

My surprise 4 pages and no one said raw!! Clint

What!!! That would have been my first guess.....Num num num.......

Barbequed in the oven! Onions celery taters!!