The curiosities of food

by P. L. Simmonds

The emu is easily domesticated when taken young, and becomes very familiar with, and attached to, the dogs, which generally leads to the death of a tame one. A full-grown one, when erect, stands seven feet high. The natives creep on them and spear them. The eggs are of a tea green colour, with a watered appearance on the surface. There is a singularity in the growth of the feathers—two of them spring from one quill. The bird is principally valued for its oil. The skin of a full-grown bird produces six or seven quarts of oil, clear, and of a beautiful bright yellow colour. The method of extracting or ‘trying’ out the oil is to pluck the feathers, cut the skin into pieces, and boil it; but the aborigines prefer the flesh with the skin upon it, regarding it as the Esquimaux do the flesh of whales and seals, as a highly luscious treat. The flesh is eaten by Europeans, and preferred by some to the kangaroo; the rump part is considered as delicate as fowl; the legs coarser, like beef, but still tender.

Bustards are plentiful in many parts of the Cape Colony, and the smaller sorts, called koerhans, are approachable in a bush country; but the larger kinds, called paws, are a great prize, as they are found on plains, and are generally shot with ball. In Australia, the bustard is called, colonially, the wild turkey. It is a fine large bird, frequently weighing 12 to 15 lbs., and extending full six feet, from tip to tip of the wings. There it is declared excellent for eating, but its flesh is much too gamey for ordinary palates.

Don Pernetty, in his Historical Journal of the Voyage to the Falkland Islands, under the command of M. de Bouganville, says, they found the bustard ‘exquisite either boiled, roasted, or fricasseed. It appeared from the account we kept that we ate 1,500. It is, indeed, hardly to be conceived that the ship’s company of our two frigates, consisting of a hundred and fifty men, all in perfect health and with good stomachs, should have found a quantity of these birds sufficient for their subsistence during a stay of more than two months, within a tract of country not exceeding three leagues.’

But they also tried other descriptions of feathered game. The wild ducks were found, in general, to have the taste of mussels. Of a kind of grey goose, weighing about 19 or 20 lbs., it is reported: ‘Its flesh was oily, had a disagreeable smell and a fenny taste; but it was eaten by the ships’ companies when no bustards were given them.’

The clucking hen of Jamaica (Ardea scolopacea), on the authority of Browne and Robinson, is looked upon as the best wild fowl in the country, although the latter writer tells us it feeds upon snakes, toads, and lizards, as well as wood snails and gully crabs. The flavour is, however, represented to be remarkably fine—a compound of ham, partridge, and pigeon. The flesh is of a peculiarly close and compact texture, and very tender.

The mangrove hen (Rallus Virginianus), indigenous to the watery marshes of Jamaica, greatly resembles the dappled grey variety of the common fowl. At the pullet age, the young birds are run down, when feeding on the mud, with great facility. At this time, I have found them to be delicious eating. Persons, on whose taste reliance may be placed, say that, though a plover be undoubtedly a fine bird for the table, and the sanderling a great delicacy, the young mangrove hen exceeds both, as it combines all their peculiarity of flavour with the fleshiness of the quail. This is no small commendation. But much depends upon your cuisinier; if he is a good artiste—a man of undoubted talents, it matters little what the materials be.

The Rallus crex is another esteemed dainty of no ordinary kind, and a most delicious bird.

In the reign of Henry the Eighth, the bittern was held in great esteem at the tables of the great. Its flesh has much the flavour of hare, and is far from being unpleasant.

Snipe of all kinds, from the ‘teeterer,’ that hovers about the edge of the surf, to the jack snipe (Scolopax gallinula), half-brother to the woodcock, are in high esteem for the table. The ‘green’ sportsman finds these birds the most perplexing of all feathered game when on the wing. Their catter-cornered, worm-fence line of flight renders them very difficult to hit, until long practice has rendered the marksman’s eye familiar with their erratic movements. Some sportsmen take them at an angle; others after they have made their tack; and others, again, seem to blaze away at them without any particular aim, and yet always bring down their bird. The yellow-legged snipe is in America considered the best species for the table. They should be larded and roasted in bunches of three, and served in gravy made from their own unctuous drippings. There are few side-dishes more popular with epicures than snipe on toast. Some cooks stuff them with a composition of bread crumbs and egg, highly seasoned; but, in my opinion, they are far better without this kind of ‘trimmings.’

While the trail of the woodcock is a choice morsel with the English epicure, the inhabitants of the North of Europe, to whose forests the woodcocks retire in the summer, never eat the birds, esteeming their flesh unwholesome, from the circumstance of their having no crops. But they are particularly fond of the eggs, which the boors offer for sale in large quantities in the principal markets, and this contributes, possibly, to make the birds so scarce.