Forum Replies Created
-
Dave,
Never fear, it doesn’t taste like any bird I’ve ever eaten. A point to note is I’ve only ever eaten eastern grays. Western grays are reportedly quite similar, euro’s are described as so oily to be barely edible and I don’t really know anything about reds. Anyway, I’m so used to eastern grays now I’ll struggle to do it justice so will describe it as I remember first encountering it.
I remember the smell first, so rich, gamey and pungent, like beef that had been aged too far and gone bad. It’s very lean, very dark red meat. I was hesitant eating it the first time, because the smell was so off putting, but once it was cooked the smell was all but gone. I remember the flavour being like a toned down version of the odor. So rich and gamey in comparison to beef to seem almost bad.
I have not had too much deer meat, but the gamey flavours were similar. The roo I’ve had has had a richer more robust flavour than the deer I’ve eaten though, but like I said, not a fair comparison from my tiny deer sample.
Fast forward to now and I breath deeply through my nose and start salivating at the smell of raw roo. It’s very easy to overcook as it’s so lean and roo rookies often complain of that after their first attempt. But if you treat it right (which in my opinion means rare at most) it is the most succulent red meat I’ve had the pleasure of eating.
I hardly eat any beef anymore and generally find it pretty watery and tasteless in comparison.
Here is a roo cut guide (they really do look like a big bunny with their skin off). Unsurprisingly the tenderloins are the choice cuts and the easiest to prepare. The thigh steaks are also great.
That whole roo cooking technique doesn’t surprise me and probably represents the very earliest techniques of human cooking don’t you think? Like the !Xo persistance hunting representing early methods of bringing down large game. But Aboriginal culture here was very diverse, from simple hunter/gatherer societies like that to the little kingdoms of the south east that conquered neighbouring tribes and made slaves of them.
I don’t think anything in Australia is going to be much of a challenge to hunt compared to what you have in America, due to our general lack of hunting pressure. Emu’s are next to suicidal as they’ll generally come running to check out any movement they see and stop within bow range wondering what you’re up to. Roo’s would be effortless with a rifle, but any herd animal is going to be challenging with a tradbow, specially given the open grasslands and woodlands roos tend to favour. They’ve spent 10’s of thousands of years being hunted at least, so they’re not dodos 😀
Wallabies while very skittish are generally solitary which makes for a much easier stalk. That whiptail pictured above had the wind behind it and I had some wonderful dead ground with soft green grass to walk through before belly crawling the last 20 metres or so to the little ridge I took the photos from.
Wow, I just wrote a lot more than I intended when I set out to tell you what roo tastes like so I’ll leave it there 😉
Nice pics Dave! That is a tough situation, unable to find the turkeys for all the elk that are blocking your view 😆
I went walking some hills yesterday looking for any sign of huntable ferals and found several species of wallabies instead. Jumped a few that were bedded down but I also got the jump on some as they were feeding. We’re not allowed to shoot natives so they were safe from me, I was just watching. It’s hard to be disappointed with the natural world isn’t it?
Edit: I took these pics with my iPhone held up to an 8x bino from about 25m away.
I’ve cropped the lense shadow out of the pics.
Mike, in answer to your question below, my ‘jumping’ the wallaby looked a lot more like slithering like a snake!
Had a nice little family hike/scout today. This bit of public land is one of the parcels set to be opened up to bowhunters in the near future.
I found a healthy amount of pig sign without trying too hard. Fingers crossed it opens up soon!
This was our end point and found some likely bowfishing spots as well, rocky outcrops and big sand bars.
The little fella was very proud of his ‘dinosaur bone’ and ignored all my suggestions that it may have belonged to a wallaby 😀
Next time I come this way I’ll have a bow and fishing rig 😉
