Muskrat Stew

01/28/2019

Author's note: This piece is not for the faint of heart. It's graphic, odd, and maybe a bit too redneck. It's also true. Read at your own risk.

19 JAN 1400

They were fascinated with the dishwasher. I can't remember a time where kids were this excited to do dishes. It's a normal weekend at camp, and it only takes one boy to deviate from the norm. Now, five of them are dressed in our red and black smocks, rinsing, stacking, and putting away the lunch dishes.

Now, what was it that I needed to do? I can't seem to remember... Wait, I should be bagging leftovers. After that, I have to clean the salad bar then wipe the front counter then-NO, YOU DID NOT JUST WIPE RANCH ON YOUR SMOCK AND PICK UP A CLEAN DISH!

Focus, Rissa. Tayler should catch it. You need to put the ketchup away and make sure they cleared the tables correctly and take down the soup bar... gosh that was good soup-oh, shoot, I forgot to pull the deserts out of the freezer for tonight!

"Yo! Here's the muskrats you ordered!" One of the group's leaders stomped into the dining room from the front door, his snow pants and large winter boots causing a racket and tracking snow everywhere. He had a gallon Ziplock full of blood. Was there even any meat in there? That doesn't seem safe to have in the dining room.

"Awesome! We'll make some stew for you guys for lunch tomorrow. How does that sound?" Suzi was on it, taking the bag from him and laughing and raving about how these inner-city boys trapped, gutted, and skinned the lake rats. "Rissa, could you put them in a hotel pan?"

I nodded from my position in the kitchen, gingerly retrieving the blood bag over the counter like a black-market pharmacy rep. Do they even have those?

GROSS, it's on the outside too, and I think I have it on my hands. My insides clenched.

"Woah! Is that the muskrats?"

"I don't know if I want to eat that."

The dish pit volunteers paused their dishwashing enjoyment to gawk at me as I placed the small things, one by one, into a pan. There were five of them: one the size of a squirrel that still had a head, the next three were like tiny, headless chipmunks. We were all fascinated, but I was annoyed by the amount of blood. You'd think the group leaders that were "expert trappers" would know how to properly bleed them out before giving them to us.

I pulled the last one out of the bag. It, like the biggest one, had a head... and something else... Ah, no! It still has whiskers! That was all I needed. I gagged, throwing the empty bag in the garbage along with my bloody gloves and running to the back sink to wash my hands for an ungodly amount of time.

After washing my hands and mind of the muskrats, I decided to focus on the tasks that I still hadn't done. I pushed my way through the swinging kitchen door into the dining room and was shocked to find a boy leaning over a table, dumping a salt shaker's contents over a small, inside-out tube of muskrat pelt. He glanced up at me, so proud of himself. He must have been one of the boys that helped to catch them.

My mind went into panic mode. UNSANITARY! UNSANITARY! RED ALERT! WE HAVE BLOODY FINGERS HANDLING A SALT SHAKER IN THE DINING ROOM!

He must have seen the horror on my face. "I probably shouldn't do this here..."

I shook my head. "Yeah, no..."

"Okay!" He smiled, skipping through the dining room and out the door, taking the salt shaker with him.

How is this any different from a biohazard? I pondered this as I went back to my work, sanitizing the table with the missing salt shaker four times. Maybe five or six. I lost count.

"Boil it with baking soda then roast in the oven. The baking soda will soften the meat so the girls can debone it." Rachael, my boss, was heading out the door, giving instructions on muskrat cooking as she went. Suzi made it clear that she understood. We later realized that she didn't.

Suzi set to work, ignoring her other kitchen chores as usual. This was something new. She had to do it now or never.

I watched her mix the baking soda with water. Was she doing that right? Okay, a fourth of a cup of baking soda seems reasonable. She poured the cloudy mixture over the little red critters. Now maybe add a bit more water? She began filling the pitcher again. Good. Wait, more baking soda? Well, you're the cook. I'm just the assistant that actually doesn't do much for cooking, so... you know how to do this, right? There was a good two cups in that box, and she emptied it. Did you use the whole thing? Well, it's not my kitchen. Okay, in the oven it goes. I wonder what muskrat tastes like...

19 JAN 1530

"It smells like it may be done!" I hollered at Suzi who was in the dining room, leaning over her phone. "You want me to check it?"

"Go ahead!"

I opened the convection oven. Hot air blew at me as the oven's fan sighed. Oh no. White clouds of bubbling baking soda were EVERYWHERE.

"Suzi!"

She slowly rose from her chair, taking on her authority as soon as she entered the kitchen. "Is it done?"

"I don't know, but it made marshmallows." I stepped aside so she could see. The entire bottom of the oven and the four racks below the muskrat pan were covered in it. Who knew that baking soda could do that?

"Oooo, that's not good." She pulled the pan out, slowly lifting the tinfoil. There was a blackened white crust that coated the tinfoil and crumbled when she tore it. If she had been really careful, she may have been able to remove the tinfoil without breaking the baking soda dome.

The meat was still red.

She shoved a thermometer into the biggest rat. "Yeah, it's done."

"You sure? It looks just as bloody as before."

"Rachael said it's a very red meat. And it's temping. So, it's fine." She pushed the pan back farther on the counter. "When it cools down, you and the girls can debone it."

It smelled like fish and duck and venison all at once. I didn't know how to feel about it. I for sure wasn't going to be the first to taste it. The girls took one look and decided to set the tables for dinner. So, I was the one selected to remove needle ribs and oddly-shaped pelvises from the meat mess. Great.

Once I got into the groove, it was fine. The smell wasn't as bad as before, and it was sort of relaxing just standing there, separating edible meat from unidentifiable carnage while the rest of the dinner prep was happening around me.

"Did you try it yet?" Suzi had just finished panning breadsticks.

I laughed. "Nope. Too risky."

She picked up a small shred of slowly browning meat. I found that the longer it sat, the browner the meat became. Maybe it now had time to oxidize. We were dealing with far too many science experiments for one day.

After tasting it, she spat in the garbage. "Bleh! Baking soda!"

She decided to rinse the meat after dinner.

20 JAN 1130

"It doesn't taste half bad. Did you try it, Rissa?" The stew was made, and I was hands-deep in raw hamburger meat meant for sloppy-joes. Half of it was frozen; the other half was leaking blood on the floor. How is this not a biohazard?! We aren't even allowed to fix our hair in the kitchen, and yet, this whole weekend: BLOOD!

I was skeptical of the muskrat meat. Don't get me wrong, I love eating game, and I was happy that these boys enjoyed their time catching their food; there was just something about rat that made me uneasy. That and how much I didn't trust that it had been fully cooked.

After some pressure from the other kitchen staff, I caved and tasted the strange, stringy stew. It tasted like the beef soup we had for lunch the day before. Cold, cow blood covered my hands, and the smell was not exactly delightful. The mixture of my uncomfortable senses got the better of me.

I didn't touch the stew after that.

20 JAN 1300

"Woah! The muskrat stew smells so good!"

"We did this! Isn't it awesome?"

"This is great!"

"You know, I trapped the most of them. I'm taking a pelt home."

"Just wait till mom hears about this!"

The boys were lining up at the soup bar, bowls in hand. Their eyes were shining at the idea of eating the food they caught.

When I sat down to eat the sloppy joes I had made, one boy came up to our staff table, bowl of untouched stew in hand. He was one of the five that had helped with the dishes. "I just gotta say, this is amazing-- I, I don't know how you guys do this, but you are awesome and this smells so good. I'm so overwhelmed, it is super cool and gosh it smells good!"

Tayler turned to face him. "It tastes good too, you know."

The boy nodded."Yeah, well, you know, I helped catch the muskrats and I watched them skin them, and I'm not sure..." He picked up a tiny spoonful, slowly lifting it to his mouth.

We all watched in anticipation. The other boys had eaten it. Half of the crockpot was gone by this time, so we knew that the overall consensus was in favor of the stew.

He slurped the very end of the spoon, smacking his lips and rolling his tongue as if he was eating dirt. "You know, I can't. I just can't." He set the spoon back in the bowl. "Like, good for you guys, and it smells great, and it tastes good, but I watched them gut them and skin them and... I just can't." He then turned and dumped the bowl straight into the garbage can.

Everyone stared.

I smirked. My thoughts exactly.