Douglas Hirt's Ratskinner's
Stew
No rats were harmed in the making of
this recipe!
Doug says this about Ratskinner's Stew: "This recipe is extremely simple to make, out of necessity. But first a little history. Way back in the late 1970s, when I was working on my Masters degree in
biology, I was employed by a natural history museum, and we did contract work
for the Department of Energy. We did the first biological baseline studies for
what is called WIPP -- Waste Isolation Pilot Project. The location was a few
thousand arid acres of southern New Mexico desert real estate near Carlsbad,
New Mexico. Kathy and I were dating part of this time, and married the other
part of it.
"Our job was to collect critters. Some were simply tagged and released,
to study home range. Others were collected to be added to the museum's
collection so that if, say 50 years down the road, grasshopper mice started
developing three ears (presumable because of the nuclear waste buried at
WIPP) scientists would have original, uncontaminated specimens to compare them
to--just to make sure three ears were not the normal configuration. The short of this
story is, when we weren't camped out in tents, in sweltering heat, in the
middle of nowhere, we were back in the laboratory skinning rats. Now you know
where the name comes from--and why I am not a professional biologist these days.
"One of our favorite meals in the field, because it was tasty and easy, and
could be prepared at a moment's notice--generally in-between the dust devils
that would roar with railroad regularity through our camp, demolishing tents
and johns and scattering equipment hither and yon--was Ratskinner's Stew."
Okay, so now that I have you salivating, here is the famous recipe. PLEASE
NOTE! No actual rats are harmed in this procedure!"
It is very easy, or we wouldn't have loved it so:
1 can of chili with meat and beans (Cheap and greasy is preferable)
1 can corn with chili peppers (spicier is better)
1 can of tamales (the product I use is wrapped in high-quality greasy paper,
and is not made of genuine corn husks. After all, were not preparing Broadmoor cuisine here.)
Mix all ingredients together in a large pot and put the pot over an open fire
or a Coleman stove (regular kitchen stove works in a pinch.) Heat until
bubbling and immediately serve in tin enameled bowls. Make sure every member
of your group gets at least one tamale. Two is better. You can sometimes
arrange this by tricking a couple members of the group to go out and check a
trap line, or run a lagomorph census just before you begin cooking.
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