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He rolls into the parking lot of Leon's Thriftway in an old, maroon Impala with a trunk full of frozen meat. Raccoon — the other dark meat.

In five minutes, Montrose, Mo., trapper Larry Brownsberger is sold out in the lot at 39th Street and Kensington Avenue. Word has gotten around about how clean his frozen raccoon carcasses are. How nicely they’re tucked up in their brown butcher paper. How they almost look like a trussed turkey … or something.

His loyal customers beam as they leave, thinking about the meal they'll soon be eating.

That is, as soon as the meat is thawed. Then brined. Soaked overnight. Parboiled for two hours. Slow-roasted or smoked or barbecued to perfection.

Raccoon, which made the first edition of The Joy of Cooking in 1931, is labor-intensive but well worth the time, aficionados say.

"Good things come to those who wait," says A. Reed, 86, who has been eating raccoon since she was a girl.

"This right here," she says, holding up a couple of brown packages tied with burlap string, “this is a great value. And really good eatin’. Best-kept secret around.”

Raccoons go for $3 to $7 — each, not per pound — and will feed about five adults. Four, if they’re really hungry.

Those who dine on raccoon meat sound the same refrain: It's good eatin'.

As long as you can get past the "ick" factor that it's a varmint, more often seen flattened on asphalt than featured on a restaurant menu. (One exception: French restaurant Le Fou Frog served raccoon about a dozen years ago, a waiter said.)

Eating varmints is even in vogue these days, at least in Britain. The New York Times reported last week that Brits are eating squirrels with wild abandon.

Here in Kansas City, you won't see many, if any, squirrel ads in the papers. But that's where Brownsberger was advertising his raccoons last week.

The meat isn’t USDA-inspected, and few state regulations apply, same as with deer and other game. No laws prevent trappers from selling raccoon carcasses.

As for diseases, raccoon rabies doesn't exist in Missouri, state conservation scientists say. It's an East Coast phenomenon. Parvo and distemper kill raccoons quickly but aren’t transferred to humans. Also, trappers are unlikely to sell meat from an animal that appears to be diseased.

"Raccoon meat is some of the healthiest meat you can eat," says Jeff Beringer, a furbearer resource biologist with the Missouri Department of Conservation.

"During grad school, my roommate and I ate 32 coons one winter. It was all free, and it was really good. If you think about being green and eating organically, raccoon meat is the ultimate organic food," with no steroids, no antibiotics, no growth hormones.

And when people eat wild meat, Beringer says, "it reminds the modernized society — people who usually eat food from a plastic wrapper — where food comes from.”

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Eating varmints is even in vogue these days, at least in Britain. The New York Times reported last week that Brits are eating squirrels with wild abandon.

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Oddly enough, I was watching an episode of Ray Mears' Extreme Survival last night where he's helping out on an aviation survival course for pilots who eject behind enemy lines. Sure enough, they showed how to trap squirrels, and the instructor said they were damn good eating!

Maybe I'll have to try it...

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Who thought Panzer cared about disease or illness?

White people eat raccoon and black people eat their own eyes. I'm not sure which is worse.

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I know of at least three families who will come pick up 'coons, or come and trap them for you. They take them home, pen them up and grain feed them for a couple weeks to fatten them up and "clean them out". Then they eat them. I never asked how they cook them.

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They do something similar with turtles. You keep them in clean water over a few days and change the water every so often. If you kill and cook (make soup) of the turtle without filtering it you get a horrible tasting meal.

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admit it, bornyo... that last part was total gypsy-bait.

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Ehhhh not really what I got out of it, but if you want to think that then go ahead.

Raccoons are dangerous, ugly and nasty rodents, they are full of rabies and destroy your garbage, garden, etc....kill em all. They can also bite you beyond recognition. They are one animal I do NOT care for.

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I never heard of doing that with catfish but it makes sense. What did you feed them, if anything?

We used to use a gutter spike and nail them thru the head to a tree in the back yard, then skin them back with linemans pliers, then clean them. It's good white meat. I expect it would be much better if you purified it.

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Now that Gypsy has weighed in, I admit I left that part about the coonhunter open to interpretation, with her in mind.

The serious coonhunters, who spend over $10,000.00 for their hounds, never shoot the coons. The dog tracks and trees them, they follow. They snap a photo or a judge records the time from release to treeing, and they reward and call off the dogs.

The racoons are so mean and ornery they'd never risk dropping one of those nasty beasts in amongst their hounds.

Edit: Jerry Clower used to say coonhunting was a most humane sport, because the coon always had the option of coming down and whipping all eight of the dogs at any time.

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Did you think I would get all up in arms about filthy raccoons? Eat what you want to eat.

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First part is Jigaloo bait.. heh

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