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I hear that tastes like chicken...

840 Views 25 Replies 12 Participants Last post by  lonelyfarmgirl82, 
River_monster91
Hit a local hole. Brought 9 home. Left 6 or 7 at least.
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Herbhome
Oh, they're mighty tasty but nothing like chicken. :ROFLMAO:

Looks like you got the makings of a feast!:)
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D_Weezy
River_monster91 said:
Hit a local hole. Brought 9 home. Left 6 or 7 at least. View attachment 334366
View attachment 334365
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Does the size of them make a difference in the taste of the meat? Are the smaller ones tastier, or is it all about the same?
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Herbhome
Bigger older ones are tougher but the taste is about the same. Tough ones I pressure cook then make stew or sauce picante. Young ones are great fried or sauted.
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Keith Mette
The best cut is up in the shell hardest to get out. LOL
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wisgobbler997
Those are fine eating for sure RM. and quite a
haul! But lots of work to clean. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve cooked a snapper. I believe I’m about due.
Keith is spot on. The loins the underside of the shell are the best. Just gotta cut the ribs apart and pull them out.
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Jbuck
I like Snapping Turtle, like Neill we pressure cooked the meat from the old ones but then we deep fried it. I was never good at cleaning turtles but could get it done with enough time.
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Torvaldsberg
Keith Mette said:
The best cut is up in the shell hardest to get out. LOL
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It's not too bad if you have a good set of larger wire nippers to snip out the ribs. It always amazed me how easily they come apart if you know where to cut. Of course, I do carry a few 'turtle' scars from my younger years. Some from the turtles themselves, some from the old man's knife-work.

Side note, do any of you leave them in a tank for a week or so to clean out before cleaning them?

My mother used to skillet fry turtle, then put it in the crock pot to tenderize, which seems to be the opposite of what most folks do(steam first then fry). I really miss her cooking, she passed before I realized cooking was something I wanted to learn.
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Keith Mette
Good side cutters werk, easy to take apart , I lay them up side down and drive a pole barn spike thru um on a stump. LOL
My mom sure could cook them!! Yum yum I almost got kicked out of grade school for trading turtle for pie n suck with the rich kids.
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DerbyCat
Fried turtle is awesome, but in my general area turtle soup is a huge thing. Basically a variation of vegetable soup with turtle meat. It's a big enough deal that several local organizations have an annual "mock" turtle soup sale where they substitute the turtle with chicken since sale of wildlife is illegal. Mock turtle soup is good, real turtle soup is awesome.
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River_monster91
The bigger ones we debone and fry. All tastes the same to me.
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River_monster91
Easy to clean with a sharp knife! No other tools needed. Cut head off, cut feet off, cut around shell, seperate shell, cut your meat out.
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bowhunter63
Mean critters
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Herbhome
I always used a sharp hatchet on the lower shell and sharp knife for everything else. Quite a bit of work for not very much meat, but as others have said well worth it.
Take a stick and tease it's head till it takes a bite and locks down, then pull back and use that hatchet on the head and it'll bleed out pretty fast.
I used to catch 'em in the ditches when I was a kid by jumping in the water behind them and grab the tail. He can reach any part of his shell to bite you but the end of the tail is a safe zone. We caught quite a few in crab and crawfish nets also.
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River_monster91
Yessir, we stick there head with a pitchfork amd yank it out and knife em off...i tried holding one like an alligator snapper, hand under the shell above the head, he didnt bite me but did smash the heck outa my finger with his beak. Felt like a hammer it it....i dont do that anymore lol.
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Torvaldsberg
Just remember when carrying them, they can't bend their necks downward. As long as the bottom is facing you, you should be safe. Anywhere in front or above is in the danger zone.

As far as the heads, we always use a set of large pliers. Thump them right on the nose, then pull their head back and open their mouth wide. Grab the lower jaw with the pliers, put a boot on the back of the shell and stretch that neck out. A hatchet works good. You can remove the head with a knife if it is sharp and you cut in the right spot. They have an oddly hard piece of cartilage on the underside of the neck that can really mess with a knife. We also usually cut the joints in the jaw after removing the head. That way it nothing got bit accidentally. We used to clean ours out by the hog lot and throw the scraps to the pigs. Forgot to cut the jaws once...heard a scream, looked up, and saw a large boar running across the lot with a turtle head latched to his snout. That got interesting, lol.
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Jbuck
Torvaldsberg said:
Side note, do any of you leave them in a tank for a week or so to clean out before cleaning them?
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We did, an old claw foot bathtub that was originally hauled home as a calf watering trough was used as a turtle cleanout containment.
We used to catch them through a thin (1/64th) covering of ice, if we got clear ice they would get right up to where the bank and water met under the ice on a sunny day. Being cold blooded all we had to do was stomp on the ice to bust it and the turtle was so cold we had plenty of time before they could get away. Always packed them out by the tail, even as a teen holding a big old snapper out far enough to keep from getting snapped was a strain.
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River_monster91
Find em once in a while duck hunting the lake. Ww clean em out somtimes, sometimes we dont. All taste the same to me.
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Herbhome
In south Louisiana all the wild water is pretty nasty so we placed them in bathtub full of water with a box of salt mixed in. Same thing with crawfish and crabs. Grandma called it purging.
Here in the Ozarks we'd place 'em in a rabbit cage and set it about half sunk in a spring branch for a few days. That pretty well cleans 'em out.
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Herbhome
I had to chuckle when I read the thread title. I've always heard that bullfrog legs taste like chicken. They are delicious but if I bit into a chicken breast and it tasted like frog legs I'd spit it out. :ROFLMAO:
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