Anyone here eat Frog Legs?

[KingCam]

It's weird that this subject keeps coming up. I've discussed this same topic with two other forum members in two seperate conversations in the past few weeks.

I eat bullfrog. Not just the legs, a good sized bullfrog has meat on the back, shoulders, and forearms. Sure, those parts aren't as easy to eat as the back legs, but I don't like to waste animals that I harvest. I hunt bullfrog with a permit during the designated frog season in Missouri.

I've had them, but I wasn't impressed with the flavor.

Store or resurant bought frog legs are usually horrible. I've literally never enjoyed frog legs that weren't wild game. The farm raised bullfrogs are fed high-fit diets and grown as quickly as possible. When you cook them big globs of fat seep out, that is NOT supposed to happen with frog meat. In nature frogs are very very lean. The best way to cook them in my opinion is to baste them with BBQ sauce and throw them on the grill. Second best is to sautee them in butter with lemon pepper & garlic powder. Third best (and least healthy) is to beer batter them (add seafood seasoning to the beer batter) and deep fry.

I've never had them. I detest the stories of how they cut the legs off the frog while its still alive and throw the torso back in the water where it of course suffers greatly before it dies. Doesn't mean ill never try them, but I highly disapproove of how they obtain them.

I agree with being repulsed by how the commercial food industry treats animals, as well. Not only are they torturing the animals, they just throw away the meat that's not as easy to get to as the back legs. Lazy, cruel, and evil practices in my opinion. I recomend harvesting your own frogs (if you ever had a desire to try frog meat), that way you can make sure everything is done according to your standards. I collect my bullfrogs by hand and put them into a big pillowcase or some other clotch sack. They arrive home alive and in good health. I inspect each frog to make sure it looks normal and free of disease. I won't go into detail on how they are killed, but I can tell you it's as quick as possible. After, and only after they are dead, do I proceed to skin and gut them. Let the legs chill in salt water OR milk in the fridge over night to draw out any blood and strange flavors. The container must be covered! Frogs legs will literally jump out of the bowl (nerves fire and muscles contract as soon as they're exposed to salt water).

Never had them, and never will, considering how they're collected. Apporximately 95% of the world demand for frog legs is from wild stock. Worldwide, from 1987 to 1997, an average of 4716 metric tons of frogs were collected annually (but neither China or Vietnam are included, two big frog (leg) export countries). Between 1998 and 2002, 5.2 million kg and almost 15 million individuals were collected imported to the US, where everything was declared as wild caught (and used for frog legs).

Yeah, I dunno about all that, I just know in Missouri when bullfrogs take over a pond not much else survives. This is why I don't feel at all bad for harvesting a few mature adults for a nice lean meal. I eat wild game as often as possible because I hate the commerical meat industry, but I also have no interest in going vegetarian. Anyone who wants to eat meat but doesn't feel right about how that meat made it to their table should start hunting. You get a real respect for nature and it's bounty when you rely on it for most of your meat. Plus you harvest an animal that lived a natural healthy lifestyle, not some overly fattened animal that's been raised in a box too small to turn around in, stewing in their own filth and disease all day every day.

I had them on rare occasion when I was little; but not since then, and wouldn't anymore. When you keep something, it sort of turns you off of eating that species forever. At the same time, however, I try not to judge those who do. As someone who eats (other kinds of) meat, I understand that some animal somewhere had to be slaughtered to sustain my dietary choice every single time. And that animal is no more or less deserving of life than a frog.

Thanks for not judging :P