Little Buppa is a crazy little girl.  Recently, she was lying next to Daddy when she told him he smelled like beef jerky.  “Ummm. Yummy,” she said. “I could eat you.”  Then, she made a pretence of eating him.[ad#ad-1]

Our family ate a lot of beef jerky in the US.  My husband did not like it at first.  He thought it tasted leathery. But, he discovered that there were different brands and different flavours.  Then, it became a part of our regular diet.  It was the snack of choice for long journeys.  My favourites were any that were spicy, while the kids preferred Teriyaki.  Beef jerky was pretty expensive until we discovered the cheap alternatives at Wal-Mart and they were edible.

Yes, we miss beef jerky.  It is such a rarity here that it is expensive.  We managed to find a small kiosk at a train station that had a small pack.  That’s the extent of the availability of jerky here. 

I guess jerky is such an American thing and it has not taken hold in the UK yet.  Though BBQs certainly have.  Maybe that’s more from the Australian influence.  But, then again, I would think jerky might be something the Australians would appreciate.  Even if it wasn’t beef jerky, the Australians might have kangaroo jerky.  Americans also like deer jerky.  (My husband wouldn’t touch the stuff, but the girls and I tried some – homemade).  If the Brits ever like beef jerky, they might consider deer and even lamb jerky.  That would be a novelty.

The return of the reds

When Walker’s decided to create new flavours for its crisps, one of the popular ones was Cajun Squirrel.  I never tasted it, and I don’t know which one Walker’s will decide to eventually add to its line, but I just thought Cajun Squirrel was a silly joke.  Apparently, this is not the case.

The campaign to reintroduce and protect the red squirrel has been so successful in the north, that the man behind the campaign is moving south to do the job.  He has reported that the gray squirrels are a delicacy and have been in great demand at butcher’s and restaurants.  (I wonder if Walker’s has been putting in orders.)  In the US, we called them “road kill” (and, yes, people in the US have devised a wide selection of road kill recipes), but here, the squirrels are trapped.

It doesn’t sound very fair to the grays, and I do wonder if there’s a difference in the taste between the grays and the reds.  And what about the blacks?  They’re still quite rare over here.  I hope they don’t end up killing all the grays.  In the US, we had the full range of colours.  We even had bi-racial squirrels running around our yard – red fur covering half the way, black the rest, and various other combinations.  I hope this doesn’t become a one-squirrel country.