Road Kill Meals

Ok this subject wont be to everyone’s liking but I’m very proud of the fact that I can provide minya (meat) for myself and others from animals that have had the misfortune to be hit by our vehicles on our ever increasing road networks. I find it very satisfying to use the useless death of these animals to sustain my life and the bonus is I don’t need to actually kill as much by doing so.
So the first little critter that I came across was a kulngu (bandicoot) He was fresh and didn’t seem to badly smashed up considering his small size so I picked him up and took him home where I skun and butchered him, I was a bit concerned the smell would go through the minya because I have had experience raising orphaned bandicoot at home in Tasmania a different species but they have a very strong smell and being a male I thought it would be worse but after butchering and washing it didn’t seem to bad so into the freezer he went.

With all road kill if I have to opportunity I will freeze them to kill any worms ect and mostly cook them very well in some sort of alcohol.
The next animal I came across was a guineafowl I couldn’t believe my luck the morning before I was just saying to my yaba (brother) Mick- jezz I could go a bird and I was thinking about getting one from a bama (aboriginal) run farm I know where their animals run free, so see sometimes you get what you wish for n the funny thing is this happened again which I will explain later on.
So there I was driving along and there just to the side of the road near a driveway maybe the owner of the bird was a dead guineafowl, I couldn’t stop at first because as per usual there were cars up my bum everyone’s in a hurry it seems to get to the end of their lives anyway I kept going until I could turn I pulled up beside the bird opened the door and with out getting out of the car I gave it a poke to check for freshness and because there were more cars coming I made a split decision to toss it into the car and check it further down the road where it wasn’t so busy, ants went every which way they didn’t seem happy with me stealing their meal…. After checking the bird further I decided it was fine so home to pluck, butcher n freeze. I kept some of its feathers as they were so beautiful and I was sure that yaba micks gran Romeo will love them.

A week later there I was sitting at the breakie table talking about how much I would love some biki-biki (pig), and what happen next you wont believe if someone else told me this I wouldn’t believe them hay, there I was driving along the same section of road I found the guineafowl on and something caught my eye hanging in the tree…. yes in the tree I’m always when safe to looking up at the tree tops to see if there is any mayi (food) on them and I swear I seen a little suckling biki-biki hanging in the tree it took a few seconds for this bizarre reality to kick in so I kept driving thinking how the hell did a biki-biki get in a tree and was I loosing my mind, so I couldn’t help myself I turned around and drove back and yes there it was a small brown boy biki-biki hanging neatly on a piece of wire bleed and all in the tree, I couldn’t believe it now this was freaking me out a bit but I lifted him down and put him in the back of my wagon to go find advise on checking him for disease ect.
I got into town and asked a couple of friends and was confident I could check him and be pretty sure of being safe so again home I took the little biki-biki where I cut him open and checked all the organs and on seeing that they were clean I butchered him I only got a back leg and some back strap because he had been mangled pretty badly but I wasn’t complaining free biki-biki and the experience of checking and butchering my first wild pig.
When yaba mick got back home I asked him what he thought of the biki-biki in the tree incident and once he believed me and thought about it he said- he recon it was one of them boys from the station coz they bin bought up by them old ones to not waste nutin n if they hit it they would bleed it n hung him up in that tree there now for someone to eat him. Well that made sense to me and I was the lucky one to find him.
I don’t have picture of any of the meals sorry, when I’m on my own I don’t mind having cold meals from taking picture of them before I eat but when feeding someone else I just didn’t do it, later I thought I could have taken shots before dinner time and put back in the pot but I didn’t I have to really be in the mood to do that, maybe next time I will make more of an effort, but I do wish I had taken a picture of the biki-biki hanging in the tree, funny as, a biki-biki tree who’d have thought haha…… it cracked me up good and it also seemed to crack up my friends but I wasn’t sure if the biki-biki being in the tree was what was cracking them up or the fact that I took it was
With the kulngu and guineafowl I made slow cooked stews with port which worked out fantastic, I really liked the kulngu but yaba mick was not so sure, it is one of those minya that need really strong flavors to cover up it’s natural taste a bit, you know that taste that taste that tastes like it smells taste but I would defiantly eat it again.

We both loved the guineafowl it was so good but I don’t recon I will come across many of them gems I think that was a fluke for sure, it must have been the farmers across the road and it was crossing the road when it got hit but if I ever had a farm again I would have some of them for sure, I wouldn’t want to pay for one in a shop I recon they would be expensive.
With the biki-biki I marinated this in port and spices for two days in the fridge then I cooked it on really high in the oven in the liquid for a hour or so and then I stewed it for a couple hour in the pot with veggies and the last two jars of my apricot and chilly sauce from Tassie it was amazing and yaba really liked this one but before we ate the biki-biki we had a very special entree, I unexpectedly ended up with a kiju (mud crab) yes that’s right a muddy! I haven’t had mud crab for about 18 years, it used to be my favorite sea food and I was so exited, I cooked it up in salt water nothing added and I couldn’t believe it yaba mick doesn’t love kiju so he only wanted one claw and I got the rest, lucky, lucky me it would have to have been the most deliciously pleasurable feeds I have eaten in memory I enjoyed it immensely and yaba mick kept sayin- you ok there or what, you not talking is everything ok wid you, talk to me are you liking that one……. I think it was the quietest he has ever seen me

This is a long blog with no pictures of the actual food or process unfortunately but I added a nice cover photo of the foraged flowers I used in the salads we had with the meals, pictured are red flowers of a hybiscus sp., yellow cottonwood (Hibiscus tiliaceus) flowers and snake weed (Stachytarpheta jamaicensis) flowers which taste strongly of mushrooms and In the blog I show pictures of the Guineafowls gorgeous feathers and a shot of the gift yaba mick bought me home the other day,it is a Rhinoceros Bettle- Xylotrupes gideon isn’t he absolutely stunning, n no I didn’t eat him, not saying I wouldn’t try one n yes he is dead, I’m going to spray him with a varnish and keep him in my van his name is Rex.

Well I hope you enjoy my blog and I hope it wets your appetite for utilizing the useless loss of life on the roads around you, if you eat minya that is, you can also use the skins if not damaged and yes there is probably some law against it all but some rules are just so stupid you cant abide by them, well I cant anyway, we are in a sad sad state of affairs if it is illegal to feed yourself from the death caused from our actions unintended or not ,there would be less need to farm and kill if we all utilized this resource.

Note: all language words used are KuKu Yalanji