The Scariest Meals You Will Eat In New York: Muskrats, Beavers, And Otters

Have a hankering to devour some muskrat? What about a healthy morsel of beaver? Leave it to the Bronx, naturally. Check out how...

The New York Times got invited to an abandoned Bronx Borough Courthouse for the First Annual Bronx Pipe Smoking Society Small Game Dinner "devoted to sampling small woodland creatures."

[Confit of raccoon. Yummy!]

Justin Fornal, a man more widely known as Baron Ambrosia, threw the event in keeping with the tradition of his TV show "Bronx Flavor."

The comestibles, it seems, would do any redneck proud:

"Mr. Fornal had tasked a handful of cooks with preparing the animals, which included two beavers, two raccoons, two otters, an opossum, a fisher, a squirrel and 'God knows how many muskrats,' said the chef Michael Sherman of Cloud Catering in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, who prepared otter three ways (braised, pan-fried and roasted)."

If you're a big fan of braised rabbit, you might try your hand at the muskrat, dubbed a "marsh rabbit" by those trying to sell the dish.

[The derelict Bronx Borough Courthouse]

The Times had reported in 1992, "the muskrat is said by those who wish to make it a popular food to be a more delectable morsel than the rabbit."

If you feel the road kill fare isn't up market enough, you might want to get a little fancier:

"Diners helped themselves to Muskrat au Vin (a leg was moist and sweet) and roasted DeKalb Beaver, which was stuffed and wrapped in pigskin in a kitchen on DeKalb Avenue (perfumey, dry and a bit like pork chop."

[Images via NYTImes]