bringing home the biltong*

an addendum to my last post:

i can't decide if i feel guilty about eating my way through my quite large supply of wild game biltong, originating from those very impala and kudu i felt so unhappy to see killed. I have so say though, as I sit here eating my lunch of dried wildebeest strips, with some crusty pumpkinseed bread and butter, I'm not at this very moment feeling all that remorseful. In fact, there is a certain kind of satisfaction to grawing away at this tangy, chewy substance. I can't really explain it, but its as though I am Really Eating Meat. It's not like the packages of unidentifiable Fosters Farms frozen meat you get at Alberton's, filled with boneless skinless (flavorless) chicken breasts or hormone-injected beef steak; this stuff requires use of one's incisors and needs no condiments, not even mustard (this coming from the girl who has eight different types of mustard lined up in her refridgerator door at home). It's got texture--somehow I'm very aware that I'm eating muscle fiber, a thought which doesn't normally occur to me when I'm eating my rosemary grilled chicken breast at home--and is full of gamey flavor. My TZ friends have made it themselves--spiced the meat, hung it to dry, and given me a hefty portion with each piece still on its little silver drying hook. Like Michael Pollan, or Alice Waters, I love the simplicity of this sort of food supply chain. The meat has gone from the bush to the small butchering room on the game farm to my friends' backyard in Gaborone (with its wintery dry, dessicating air) straight to my belly. No preservatives, no overly inhumane crowded animal pens, no carbon emissions from supply trucks burning through petrol as they cross the I-80.

So...no guilt?? I'm still not totally over the jolt of the "happy pretty oblivious impala prancing and grazing" to "dead bloody impala folded over itself on the back of the truck" image transition, but maybe I just need to try a little harder. Otherwise what is the use in waxing on about the importance of "sustainable use" of wildlife and natural resources? Research dedicated to pursuing that elusive and nebulous term, "sustainable development" doesn't really mean much of anything, on either a personal or professional level, if I don't put my money where my mouth is...or perhaps more specifcally my biltong where my mouth is!


*biltong being the South African highly superior version of American beef jerky, for those of you unaquainted with the culinary delicacies of this region of the world.