Doctors in Kentucky have issued a warning that people should not eat squirrel brains, a regional delicacy, because squirrels may carry a variant of mad cow disease that can be transmitted to humans and is fatal.
via www.nytimes.com
This is why I like the New York Times. You'll go through all manner of assumptions as you read this article, all of which the NYT reporter Sandra Blakeslee will denounce in turn. So don't go thinking that the people eating squirrel brains are 1) stupid, 2) poor, 3) desperate, or 4) indiscriminating in their palates.
The folks over at Weird Meat have eaten their share of pig brains, but not the grey matter of a squirrel. It just goes to show you that you don't have to travel to distant lands for a taste of the exotic.
Eating squirrel--let alone its brains--is not something I could do, however, unless I were poor or desperate. It's taboo for me. If I'd grown up in rural Kentucky, I might feel differently.
(Thanks to Sara Gregory, via Twitter, for the link to the article.)
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