Turtle Soup

I know my last post dealt with some very serious subject matter, so I thought I'd post something lighthearted as my next entry.

This story happened in the summer of 1994  or 1995, just after we moved from Wyoming to Ohio so that Dad could take a new job as the Pastor of a medium-sized Charismatic church.  

We were now living in a lakefront property in a suburban community surrounded by cornfields. The house we were living in was a little small for a family with three growing kids in it, but we did have a large backyard full of mature trees and private access to the lake. Unfortunately the soil was too poor for any sort of gardening, but the fire pit at the edge of the lake and the hammock that Dad hung up for me made up for the occasional twinges in my green thumb.

One day, one of the members of our congregation came over to visit. He was a stocky, bearded man in his 60s who always had some sort of project to work on. On that day, he decided  to have some turtle soup for dinner. He also decided that we ought to join him for this meal.

We had a big cooking pot, a wooden spoon and some root vegetables. His fishing skills provided the meat. I didn't go along with him to catch the turtle, although I believe he caught it with some sort of fishing line and bait instead of using any sort of trap.

The turtle that was to become our dinner looked like the turtle in the above picture, more or less. It's shell was greenish-brown, it was healthy and full grown to the best of my recollection. It was still alive when he brought it to our backyard. Once again, I vacated the premises. I wasn't opposed to learning what turtle soup tasted like, but I had no interest in watching the living, breathing turtle in front of me transition into a pile of meat.

I do have a vague memory of our fisher-friend cleaning some stray membranes from the shell of the turtle, so I must not have wandered away for too long. And then I remember the turtle soup bubbling on the stove, almost ready to eat. 


It was a delicious meal. Turtles - or at least that particular turtle - taste sort of like the dark meat on chicken. Very tender, just a little chewy. It's something I wouldn't mind having again...but only if someone else does the slaughtering!


(The turtle picture came from this website, and the soup picture came from this one ).