Animal-vehicle collisions have long been a problem in western states, leaving big game carcasses discarded along – or as an additional hazard, in the middle of – roadways. In April, it became legal in Montana to salvage and eat deer, elk, antelope and moose that have been hit and killed by cars.

Unfortunately, similar legislation, House Bill 144, died in the Wyoming Legislature this year, and currently, anyone who picks up road-killed game without a game warden permit runs the risk of being charged with poaching. 

Photo: LostinFog

Apparently “hunting by vehicle” is at least part of the worry - that people could track a bison and wait until it gets on the road, get in their truck and try to run it over. but honestly, unless you’re a complete fool, it’s not worth the damage to your vehicle — State Farm estimates the average cost of collision with a deer is just over $3,300, making it a fools folly to seriously consider hunting with your vehichle. 

Bill co-sponsor Representative Dan Zwonitzer says that failure of the house bill means more work for state agencies, which manage the road kill.

“Currently, it’s a two-part process. If the animal is on the roadway, it’s WYDOT’s responsibility to get it off the roadway… After that, it becomes the Game and Fish’s responsibility to collect the carcass, dispose of the carcass, or, in some cases, they leave it to disintegrate along the side of the road.”

It's my strong opinion that this needs to change. 

Ethically speaking, we should all be eating roadkill, but practical, culinary and legal considerations make it hard for many to imagine cooking meat that is the result of vehicular accidents, but that needn’t be the case. If the roadkill is fresh, perhaps hit on a cold day and ideally a large animal, it is generally as safe as any game. Additionally, not eating roadkill is intensely wasteful: last year, State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company estimated that some 1,232,000 deer were hit by cars in the United States. Now imagine that only a third of that meat could be salvaged. That’d be about 20 million pounds of free-range venison. I couldn't find any numbers on elk, antelope or other large game species, but I think it is safe to say that in western states these animals would add considerably to this total. 

Having personally hit a deer on an interstate in a snow storm several years ago, I have always regretted not being allowed to harvest the result of the accident. I stopped my vehicle, which incurred damage to both doors on the drivers side. The deer having been hit primarily in the head, was otherwise in pristine condition. Ultimately, I dragged the deer off the road, and sadly, left it to be buried by the next passing snowplow.

As some of my readers know, last year I made the leap from serious home cook back into the world of professional cooking - as an instructor and as the owner and chef of Sabor Del Sol a modest street food and catering company that operates here in Laramie, Wyoming - primarily at the Laramie Local Community Market, a farmers market here in town that I helped organize this last year. 

Sabor Del Sol specializes in Paella, though I maintain a much wider menu, Paella has become our most sought after offering. We cook out paella almost exclusively on site in one or more of our enormous paella pans. The farmers market is our primary market, however we do offer catering for a few special events each year generally for groups of 100 or more. 

This last week we cooked up a great new recipe for a Fire Roasted Green Chile and Chicken Paella Topped with Crumbled Goats Cheese. I decided to set up a camera and shoot a video documenting the cooking process for the Rogue Gourmet since up to this point I haven't actually even mentioned that I have started cooking again professionally. 

So without further delay, here is the video. I hope you enjoy it!

Professionally I am a designer. Recently I have been working on a new project to bring my interest in food to bear on my professional life; so I have been keeping my eyes open for great food related websites, mobile applications and designs. This morning I ran into this fantastic visual guide to grilling on the Visual News Blog: 

"We’ve all been there before: You cut into your seemingly medium-cooked, char-broiled burger only to find it’s still a little too pink inside. What gives? Many things can affect how long it takes to properly grill perfectly moist and tender meats, seafood, and vegetables. Take the guesswork out of grilling with this guide to average cook times. The guide provides average times for a wide variety of beef, poultry, pork, and vegetable items you might plan on throwing on the grill this summer—all you’ll need is a watch and a meat thermometer."

Click here for the full size guide (big enough to print!). Visual News is a great resource and honestly is loaded full of wonderful eye candy for those of you who are visually inclined. Also worth checking out is their Visual Guide to Seasonal Produce.

Original Post via: Visual News

As some of you know for the last year and a half I have been changing the way I eat. I have been trying to get away from eating as many grains and legumes, sugars, dairy products and processed foods as I can. Instead I have been focusing on eating whole foods; vegetables, nuts and seeds, wild caught fish, and naturally raised animals, like local grass fed beef, or when I am lucky wild game harvested locally here in Wyoming. 

I have placed a great deal of emphasis on finding the best ingredients that I can find, organic over conventionally produced products, local whenever possible, and always the freshest and most flavorsome products I can find. 

I do give myself a day a week for indulgences like beer, cheese, a great loaf of crusty bread or a desert, but the rest of the week I have given up entirely eating the vast majority of the foods in the categories I listed above. Note: If you are interested in why I have decided to make these changes in my diet check out this article. 

If I tell you the truth, one of the things that I miss most on my diet is a good sandwich. I should also note that I am not usually one to search out alternatives. I lived once in a vegetarian household and was always bewildered by my veggie roommates quest for meat "substitutes"; Soy Sausage, Tofurkey, fake bacon, bean burgers, gluten based faux chicken. I wasn't and am still not a fan of any of these products, and I when I started my own eating project I made a concerted effort to change the way I eat, not try to fool myself into believing that I was still eating this or that now forbidden food item. Instead I let myself have the occasional indulgence on Saturdays, or when I eat at a friends house. 

So, all that said, I did find myself searching for a good sandwich - without bread.

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"The wonderful world of DOUGH Donuts in Brooklyn, New York... Your eyes will glaze over with the amount of colorful sugar you're about to see."

DOUGH Donuts: A Far Cry From The Old Fashioned from SkeeterNYC on Vimeo.

I recognize that this video is effectively and advert for Knorr, but the advertising is discrete. Marco Pierre White is one of my favorite chefs, and these steaks look delicious. I couldn't resist posting this video, and I might not be able to resist actually making this for dinner tonight. Enjoy.