In Defense of Wild Boar — It's Actually Delicious

Last time, I wrote that a life taken in a trap becomes wonderfully good meat — if you butcher it properly. Today, let me talk a little more about that word: delicious. This is a story about wild boar meat.

To be honest, for the longest time, I didn't think wild boar was delicious at all.

My grandfather's boar

When I was small, my grandfather was a hunter. So I had plenty of chances to eat wild boar.

But if I'm honest — it just felt like "meat." Nothing special. That was the impression that stuck in my child's mind.

What I believed for years

Even as an adult, I'd eat boar now and then. And there was always something — a faint off-smell.

"Ah, so this is that distinctive wild-boar odor," I'd tell myself, and I went on believing it for years. Boar, I assumed, was simply like that.

And then — my word

But then.

The day I ate boar that had been properly bled and carefully butchered, I was, frankly, lost for words. My word. That smell was completely gone. More than that — it was rich, fine meat, like high-quality beef.

What on earth, I wondered, had that thing I'd always called "the boar smell" actually been?

The smell wasn't the meat's fault

That's when it hit me. It isn't the boar that smells. Whether it turns out gamey or not is decided by how it's handled after the catch.

Bleeding and butchering — do this one step with care, and boar is this good. Which means that "distinctive odor" was never the meat's fault at all.

…And here, at the risk of objections, I'll say it: botan-nabe, the miso hotpot made with wild boar — is that perhaps just using the power of miso to mask the smell? (Botan-nabe fans, I'm sorry. It's purely my own wild speculation.)

Because we catch them alive

Here's the thing. In our hunting team, "HUNTER BASE ZERO," we catch every animal alive.

Both the box traps and the snare traps I've written about before capture the animal while it's still living. And precisely because we take them alive, we can bleed them thoroughly, right there on the spot — and then butcher with care.

Because of this process, I'll just come out and say it: not one boar we've handled has ever been anything less than delicious. "Gamey," "off-putting" — being caught alive and handled with care solves all of it, completely.

For the dignity of the wild boar

So, for the honor of the wild boar, I want to say it clearly:

Boar, you are delicious.

That reputation — "smelly," "gamey" — is not your fault. Faced properly and handled with care, you become a fine feast. I know it now, on my own tongue.

Please, give it a try

If you're someone who finds wild boar "a bit much" — then perhaps you simply haven't yet met a properly handled boar.

If you get the chance, do try meat from a boar that's been correctly bled and butchered. I think you'll be as surprised as I was.

A life taken to protect our fields, received without waste, in its most delicious form — that, I believe, is the greatest respect we can pay to that life.

As the Keeper of Zero, I'll keep facing the lives we receive, head-on.

ZEROSPHERE / The Keeper of Zero