#intestines food

[bonefall]

i’m curious- can you explain, from prepping to actual processing and cooking and such, how the clans make sausage? is it really that easy?

SAUSAGES!!!

It's SO easy. The WHOLE process from prep to cooking is essentially 5 steps. Sausage is so old that it predates the historic record. The earliest record of it is from 4,000 BC-- but it's SO simple to make that it's almost a guarantee that any carnivorous society would learn how to make their own.

You don't even need fire. Most types of sausage are made by cooking the meat with heat or smoke, but you can get SALAMI through passive fermentation and air drying. Pepperoni is also in that same category of "dry sausage"! It was an invention of Italian American immigrants modifying sopressatta back in the 1920s.

Sausage is how you can use every last little scrap of meat on an animal, AND preserve it while you're at it. There's a ton of different types of sausages, but what binds them, literally, is that they're meat stuffed in digestive tract. ALL types of meat. The filling can be offal, muscle, or even blood, packed in with varying types of preservatives and spices.

(though in modern sausage production they use don't use natural cases as often, because it's more expensive than artificial collagen casing. that's actually how you can tell right away if you're at a quality pizza place or not-- if your pepperoni "cups" up after it's cooked, it's made with the real stuff. That's caused by the natural casing shrinking because of the heat.)

the TL;DR of making sausage is collect, scrape, soak, stuff, dry. Five simple steps. I am going to create an incredibly detailed walkthrough of it, every little tiny thing, from harvest to mealtime.

Minimum tools needed: a flat rock and a dark place, such as a cave.

Recommended tools: A flat rock, a bird bone with a stick, a cold underground den, fire.

It usually begins when an animal is brought back to camp, though it could even be started right in the field where prey is caught.;

CONTENT WARNING

This post contains discussions of evisceration and unsanitary topics in the context of natural butchery.

We're going to talk about disembowelment and processing animal organs into food. This includes how to open a carcass, and washing out the things that intestines usually contain. There is also an image of sausage casings at various stages of processing, including when it's still raw (but clean) intestine.

I was taught how to clean a deer carcass when I was only a teenager and I've never been squeamish, but everyone's tolerance for this sort of thing is different. It's okay if this isn't something you can handle; just know that the process of sausage making is easy, yet still a work of skill.

Appreciate the effort that goes into making your food! Just remember; there's a reason why they warn you about "finding out how the sausage is made!"

Step 1: Collecting the offal

You might think that because the prey that Clan cats hunt are so small, there would be some animals they can't make sausage from because of it. That's not the case! Bowels are naturally stretchy and will expand when stuffed; even a mouse can make for snack-sized sausages that a cat would enjoy.

(Remember; an entire mouse is approximately 1 meal for a single warrior.)

Removing the intestines is easy to do, requires no fire, and is necessary for avoiding parasites. Even a canon-compliant Clan can, and should, do this as part of their food processing. Canon treats claws like they're small knives and I do too because it's cool as hell, but if your Clan is more tool advanced, you could even allow them to use knives.

That gruesome phrase, "there's more than one way to skin a cat" is EXTREMELY accurate for ALL types of skinning. EVERY hunter and butcher you will meet will have their own method. Here's ONE way to do it, for right after the carcass has been bled dry and skinned;

It is helpful to hang the carcass by the legs, but not required. Especially for a large animal like a hare, this will make gravity your friend in getting the organs out. Clan cats have access to plenty of twine for this; brambles, willowbark, flax, etc.

Cut a "circle" around the anus first, under the tail. You want to keep the whole tract in one piece. If the intestines rupture, it might contaminate the rest of the ENTIRE carcass. This part you cut now will be the back end of the "tube" you're going to pull out.

From the bottom of the "circle," slit carefully down the belly until you hit the bone in the middle of the ribcage. This is tricky. If you go too deep, you'll cut the guts and spill waste everywhere. Don't go deep enough and you won't even get through the membrane. A good mentor would guide their apprentice's paw at this point, showing them how to carefully hook one layer deeper each time and how to angle the claw so they don't cut deeper than they mean to. (NOTE: the sternum is a lot shorter in most four-legged animals than it is in a human. The warrior's cut will be much further down the "chest" of the prey than you think.)

Now, the guts need to be cut from the back of the cavity. This is MESSY, but not tricky. This is the part where an impatient warrior would mess up, start yanking, and puncture the gut. If the animal is hanging, this is MUCH easier as the anus is still "anchored" to the pelvis like a big noodle.

Lastly, reach down and pull the throat up, then and take the whole tract out in one piece! In a very "large" animal like a muntjac or a hare, a more advanced Clan might tie off the colon with string before pulling it out, to avoid making a mess.

That's it! You now have the entire GI tract of an animal, including esophagus, stomach, large intestine, small intestine, and all the extra species-specific organs (like tripe or gizzards) they contain. An experienced butcher can do this whole process in less than a minute on a smaller animal-- and the small intestine of a mouse alone is over a foot long for making into sausages!

(In Clanmew, this "tract" is called a gwussip. It basically means "pile of slightly processed food." It's also used to refer to the dough used to make tunnelbuns in WindClan, and the minced meat that will be used to stuff the sausages later.)

Various types of sausage are made from the stomach down. Haggis is one type of sausage, for example, traditionally made of a sheep's stomach. The esophagus doesn't have the same "stretchiness" that the intestines are known for, and is more often made into a mince and sauteed if it isn't just wasted by being tossed.

BB!ThunderClan in particular likes to let it slow cook in fat and fruit sauce until it's more tender, but still delightfully chewy. It's not enough to fill a warrior up, but it makes a good snack for in between mealtimes. If you're familiar with Mexican cuisine, pig esophagus is prepared as "buche."

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

But, digressing,

Now that you have your intestines, it needs to be turned into casing.

Step 2: Scrape the inner membrane

Intestines are full of fecal matter. We all know this. Especially if you collected it correctly, it's going to be full of unwanted liquid when you first pull it out. Thankfully, it's just a tube and it can be washed.

These organs are made to contain everything icky inside of the gut, protecting the rest of body with its specialized buffer layers; the meat itself is perfectly fine.

The first thing a warrior needs to do is run it through a clean stream of running water, just like rinsing out a reusable straw. They'd be taking care to rub every fold clean, like a raccoon washing stockings in a river. Depending on the species the organ comes from, the culture of the Clan, and the condition of the animal before it was killed, some intestines might smell worse and need to be washed for longer than others.

BB!ShadowClan is different from other Clans in that they will flush it with a mix of vinegar and water to clean intestines. Especially since so much of their territory is stillwater, they're extra concerned with making sure their offal is cleaned. Other Clans find vinegar repulsive. ShadowClan finds other Clans dirty. Other Clans point out that they're the ones that eat literally anything. ShadowClan says they'd be able to stop wasting food if they spent less time whining and more time food processing. Cultural friction ensues.

After it's flushed, the cleaned intestine is turned inside-out. Just like a sock. From there, the inner layer of membrane is scraped off.

A long, flat rock is the best tool for this, or a good bone scraper. I've also heard of people doing this with a knife, so the rock is actually still technically optional for even the most thumbless Clans... but the cats can weave ropes out of grass canonically. They can use a rock.

(meanwhile in the background the bb!cats are playing instruments around a fire, absolutely ignoring canon's inconsistent tech level)

This is what it looks line at each stage of this process. Totally raw intestine looks like the image on the left. When turned inside-out, it resembles the middle. After scraping, it looks like the right.

Now there's just one more step before you officially have casing.

Step 3: Soaking in salt solution.

This is actually the hardest part for a Clan trying to be ecologically accurate. Salt is very rare in most forest environments. If your Clans are set up in a place with a natural salt source (near a beach, or near a geological deposit), you'll have no problems!

But... most Clans would, logically, not be so lucky and need to get creative.

The first option is stealing salt from farmers and hunters. Salt licks are usually left out in large, white blocks for sheep in fields, and deer in the woods. However, BB!Clan cats, except SkyClan, strongly avoid interacting with humans. That includes not approaching the salt licks left out for deer and livestock.

So, traditionally in the Forest Territory, they used the second option: Slowly burning the roots of coltsfoot. Dandelion also works, but will give you much less salt. In the Lake Territory, cats are sent on regular "Salt Patrols" to the ocean, bringing back bags of ocean salt from evaporated water for medicinal and culinary use.

Once that's done, simply toss the intestines in salt water for a few hours. That's it. You now have casing.

Step 4: Stuff the casing with mince.

Mince is just finely shredded meat, mixed with any spices your little kitty heart desires. Humans use a lot of herbal spices such as fennel, but as obligate carnivores, warriors prefer mushrooms which have compounds resembling the taste of meat.

The real secret to stuffing, though, is to make sure EVERYTHING is chilly before you do it. Cold mince is less sticky, keeps its shape better when being handled, and the fat is distributed more evenly in the mix. Sausages made during winter come out better than ones made during summer, for that reason.

Don't overstuff and try to keep it even. You can do it by paw, but it would be MUCH easier with a simple gadget. The earliest sausage stuffing tools we know of were as simple as a funnel and a plunger like this antique;

But since Clan cats are stuffing little animals, they can work with much smaller natural materials. The bones of birds are naturally hollow-- just clean one out, get a stick to push the meat through, and you're making tiny sausages.

And the last, but most important part,

Step 5: Dry it by way of heat and smoke (sausage) or fermentation and air drying (salami).

What you have in your paws before you start this process is, essentially, a little bag of raw meat. Most food preservation can be understood as the simple act of drying. Salt, fire, smoking, wind exposure-- those are all just fancy ways of removing moisture from food.

So generally, the more moisture the technique removes, the longer it will last.

"Fresh" sausages, your bratwurst, cheap hot dogs, bangers, the ones that are JUST made of mince and casing and you're not planning on doing anything else, those get cooked and eaten immediately. These types are actually pretty "recent" historically speaking, because it was a luxury to not be making sausages to store and transport meat.

So to make it last, they will usually be "cured." That means that the mince was mixed with salt before stuffing. Simple as that. Smoked cured sausage is self explanatory once you know what the terms mean-- it's been cured with salt, and then put in a smokehouse to dry.

(side note: curing is also required for smoking, else the conditions inside the sausage become the perfect breeding ground for botulism)

But the thing you're really waiting to hear about is "dry sausage." NO refrigeration required, NO fire needed at any point in the process. Salami specifically is cured, fermented in a dark and humid place, and then air-dried. This process takes only a few days if it's hot, and up to a week if it's cold. There are often starter cultures and sugars (fruits) added to the mince which reduces the "failure" rate, but this can work completely on its own.

Its taste will also vary depending on the cultures of bacteria doing the fermenting-- but that's unironically the kind of thing beyond the scope of this. That's culinary science.

This is where a dedicated "den" for hanging fermenting sausage would be handy. You can make do with a cave, but being able to completely control the environment can be the difference between having food in two days, versus having food in a week. You can even store it while it's fermenting for months if you can control the environment perfectly.

The last step is simply to take it out when it's at the absolutely perfect conditions and stop fermentation. If it ferments ALL the way, it will taste so sour it's inedible.

And that's it.

It's that simple. You hung it up in a cave for a while, and now you have shelf-stable meat that doesn't need to be refrigerated.

The catch; this works best in hotter, sunnier, southern environments, where the post-fermentation process is finished off with air drying. Drying is VERY GOOD because it totally removes the moisture. BB!Clans, in Northwestern England, prefer to finish this off with smoking unless they're doing it in summer and the weather cooperates.

Air drying is better because it typically removes more moisture and makes the sausage hard. Finishing fermentation with smoking causes it to be "semi-dry."

This far north, the days are cloudier, darker, and colder than it is further south, where the most famous dry sausages are made. It's not impossible to make fully dried sausage here, but it's a LOT more precise of an art.

If your Clans are based in the USA, don't worry about that. Dry fermentation is possible everywhere there except Alaska. Even if they're at the very tippy-top north of the continguous 48 states, they are barely higher in latitude than Paris, France. To put what BB's environment is in context, remember that you could walk a straight line across the globe from Liverpool, UK and be somewhere near Edmonton, Canada.

(in fact, dry fermentation can be done easily anywhere it isn't too dry or too cold. RIP Southern Chilean fanclans you will simply have to smoke it just like the Brits.)

And that's sausage. That is an in-depth guide to how salami can be made by Clan cats.

[oneshortdamnfuse]

Students with food intolerances deserve a safe, free lunch too. Failing to provide that because you think it’s unnecessary is just ableism. “Eating this food causes them pain because their body can’t digest it, but it’s not life threatening so we don’t need to accommodate it” is such a bad take. Yes, let’s just make them sick every day instead of giving them the option of safe, free foods to eat. So poor kids will have to choose every day if they’re going to starve themselves or if they’re going to be in excruciating pain the rest of the day when they’re trying to learn. Makes no sense.

Furthermore, I don’t think people realize what food intolerances entail. It’s not just, “oh, eating this food gives me a stomach ache.” It is often caused by the body’s inability to break down the sugars in the food because the pancreas and/or the small intestine doesn’t make enough digestive enzymes. People with food intolerances can have a number of disabling conditions, especially because of malnutrition and malabsorption. I am dependent on digestive enzyme supplements, as well as vitamins because I can’t eat and/or get the nutrition I need to thrive without them. This is disabling. Yes, even if it’s not going to immediately kill me if I eat the wrong thing.

Don’t put people in places where they’re required to work, promising that food will be provided for free, and then only provide foods that will make them sick.

[bright-eyes-strawberry-lies]

PJO is so annoying to write whump for bc it's like "oh you've healed everything done to you in a matter of seconds and you don't even have a sexy scar for my troubles."

[nombitenary]

vore scenario: pred sneaks prey into the movie theater and buries them in soda and popcorn, then gets so into the movie that they forget to let them out. they leave the theater wondering how they got so fat..

Oghhhh… I love that in like a g/t style of scenario.

The pred has every intention of letting their tiny prey out, but has a few sips of soda to tease them, and the popcorn smells so good that they just have to have a few bites. All while the prey is at first just. Annoyed. Listening to their pred friend’s muffled but eager gulps from above and cringing as they’re showered in more of the pred’s snacks. They kick one of the walls and say that they better let them out before the previews are over and in response to their movement, they’re treated to the stomach around them contracting a little and a soft hiccup from above them.

It’s only when the pred’s stomach starts to really gurgle that they start to worry, and they shove the walls as more and more of their space is taken— the series of muffled glrks and glucks from above only adding to the humiliation. They’re the same size as those mouthfuls being squeezed down, and they realize with a sinking feeling that the pred must have decided to keep them.

When they start struggling more, the pred doesn’t notice thanks to their lack of room. They can’t make any huge movements, and as the pred takes another slow gulp of their drink, they smile at the thought of their prey stuck so deep inside their belly. Gently, they rub at their middle and coax up another soft hiccup as their guts get to work— slightly overstuffed and heavy feeling— before settling in to watch the movie as their body massages their meal deeper, deeper…

Maybe the prey is indigestible. Stuck feeling the popcorn around them mix into the sludge of fountain soda and acid that fizzles around them, causing the stale air to make their lungs tingle as they inhale. There’s hardly space for them in the bottom of the stomach, hardly air where they’re squashed under layers of soggy popcorn— though that becomes the least of their worries when a deep and rumbly grrrrrrgl shakes through them. With a slick squish, they’re slowly pushed down into the predator’s intestines… listening to the predator gulp down still more of their drink thanks to their stomach emptying out… all while the pred enjoys a movie, blissfully unaware of how far from their stomach the prey has gotten.

Oh well, they’d say when the movie’s over as they rub the weakly twitching lump in their middle, barely able to locate it in the slushy and gurgly mess. They suppose they’re going to have to keep you in there. Enjoy their belly. It certainly enjoyed you <3

[bassgif]

bloody cinnamon rolls: source

[existennialmemes]

Saying "I'm Gluten Free":

-boring

-not literal enough

-people might think you're just on a fad diet

Saying "I live a live a life bereft of gluten because my intestines are cursed":

-sounds way cooler

-extremely literal

-obvious that you aren't doing it for fun

[dunmeshi-would-you-eat]

Chilchuck's "Faligon Blood Sausage"

[fictionkinfessions]

wow ok jimmy i have some questions. for the silly birthday party were we out of food. were we actually out of food or did you just decide to be goofy like that. jim were we out of food yet. i couldn't exactly get up and check

- captn #🚛🚀

[bonefall]

Elder Bones... what if I... made a ClanGen mod based off of Better Bones.

Sure go ahead!

I hope they take that nutrition mechanic off the backburner soon, I feel like that update would be the perfect opportunity for someone to go in there with a BB-inspired mod.

[buffetlicious]

Dinner an assortment of braised chicken, duck and pig dishes. This Braised Duck Rice (卤鸭饭) came with not only braised duck but also braised egg, peanuts and pig’s big intestine over braised savoury rice. To go with the dishes, a scoop of umami sambal chilli paste to give it a spicy kick.

[entropy-sea-system]

ARFID and IBS (and other GI issues) culture is feeling like you're "wasting food" by not eating the exact same food that the people around you are, even when you're not throwing it away, and when it would literally harm you to eat it

[dw-flagler]

gross thought but like what do you think would happen if taylor got a parasite. like a tapeworm. one of the ones that hatches in the human body. cause her power doesn't detect larvae or eggs i don't think so she wouldn't know about it if she drank dirty water or something.

again gross thought but i'm thinking about her like detecting through her power a tapeworm hatching in her own stomach. or intestines. wherever tapeworms live. what would you do about having a tapeworm in your stomach and knowing about it from the moment it hatches from its egg. like do you let it die? cause she controls it so she can just make it so it doesn't eat any food and it starves to death. does that make it worse does that kill you

[mariluphoto]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

BREAKING:

Chickenpox has spread amongst children st the Al-Najjar Hospital in Gaza. 1,500 intestinal diseases are being reported everyday due to a lack of food.

(via. savesheikhjarrahnow)

[arctic-hands]

yes I am hungry. yes the thought of food makes me want to hurl. we exist

[themanwhowouldbefruit]

can finally eat lentils again without being in excruciating pain for 6 hours afterwards

[unhonestlymirror]

Lithuanians have no right to be so good at cooking