Gator!

I've decided that I'm not going to continue to bore you with the trials and tribulations of my travel eating habits.  Been there, done that, you've all gotten the idea of my successes and challenges.  However, this post was prompted by yours truly doing some research into where my recently devoured alligator nuggets were raised, so I feel like I owe you just a bit of background.

Wait... did you say alligator?  As in... alligator?  Where, pray tell Jordana, did you have a chance to eat gator?

In New Orleans, loyal readers.  So yes, I will preface this post by saying I was recently in New Orleans for yet another conference, so file this under the business-travel-where-I-can-eat-a-real-meal type of trip.  And among the many different and fantastic offerings of cajun cuisine on which I dined (and there are many), I treated myself one evening to fried chunks of gator.  It was deeeelicious, if I do say so myself.

But of course the meal, along with the shrimp I ate, prompted the Au Naturale section of my brain to begin whirring.  Where did the gator come from? Was it wild or raised in farms?  Are the farms mimicking the gator's habitat in the wild or are there gator CAFOs that should make me cry?  In addition, I was still a bit nervous about the local shrimp.  Undeniably fresh, yes, but they are farmed from the Gulf and for me the jury is still out on whether the shrimp is safe to eat a year after oil began gushing uncontrollably from the underwater abyss of that region.

But first things first: Gator!  Thanks to my handy friend the internet, I learned quickly that alligators are indeed farmed in Louisiana, Florida and Georgia and the practice, though designed for uses like skins and my nuggets, has helped an endangered species become viable again.

Unfortunately, though, while I learned much about the habitat, how to build one of my own, and the tell-tale differences between gators and crocs, I couldn't find much in the way of telling me whether these reptiles were as healthy and the farms as ecologically sound as they would be in the wild.  Gators are meat eaters and are supposedly fed as such, but that doesn't necessarily mean a whole lot: Steers are vegetarians but we all know what happens when you feed them grain.

Shrimp is another matter.  I am torn between wanting to support the struggling Gulf fishermen and worrying about my own health.  This recent article says that you would have to eat 63 pounds of gulf shrimp each and every day for 5 years in order to be negatively affected by accumulated oil amounts.  Well, if I ate that much I'd be worrying about mercury and other elements, too.  However, this article shows briefly a different side and more specifically the side I'm worried about: how much below the designated "safe" level is actually safe?  Many additives that are now intentionally put in our food are considered "safe" but in the long term take a damaging toll on our bodies.

So I am truly, truly sorry to the Gulf fishermen: I know it's not your fault. I did eat a whole bunch of your products last week, from shrimp to oysters.  And I will say they were delicious!  But given the choice, I may be sourcing my seafood elsewhere for a while.

And for those of you who were wondering: Alligator tastes like chicken.