Facetious subject line, but the question is genuine (sort of…): we Americans eat a very limited variety of meats. Beef, chicken, pork, lamb/mutton, turkey, maybe duck, rarely goose or rabbit.
Could I set up a breeding operation and start selling, say, cat meat, dog meat, horse meat, hell rat meat?
Could I set up a hunting operation and sell venison or other wild-caught critters?
Well, you can buy venison and other game in butcher’s shops, so obviously it can lawfully be sold.
As for rat, cat and the like, I don’t know whether there’s an explicit ban - it may depend on the jurisdiction in which you live, I suppose - but obviously there are general requirements about fitness for human consumption, and specific public health requirements about conditions of slaughter, veterinary certification, etc. I’ve heard it suggested that catmeat isn’t fit for human consumption and, even if it is, you might have some difficulty getting a vet to certify it as such. And selling it without attending to these formalities might well give you legal problems.
There’s been a scandal in the UK and other European countries lately involving supermarkets selling “beef” burgers that turned out to contain more horse that a “beef” burger should. But the issue seems to be the fact that it was misleadingly named as beef; selling horsemeat for human consumption is not itself a crime, and in fact it’s a common - if low status - food in a number of European countries.
There’s been a nearby thread, within the last few days, discussing the differing English names for food animals while they’re on the hoof (or paw or whatever) versus when they are served on the plate: The live-animal names deriving, often, from Anglo-Saxon/Germanic origins, while the cuisine names tend to derive from the Norman/French/Latin origins.
If we start eating a lot more critters, we will need to develop new names for the live animal or the served animal (depending on which one we don’t already have).
Shall we open this thread to suggestions for more kinds of animals we could be chowing down, and the pairs of names they should have?
Hyena anyone? Opossum? Koala? Hippopotamus? Bear?
We recently had a suggestion from a horse loving celebrity, that making horse meat more acceptable might raise the value of horses and reduce the all too common instances of neglect and downright cruelty. As a bonus, the meat is low fat and low cholesterol.
As said above, for most people the scandal was not about eating horse meat, but mislabelling. I suspect that we may see horseburgers (equiburgers?) in some shops before too long.
Bear is considered a delicacy.
This is what wiki has to say about RATS Rat is a legit FOOD, bon appetit.
So is dog meat it’s fit for human consumption, apparently was commonly eaten in the USA during the 20th century. Wiki
Cat meat is apparently a delicatessen in Switzerland
Horse meat is pretty common as such: Wiki
Lots of Europeans where eating it unknowingly for the past couple of years, thinking it was beef. Scandal.
Venison, Boar, Rabbits, Kangaroo, etc…. is all pretty much standard and edible.
I have eaten bobcat and found it very tasty. My buddy buthered and attempted to eat a coyote and it ended up in the garbage. I was at a primitive gathering once where rats were served, they tasted ok. Song bird stew used to be an acceptable dish in Italy that I know of, they would catch the little birds in hairnet type nets extended between bushes. I prefer the standard fare and see no need to expand on it.
I’d go for Pâté Râté.
Opossum (or possum as it is called around here) is a rather common game animal.
The trick, apparently, is to catch the critter and cage feed it for two weeks with corn.
Then, you kill, skin and stew it. Made with dumplings, it is actually quite tasty.
Of course, around these parts, in the old days folks ate whatever they could shoot or trap. When I first bought this property 25 years ago, it seemed like there wasn’t a single squirrel, opossum, raccoon, rabbit or deer in the entire valley. Once they finally paved the roads and put in stores with food in them, the animal population gradually recovered.
The GQ aspect of this is not so much whether anyone would eat such treats (whether store bought or wild caught), but whether they may be legally sold in the US (whether wild caught or raised for slaughter).
UDS’s comment on having the product certified as fit for consumption is probably closest to a solid answer, though I’m curious as to whether there are any specific animals that are excluded by law from being sold.
I’ve eaten both boar and elk at restaurants, ditto rabbit and goat (which while uncommon in the US, is not all that exotic). I assume the rabbit and goat were farm raised, I have no idea how the boar or elk were obtained.
I know that when I was growing up, it was illegal to sell horsemeat in Pennsylvania. Here in Montreal it is openly sold. I have eaten horsemeat sushi in Japan. Kind of bland and hard to tell from beef. Cats are eaten in China, one of my professors who grew up there told me.
I remember there being a company in California named Night Bird Game and Poultry back in the 80’s; I had some of their smoked raccoon and it was amazing. However, a quick Google search for it indicates that they were probably ahead of their time and faced some stiff opposition from the furry animal rights societies. Nowadays, it might work better, but you’d have to ease into it from conventional meats to bison, elk and other “game” animals. I doubt the public would ever be happy with somebody selling cat or dog meat; you probably wouldn’t even be able to sell horse meat, even if you got all the paperwork signed and raised the horses specifically for meat.
You shouldn’t if your customers speak any French 
(for non-Francophones, “raté” means “messed up” or “failed”)
I can’t resist sharing this story.
Little background first : my sister’s a veterinarian, and because she didn’t want to be stuck working on widdle doggies and pwecious cats (moreso their owners) she set up shop out in the sticks. The rest of the family is *very *Parisian.
After a visit to said sister, my mother came back with stories of the barbarous life she led out there, notably the fact that the lake near her house was plagued with ragondins - I think the US term is capybara, though they might be similar-but-not-quite species. Short version : it’s an invasive species of burrowing rodents that dig nests into lake and river banks, and there’s a national directive to kill them on sight because they’re destructive pests. The conversation went thus :
Mother : Your sister is weird : she makes *pâté *out of ragondins now !
Me : Well that can’t be sanitary.
Mother : I know ! They’re herbivores !
Me : Exactly !.. Wait, why is this relevant ?
Mother : Well, people don’t eat herbivores, like you said, it’s very unhealthy.
Me : Think about what you’ve just said, Mum.
Mother : Why, what did I… oh. I’m not living this one down, am I ?
Me : Nope.
FTR, it’s been about 8 years now. Not lived it down yet.
Argh, missed edit : just checked and it’s coypu, not capybara.
Nutria is the American term.
Sounds nutritious to me.
That is awesome. I’d like to borrow your family, but then I’d have to eat random pâté.
No, you can’t do this, at least not in the US. Most states prohibit the selling of wild game taken by hunters. You can give it away or donate it to charity but you cannot sell it.
The venison, elk, buffalo, etc. that you see for sale is raised on ranches or imported. Most of the venison in the US comes from New Zealand.
Considering the deer overpopulation some US states have, it would be nice to see those laws changed…