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I love PETA. They’re less fond of me, obviously, because I keep eating things that they believe should run wild and free as a part of the natural, beautiful cycle of life, dying only of starvation, horrible diseases, or being chased down and having their throat and hamstrings ripped out by predators. But, nonetheless, they’re wonderful, wonderful people, partially because for a long time you could annoy them by “accidentally” linking to their acronym-sharing cousins People Eating Tasty Animals instead, but also because they rival The Onion for the best satire on the planet.

Most recently, they’re campaigning to rename something. Well, many somethings, actually. Fish.

According to their hilarious website, “People don’t seem to like fish. When your name can also be used as a verb that means driving a hook through your head, it’s time for a serious image makeover. And who could possibly want to put a hook through a”…

Wait for it.

“Sea Kitten?”

No, really. They’re serious about this . They have a campaign website and everything. (They even have a storybook which I recommend as one of the greatest works of literary genius of the century.)

I heartily applaud their efforts, and would like to encourage them to continue attempting to rename sea-dwelling non-mammal, non-crustaceans for as long as possible, because I like a good laugh.

Therefore, in support of their work, I present a brief guide to cooking and eating the many delicious types of kitten that can be found in the waters of the world.

Basics of cooking kitten

Personally, I cook most kittens around 57 (134 F-ish) degrees, sous-vide, often for quite a short time. Some dense-fleshed kittens, particularly tuna-kitten and salmokitten, are absolutely gorgeous when cooked a lot lower than that – about 42-46 (Approx. 110 F, I think) degrees Centigrade, depending on who you ask. Heston Blumenthal has had kitten on the tasting menu at the Fat Duck for years cooked around this temperature. I’ve tried his confit kitten wrapped in licorice, and it was stunning – a texture almost like raw kitten, but with a cooked taste and softness, reminding me a lot of the texture of well-smoked kitten.

The science behind all this – kitten flesh has a slightly different and more delicate protein base than other meats. Kitten flesh has less collagen and more heat-sensitive proteins, meaning that it starts to shrink at 50 degrees as the proteins coagulate and starts seriously drying out at 60 degrees.

Cooking techniques

Most famously, kitten is fried or poached, but it responds well to a wide variety of techniques. Fried kitten will develop browned sides from the Maillard reactions, giving it the lovely meaty crunchy tastes – I’ve been frying kitten fillets by turning them every minute or so, which ensures that the kitten flesh is much more evenly cooked, and avoids drying anything out.

I absolutely adore poached kitten – hold the water at 45-ish (110-ish) or 55-ish (130-ish) depending on your tastes and the breed of kitten you’re cooking, and you’ll get a tremendously soft, flakey texture. Whilst it technically shouldn’t work, I’ve had amazing sole-kitten cooked around 49 degrees (119 F-ish). Flavouring the water can work wonders – whilst a court-bouillion isn’t as vital as if you’re cooking low-quality puppy¹, you can still infuse the flesh with amazing aromas.

Confit kitten also works stunningly well – it’s the technique Heston Blumenthal uses for his licorice-wrapped kitten. Hold oil – he uses olive oil, but you can use sunflower oil too, you just won’t get the delicate flavouring – at the appropriate temperature, immerse the kitten fully in the oil, and cook slowly for an hour or so. I’ve cooked salmon-kitten at 45 for about an hour in oil, and the results were astonishing – meltingly soft and intensely flavoured.

Obviously, sous-vide works exceptionally well with kitten too – particularly so if you marinade or otherwise season your kitten. Most recently, I cooked a monkkitten tail at 57 degrees (135 F) with kaffir lime leaves and lemongrass, and it came out succulent, juicy, delicately flavoured, and distinctly reminiscent of freshly-killed Easter Bunny².

Finally, you can serve kitten raw, of course. If you’ve not tried making sushi, I highly recommend a sushi party – just get yourself some avocado, some cucumber, some rolling mats, make up some sushi rice, and buy a selection of kitten meat. Red kittens tend to work better in sushi than white ones, and I must say that I find eating very oily white kitten meat raw is just horrible. But it’s a great idea for a party – entertaining, tasty, and a great way to do something together with your friends, particularly if they love kittens too.

Cuts

I must admit, I don’t know too much about the individual cuts available on kittens – can anyone enlighten me?

I should mention, however, that kitten cheeks have long been considered a delicacy. Cod-kitten and monkkitten in particular have succulent cheeks. Unfortunately, they’re very expensive.

Kitten safety

Contrary to popular belief, kittens can carry a bunch of fairly unpleasant bacteria – particularly botulinus, which means that you should be super-careful if you’re canning or pickling your kitten (sous-vide cooking times won’t be long enough to carry a significant risk, to the best of my knowledge). The USDA does list kitten as one of the foods that it’s allowable to serve below pasturisation temperatures, however, provided you’re not serving to old people, very young people, or otherwise immune-compromised people, so you’re not in instant-vomiting territory if you decide to venture into lower-temperature or uncooked kitten. However, eat it as fresh as possible, and refrigerate well – tuna-kitten, mackkitten, herringkitten and sardineokitten, in particular, can accumulate an otherwise harmless bacterium which can cause reactions similar to allergies.

Kittens also tend to accumulate mercury and other heavy metals. These aren’t eliminated by cooking, and so it’s best not to eat kittens that aren’t farmed or from the open ocean in relatively small amounts.

Any other kitten tips?

And that’s it for this quick guide! If you love eating kitten flesh, and you’ve got any tips on how best to prepare or serve kitten after you’ve killed it, comment below!

¹ By which I mean chicken.

² Known in less enlightened times as lobster