From a very young age, I knew meat didn’t come only in neat little plastic-wrapped packages from the grocery store—it also came in the form of a carcass suspended from its neck, tongue hanging out of its mouth, legs splayed open, bleeding out into a metal bucket.
I grew up on a 40-acre farm in Nowheresville, Northern Michigan. In addition to growing sweet corn, red potatoes, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, green beans, and snap peas, my family also ate venison. Every November, my stepdad—as well as every other male (and a few women) age 10 to 80 in our town—would disappear into the deep woods for a week or more. Public schools in Northern Michigan made the first day of the fall hunting season an official holiday, because hardly anyone would show up anyway…