I have to share this experience.......
It's November 2008, I am at our hunting property getting prepared for the morning hunt. I decided to throw a pole in the water (tank) to catch a catfish or two for dinner that night. Well, long story short. I caught just one 1.5' catfish. I field dressed the catfish (LOL), grabbed a 4' stick and craved a point at the end of it. I pushed the stick through the catfish and cooked it like a marshmallow over an open fire. I have to say, it was the best tasting catfish I have ever eatin'. The skin hardened and the meat flaked off the bones perfectly, it was perfection. I used Mesquite wood in the fire since our property has an overabundance of them, it flavored the catfish to perfection.

I love cooking over an open fire. I used to cook a lot of rabbits that way, just clean em' & put them on a stick. I don't know what it is about it but it sure is good.

Done this with tree rats alot...good stuff

AGREE. Love the smell and taste.
Check this video you may try it for the next time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1RWFO-6sPI
Start at 4.00 min to the end.

That is a great idea....I love to eat squirrel.

Thanks Navasot!

Nothing like a cottontail seasoned would good ole salt and pepper and licked by flames. (steak works great too if no rabbit around)

Can't beat an open fire for cooking. Nothing else can match the flavor. We used to slow cook whole hogs over a open fire until the meat almost fell off the bones. We would cook them all night with a lot of "refreshments" being consumed :-)

LOL - I like your taste!

I think you could cook an old boot over an open fire and it would be good to eat.

That's good stuff. I hunted as a guest on a big ranch about 15 years ago. They had a HUGE fire-pit walled in with about a foot-high wall of field stones. Every afternoon when we went out for the evening hunt the ramrod would fill it with mesquite and fire it up. Once a good bed of coals was going he'd throw on a few sheets of expanded metal. That evening everyone just brought what meat they wanted or had handy and cooked it right there. Some had $50 steaks they'd brought with them from Houston, some had rabbits they'd killed that morning. It was pretty cool, and the food was all good.

Great story. I am not sure what you mean by "sheets of expanded metal". Are you talking about a grill top?

expanded metal is the stuff you see on the tailgate of a trailer. Strong but lets the wind thru and you can get it in 4x8 sheets, just like plywood. I welded some to some rebar and bent to shape like legs. We used to pull up some coals from the fire pit and cook on it, great tasting and easy clean up.

This is expanded metal.....

Just don't use galvanized.....

rick

Thanks all, I will definitely look for some and make my own grill for the fire pit.

I bought a grill grate from Academy with foldings legs that I set ontop of rocks on each corner in the fire pit.

Love it!!

I promise if you take a potato, wrap it in foil,
Put it in the fire, just to the edge--but still
In the coals--you won't taste a better baked
Potato, it's different than an oven potato or
A potato cooked out of the fire. Something
About that crispy skin.

I have a redneck version of this. When we bought our place there wasn't much there, water and electric and what the last people had dumped. I too a metal framed chair nocked the 1/2 rotten wood seat of and set it in the middle of the fire with a piece of an old little smokie for a grate... cooked some dang fine campfire eats on that!

Good size campfire in a keyhole shape, a piece of old grate, a medium cast iron frying pan, dutch oven, an old enamel coffee pot and you can cook just about anything your heart desires.

The best treat I ever had was put together by my Aunt while on a Colorado/New Mexico mountain vacation when I was 8 years old. She whipped up some raspberry dumplings made with hand picked berries and bisquick strips cooked in a dutch over sitting in the coals.

+1

Yupp. Quicker than the oven this way too.

True statement! I have done this and you are right, unbelievably good!

Thanks for the recipe, I will give that a shot!

I've gutted rattle snakes, seasoned them on the inside, laid them on the coals skin side down for about 10 minutes and have an appetizer.

We keep a metal trash can with a lid around our camp for our hot ashes. We fix some mean "trash can taters" occasionally with our hot ashes. We cook them on the fire pit also but the grans like huge fires and it is much easier to maintain a constant temp in the "ash" can.