Living as a Single Farang in the Jungle: De Knert
Several months ago this blog published an article by Gringo about rabbits here in Thailand. This showed how difficult it was to get hold of rabbit, which is a guarantee for, especially the Belgians and also the Dutch, to prepare a delicious top meal.
This problem is now gone and how did it come so suddenly? Many years ago there was a real rabbit plague in Australia that caused enormous damage to agriculture. In 1950, no better solution was found than to artificially introduce a virus that only affected the rabbit stock. It concerned the myxomatosis virus. As a result, the rabbit population in Australia was reduced by more than 85%. The unforeseen consequence was that the spread of this virus manifested itself worldwide and also spread in South America and Europe. Man is very ingenious about destroying nature, yet nature is equally ingenious in always restoring itself. And so it happened: a new animal species developed at lightning speed in Australia: the KNERT.
The knert is a cross between a large rabbit breed and a small deer breed. This new species is also totally immune to the myxomatosis virus and has almost no natural enemies. As this new species once again poses a threat to agriculture, it is hunted very intensively, so much so that the meat has become an export product for Australia. It has already been marketed in Belgium, albeit to a very limited extent, but with success. A trial delivery has already been launched in Thailand and is aimed more specifically at some top restaurants in Bangkok.
The meat has the characteristics of both venison and rabbit and is extremely tasty when prepared in the right way… eg stewed in brown beer, as the Belgians prepare rabbit. Also stewed in a dry white wine it gives an exceptionally tasty result.
Since the trial delivery in Thailand was a success, the 'Tesco Lotus' department store chain immediately jumped on the bandwagon and acquired the exclusive import rights to this product. Coming Monday, 1/4/2019, a one-off promotion will be launched in all Tesco Lotus and Tesco Express stores throughout Thailand. The knert is offered at an exceptionally low price of 75 THB/kg, where the normal price of the product will be around 300 THB/kg. It is offered frozen and the first stock is about 50 tons…. So it's gone and afterwards the full price will have to be paid.
In Thai the knert is called: KWANTAAI, a contraction of the two words: Kwang and Kataai.
For those who would like to buy a new top item at a super affordable price: Monday is the day to do this... but be quick because the Thais, unlike rabbit, also love it.