Knoxville business explains how to cook and eat gator ahead of UT/Florida game
Shrimp Dock in Knoxville makes eating gator a yearly tradition
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) -”It taste’s just like chicken” is the age-old adage when it comes to eating gator. For Phil Dangel and the rest of the crew at the Shrimp Dock, they’ve taken a special approach to the week leading up to Tennessee playing Florida.
At the Shrimp Dock, gator is served year round, but Dangel says 90% of gator sales come the week leading up to the game. This year they expect to sell nearly two thousand pounds of gator between their three store locations.
Customer Jana Gouge said “we’re going to have a party on Saturday, it’s football season you know.” Instead of pizza rolls, pasta, or nachos, Gouge left the Shrimp Dock with four pounds of gator meat. She plans to season it, and fry it as nuggets to serve to hungry guests.
As far as the recommended way to cook gator, Dangle says the most common way to do it is by doing fried nuggets and using any kind of sauce you like. At the Shrimp Dock, they soak their gator meat in buttermilk and hot sauce for 24 hours before it’s cooked to get that unique flavor.
If you don’t want to try fried nuggets, the Shrimp Dock also sells gator gumbo, sausage, po’boy’s, and fillets.
The gator meat now sits behind a glass case or a fridge now, but 12 years ago when Dangel came up with this idea he was thinking outside the box to excite the Vol faithful.
“They laughed at me they told me you couldn’t bring it over state lines. And I really had no plan for how I was going to do it or what I was going to do but I thought it would be exciting,” said Dangel.
Shrimp Dock will be open Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. At the Bearden location on Saturday they’ll have smoked gator, which won’t be available at the other locations.
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