President Taft Loved This Once Popular Soup That's Illegal To Make Today

For years, the favorite foods of presidents have fascinated the public. John F. Kennedy was a fan of classic New England fish chowder; Richard Nixon loved the, ahem, unique combination of cottage cheese and ketchup; and Bill Clinton had a penchant for spicy jalapeño cheeseburgers. President William Howard Taft, however, is likely the only president whose favorite dish is now illegal: Taft Terrapin Soup. Of course, Taft wasn't the only U.S. President who was fond of terrapin soup; legend has it President Andrew Jackson also kept it on-hand.

The history of turtle soup goes back for centuries since turtle meat was a dietary staple in many Indigenous cultures. New York City steakhouse Delmonico's offered turtle soup to diners in the mid-1800s, and soon, the delicacy was served at high-end government dinners. The soup was a favorite of President Taft during his time in the White House from 1909 to 1913. The president's fondness for the soup made it so popular that steps had to be taken to protect native turtle populations, making the original version of the dish illegal in the United States today.

Not just any turtles were used to make Taft's favorite soup. Recipes called for turtle meat sourced from diamondback terrapin turtles. While many turtle soup recipes commonly used green sea turtles until the late 19th century, by this point, they had become rare and costly as a result of overfishing. This spurred a shift to using diamondback terrapin turtles, an aquatic turtle found in brackish waters along the East Coast and the Gulf of Mexico. Turtle hunters realized that female diamondback terrapins offered better-tasting meat than males. As hunters eliminated females from the population, fewer eggs were being produced, resulting in diamondback terrapins being killed off faster than they were being born. As the soup's popularity continued to grow, sadly, the population of diamondback terrapin turtles along the coastline began to decline, just as in the case of green sea turtles.

In an effort to keep up with the growing market demand for terrapin turtles, attempts were made to create terrapin farms. Ultimately, these efforts proved unsuccessful. Today, it's illegal to hunt terrapin turtles in the United States, as well as in many other areas of the world. While the diamondback terrapin population is protected from human hunters, the species still faces many threats and is even listed as a species of special concern.

If you're craving Taft's favorite meal, you can actually use hard boiled eggs to take the place of turtle meat. Hard boiled eggs have long been an ingredient in turtle stew, and adding more of them to make up for turtle meat creates a hearty dish that's not too far off from the original. You can find tons of recipes for mock turtle soup, or you can take an original turtle soup recipe and simply sub hard boiled eggs for turtle meat. While it may sound counterintuitive to use hard boiled eggs instead of meat in a recipe, the substitution works well. Fans of turtle meat say that the taste is similar to veal: smooth, delicate, and non-greasy, much like hard boiled egg whites.

If you're not a fan of eggs, you can create mock turtle soup using shredded chicken. Many people say turtle meat is texturally similar to alligator (which is considered both a meat and a seafood), and that alligator is texturally similar to chicken. In some regions, you can still find turtle soup on restaurant menus, but it isn't the same as Taft's beloved version. Snapping turtles are used in place of terrapin turtles in some areas since these animals are unprotected in many states.