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[Lagslayer]

Birds. Lots and lots of birds. They grow quickly and lay eggs. Plus, I think animal products fatten up your dwarves better than plants. It slows them down a bit, but builds up another thick tissue layer that enemies will need to get through.

[Conan]

If you're embarking somewhere with non-frozen water you could try fishing. Having 20 or so adequate fisherdwarfs on the same square fishing can provide a lot of food in the long run, for a while at least.

[greycat]

An advantage of caravan meat is it always comes in stacks of 5, which becomes size-20 roasts. That's way more food than you can fit in a barrel

Before 0.34.08 it was, but barrels hold a lot more now.  At least 30 units of food -- I'm not sure what the actual capacity is, so it might be even higher.

[Xvareon]

Turkeys. They are a piddling 6 dwarfbucks to take along on embark and lay a LUDICROUS amount of eggs which can be prepared by your Cook (of course this approach means you must bring a Cook along because eggs are inedible raw). They also don't require pastures to graze, and can be slaughtered for meat as necessary. Seriously, Turkeys pretty much make farming for food obsolete; I could just get away with making my Dwarves eat omelettes and souffle every day and focus the bulk of my farming on cloth and dyes and watch as my fort becomes the center of fashion for the entire world. Urist McKardashian all over again.

[Ai Shizuka]

Thanks everyone for the replies.

I already embark with 5 turkeys most of the times, so I'll try with more.
Maybe 2-3 alpacas to kickstart an early breeding program for milk/yarn.

[peccan]

Dogs are quite usable as well. Large enough at birth to be of some value (I believe, large enough to give leather) (Urist DeVille will be DELIGHTED), and also trainable for hunting/military purposes.

But mostly turkeys.

Hydraulic cannons that shoot armoured war turkeys. Soon...

[Lagslayer]

Dogs are quite usable as well. Large enough at birth to be of some value (I believe, large enough to give leather) (Urist DeVille will be DELIGHTED), and also trainable for hunting/military purposes.

But mostly turkeys.

Hydraulic cannons that shoot armoured war turkeys. Soon...

Can we load them into minecarts? If so, we should be able to mod the rest in.

[Poindexterity]

Butchering seems impratical in the early stages of a fortress and probably inadequate when the third migrant tsunami arrives.

on the contrary.
Butchering is one of your BEST early options as all those migrants usually bring delicious meat filled animals with them in DROVES.

[peccan]

With a constant flow of poultry your butcherer(s) will soon be lightning fast and almost able to keep up with your breeding birds

Yes, butchery is one of the best ways to feed a large fortress. You might even restrict your veggies to booze production only.

[MasterShizzle]

I usually prefer geese over turkeys. They're more expensive, but not overly so, and more handy for butchering purposes. They'll produce less eggs, but if you're breeding them for meat then they're only slightly smaller than turkeys and they mature in half the time, which means double the meat and hides. You'll be swimming in roast goose and Goose Leather for decades.

[Triaxx2]

Not to mention that geese make for superior jokes. 'Your Turkey is cooked' is measurably less funny than 'Your Goose is cooked.'

[Reese]

I always start a 5x5 plot of plump helmets for all year round.

Lately, I've taken to butchering my starting draft animals(and all unattached migrant animals) so I don't have to deal with pasturing them or random fights breaking out. (the dog child bit the puppy...)

[wuphonsreach]

I also butcher my starting draft animals now, all you have to do is build a butcher shop, kitchen and tanner's workshop next to each other and make sure your farmer has the butcher/tanner labors turned on.  Then just have workshops setup to pull tallow out of the kitchen and meat out of the butcher and into storage so it doesn't rot. 

I don't start collecting mammals until after the first winter.  Although alpacas/llamas are very tempting as an embark choice because they don't need a lot of pasture area.

[Triaxx2]

I start with a 11x11 room with 9 3x3 plots. That way I can get cloth, and booze moving at once.

[Snaake]

I also butcher my starting draft animals now, all you have to do is build a butcher shop, kitchen and tanner's workshop next to each other and make sure your farmer has the butcher/tanner labors turned on.  Then just have workshops setup to pull tallow out of the kitchen and meat out of the butcher and into storage so it doesn't rot. 

I don't start collecting mammals until after the first winter.  Although alpacas/llamas are very tempting as an embark choice because they don't need a lot of pasture area.

Sheep require even less than alpacas, and only about 1/4th as much as llamas: they're slightly over 1/4th the size of a lama when fully-grown, so slightly better efficiency, too, especially when you consider you get 4 skins instead of 1, and can get 4 times the milk and wool. So I'd prefer alpacas/sheep, not llamas, if trying to save on pasture space. If the numbers on the wiki are right, llamas only give about 2 more meat than alpacas when butchered (which does sound wrong, given creature sizes of 180k compared to 70k). Oh, and rams (male sheep) apparently give horns as a bonus.