INGREDIENTS

INSTRUCTIONS

Venison is the generic term for meat from a large group of related grazing
animals. It includes caribou, reindeer, deer, moose and elk. For all
practical
purposes it also includes musk oxen, antelope and buffalo [bison]. The
recipes
are generally interchangeable. musk oxen and buffalo cuts tend to be more
tender as these animals are more sedentary by nature.
You can do anything with venison that you would beef. Just remember that
it is
drier- less fat, so steaks should be marinaded/tenderized/pounded and
cooked
just to medium, not over-done.
It is important to realize that wild meat can vary in quality and
toughness,
whereas commercial beef is a pretty uniform product. Venison factors are:
~1- Age and sex of animal. Meat can be as tender and mild as veal in a
young
doe. (And you always get steer meat in a store never bull. Castration does
make
a difference.)
~2-Clean kill. If a deer is stalked while it is peacefully grazing and
dropped
dead in its tracks, it will taste far better than an animal that has been
chased by hounds, then gut shot, then it runs a few more miles before
collapsing. The blood is full of adrenaline and the acidic by-products of
exercise and exertion and the flesh is tainted by the torn up organs.
~3- Aging and butchering. When I was a kid growing up in Eastern Ontario,
we
went deer hunting in the fall, when it was cool and deer were hung to age
and
tenderize, then  butchered at a local abattoir that handled beef and pork
professionally. We received nicely wrapped, properly cut and trimmed frozen
packages. It was generally pretty good. Up here caribou is shot all year
long
and traditionally butchered immediately [before it spoils in the summer or
freezes solid in the winter] And some hunters are more skilled at
butchering
than others... I have been made "gifts" of quarters of caribou that have
been
field frozen with the fur on and wrapped in green garbage bags and stored
in
somebody's back yard for a month or two! I have also received superb
sausages
made by a man who apprenticed as a sausage-maker in Germany.
If you know where your meat came from, you will know whether it should
tenderized or just cooked.
If your steaks are coming from a commercial game farm, they will be from a
young animal, carefully slaughtered and aged. I would treat them the same
as
any prime beef T-bone. Probably charcoal BBQ'd or gas grilled to just
medium
rare and sprinkled with a little salt and pepper AFTER it has been
cooked...
nothing fancy, no marinades and no strong BBQ sauces. That way you will be
able
to truly taste the venison.
For wild meat you may want to marinade first, if it's tough.
File ftp://ftp.idiscover.co.uk/pub/food/mealmaster/recipes/caribou.zip

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