The following was posted to another list I am on. I thought it might
interest people here too.
...Since we are exchanging recipes, here are some thoughts on venison
preparation. I wrote this thinking I might sometime get around to
putting it
in a cookbook. LRT list members are advised that a venison meal at
Chez Fishbone might be put in front of you if you are passing through
Montana. Always glad to meet freedom fighters. Basil
Venison on the Hoof and the Plate
Venison (for our purposes, deer, elk, caribou, moose, and –though not
actually
related-- pronghorn antelope) is, properly prepared, the finest red
meat in
the world. It has long had a reputation as the premier meat of Europe,
reserved only for the tables of the aristocracy. In American cities,
venison
raised on game farms commands very high prices in fine restaurants and
specialty markets.
So why is it, then that a great many hunters and their families and
dinner
guests regard venison, especially deer and antelope, as a barely edible
meat
suited, at best, for salami. There is a particular flavor, known as
gaminess,
that most (but not all) people find unpleasant. A very strong gamey
taste can
render an animal inedible for most people. Too many deer and antelope
acquire
a gaminess that they do not need to have, because hunters and butchers
do
certain things incorrectly. (I think this is true to a lesser extent
of elk,
moose, and caribou, which are less susceptible to gaminess. For
reasons that
are probably related, these animals are not quite as tasty as deer or
antelope. Deer and antelope are also exceedingly tender if properly
aged and
trimmed of all connective tissue.)
Gaminess enters the meat when, during field dressing, the hunter allows
hair,
especially urine-soaked hair to get on and stay on the meat. Or cuts the
urethra so that urine sprays directly onto cut surfaces of the meat.
The
bucks, especially, have musk glands in the vicinity of their hind
knees that
soak the hair in the region with musk, and this can also contribute to
gamy
meat.
What to do? First, field dress and transport the animal with care, to
avoid
the above problems. Skin the animal as soon as possible, to get rid of
the
hair and allow for quick cooling. Antelope, especially, should be
skinned in
the field and wrapped in clean cloth (like an old cotton sheet) for
transport. The hunter should also cut off the musk glands from both
bucks and
does when the animal is dressed. It is sufficient to remove the skin
from the
vicinity, the glands will come off with the skin. Avoid slicing through
the
tendon on the rear of the knee; otherwise it will be difficult to hang.
Then
clean the blade before you cut anywhere near any meat. Try to keep it
clean.
People do things to game they would recoil in horror from if they
thought
their beef had been handled that way!
If at all possible, hang the animal, skinned and covered with
cheesecloth, in
a cool, dry garage or shed secure from animals, or better yet, in a meat
locker, for at least seven to 10 days, up to three weeks. Hanging meat
tenderizes it as autolytic enzymes begin to break down the muscle
fibers. If
it gets a little moldy, generally this doesn’t hurt anything. You just
trim it
off along with the outer filament. (I did encounter a mold once which
was bad
news. It grew on antelope hanging in a musty old basement, and proved
to be
highly invasive, penetrating deeply into the muscle, and really tasted
terrible.)
Secondly, when the animal is butchered, if you take the short and easy
route,
you will end up with inferior, gamey, meat. Many people bone and cut
the meat
into random chunks with steaks cut right through muscle masses, and
including
chunks or sheets of fat, tendons, and filaments (gristle). Or they take
it to
a commercial butcher, where the quarters are cut with a bandsaw into
steaks
and roasts familiar to consumers, including all the fat and gristle and
frequently bone. Bone and fat are repositories for the gamy flavor,
and you
must cut them away from the meat. This is a tedious and time-consuming
process, but crucial if you want gourmet-quality meat. Venison fat
also gets
rancid quickly in the freezer. And gristle, of course, makes the meat
tough!
To butcher venison properly, take a sharp flexible knife and strip off
the
outer layer of dried sheath and fat, then separate the individual muscle
masses and remove them one at a time. To do this, tease an opening
with your
knife and fingers and follow the muscle mass around, separating it
from the
adjoining muscle. Each muscle will have an outer layer of filament.
Strip off
this filament and cut off any tendons, wasting as little meat as
possible.
Remove any small clumps of fat. Look carefully to find any filamentous
sheaths
that dive into the interior of the muscle. Carefully cut these out.
Practice
will make this easier. This process results in smaller steaks than you
would
get otherwise, but they are prime, prime, prime! Be sure to wrap well
with
freezer paper to avoid freezer burn, and label the packages (i.e.,
whitetail
buck, loin, 2003).
So for steaks (and salami, for that matter), you have removed all the
gristle
material, and all the fat, and you end up with beautiful lean red meat.
I
leave gristle in stew meat, because it is necessary to ensure a moist
and
succulent end result.
Traditional European venison cookery usually employed elaborate
marinades to
cover up the gaminess and to tenderize the meat. With this method of
preparation, this is generally not necessary. However, it can happen,
particularly if you shoot a big old buck in the rut. Their bodies are
pumped
full of hormones and adrenalin, their hair is soaked with musky urine,
and
they can be gamy despite your best efforts. On the theory that antlers
are
not edible, you might consider not shooting these bucks during the
rut. Also,
what the animals have been feeding on does have some effect on the
quality of
the taste. If there is a problem of this sort in your area, hunt
elsewhere.
It is more of a problem with mule deer than white tail, but I love a
good mule
deer.
Freedom, Immortality, and the Stars!
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