Butchered the fourth big game animal of the season this morning. A white-tailed deer. Looks big, but cut weight was just under 40 lbs. For context, my calf moose was 100, and Henry’s 2 or 3 year old bull moose was 240. My dad’s cow elk was high 100s-200 I think. So my adventure in cooking venison begins. First lesson … Read More
Hit it with a car = regional.
Today I read an add in the paper from Normand’s – a respectable local restaurant – advertising: “Fine Regional Cuisine, Featuring Wild Regional Game: ELK, CARIBOU, and MUSKOX…”. Now for those of you who do not spend much time outdoors, you will not find, no matter how hard you search, a wild caribou or muscox within many, many, many hours … Read More
Mustard Crusted Pan Roasting
Last night I tried a variation on my ‘steak au poivre’. I’d seen Cat Cora on Iron Chef America – Battle Ground Beef [okay, somewhat embarassing] crust red meat by slathering it in Dijon mustard prior to frying. It looked good and sounded good in theory, although I had a hard time picturing how frying mustard wouldn’t make a mess … Read More
‘Steak au Poivre’ with Cambozola Cream Sauce
Haven’t passed on any recipes lately, so I’m excited to share one of my successful creations of the fall season. Plus, I’m always really proud when I figure out a way to serve game meats in a fashion that would please even non-game-eaters. The concept is far more important than the recipe here. The fundamental is a ‘steak au poivre’ … Read More
Butchering
Not everyone’s cup of tea, I know. But I just got back from butchering the calf moose I shot. It yielded 100 lbs of meat – and oddly, exactly 50 of super-lean super-clean burger, and 50 of varying steaks and roasts. It took very close to 5 hours from start to finish, including grinding of burger and cleanup. This is … Read More
More On [or Moron] Hunting II
Another video frame grab from my recent trip. I was using my scope instead of using binoculars, so I had no intention of shooting here – I was just looking at it. It’s a cow moose, which one cannot shoot legally. Once again, my lovely blaze orange toque is featured. So hot right now.
More On [or Moron] Hunting
More pictures, as promised. This is a cow and calf we caught in the open. I had told Jacques I wanted a ‘5 minute moose’ at 50-100 yards, meaning one that would sit there and let me gather my composure prior to shooting anything…for 5 minutes. Well it turns out that’s a tall order, so instead, I got a “1 … Read More
Moose Hunting 2006
This photo tells a lot about the hunt I had. What you see, is myself in the lovely blaze orange hat, and my cousin Darwin, being photographed by my dad. Behind us are 6 moose, 4 of which you can see in the picture. The black stuff behind Darwin’s head…a moose. The two between us in the photo are obvious, … Read More
More on Food: Wild Big Game
Tomorrow morning I’m up at 5 to head north on a hunting trip for a variety of big game. I’m going to be looking for my first calf moose, but the guys have tags for a whitetail buck, elk calves, cows, bulls – so who knows what will come of it. As my foodiness has exploded over the past few … Read More
You should thank Gordon Ramsay
I hunted, killed, butchered, cleaned, cured, and confit’d 11 wild ducks. Not 1. Eleven. I pitted and dried a bunch of evans cherries that a friend picked for me. I roasted a sweet potato, days ahead. I ground pork fat and the above mixture. I moistened the mixture with some white wine I made. I stuffed it in hog casing. … Read More