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Venison Cuts and Preparation

Bama_Xander

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 11, 2019
Messages
1,226
Location
North Alabama
After learning about some new ways to cook some venison cuts this past year, I thought it would be neat to share and hear how people like to prepare the various cuts on a deer and new preparations they would like to try. So here is mine:

Shanks
-Slow-cooked in Adobada sauce - shred for street tacos
-Next New prep - Osso Buco (Meat Eater Cook Book)

Shoulder
-Bone-in Blade Roast
-Next New prep - Barbacoa - shred for street tacos (Hank Shaw - Hunt Gather Cook website)

Neck
-Whole Bone in Roast
-Next New Prep - BBQ Braised Venison Neck (Meat Eater website)

Sirloin - Eye of Round - Back Strap - Tenderloin - Heart
-Cast Iron Pan-Seared + Butter/Herb Basted
Next New Prep - Garlic and herb marinated Backstrap (Meat Eater website)
Next New Prep - Herb Crusted Eye of Round with red wine reduction (Meat Eater website)

Bottom Round
-Jerky

Top Round
-Jerky

Sirloin Tip
-Grind for Summer Sausage

Tongue
(Three in the freezer. Never cooked before.)
Possible Preps-
Venison Tongue with Chimichurri (Meat Eater website)
Venison Lengua Tacos (Hank Shaw - Hunt Gather Cook website)
Seared Tongue Sandwich (Meat Eater Cookbook)
 
Some excellent choices, @Bama_Xander! Hank Shaw and Steven Rinella are two of my favorite wild game cooks. I've made and love the osso buco and barbacoa recipes you mentioned. A couple to add to your list:

Bulgogi (Korean BBQ) - Hank Shaw's recipe from Petersen's Hunting is excellent. I like to make thin slices of a thick steak or roast, put them on skewers and marinade them in this sauce for a bit, then grill them quickly on high heat. Excellent finger food for a BBQ. https://www.petersenshunting.com/editorial/8-best-venison-marinades/272945

Steak, guiness and cheese pie or with dumplings - Jamie Oliver has recipes for this as either a pie with phyllo dough, or as sort of a stew with dumplings on top. I prefer to follow the pie recipe for the filling and then do the dumplings instead of the pie dough. This takes a couple of hours to cook down to the right consistency, so plan accordingly. Really good though.
 
Bro, I do this one all the time. Totally rules. I use neck in this as well.
-Next New prep - Barbacoa - shred for street tacos (Hank Shaw - Hunt Gather Cook website)
 
Bro, I do this one all the time. Totally rules. I use neck in this as well.
-Next New prep - Barbacoa - shred for street tacos (Hank Shaw - Hunt Gather Cook website)

Yup. I’ve done this with shanks, front legs and a neck but now I’m running low on those cuts and it’s still 4 months until hunting season! Have you tried any other cuts for this? Wondering how my stew meat would do (generally scraps from the rear legs)....
 
These days I grind less than I every used to. Now everything that is an "offcut" gets run either in this barbacoa recipe or some version of braising. For the barbacoa, it all shreds great and freezes really well. I blend the cooking liquid and use it as a taco sauce.

I would say your stewing meet would work just fine - just maybe watch out for it breaking up too much before you can separate it out
 
Bro, I do this one all the time. Totally rules. I use neck in this as well.
-Next New prep - Barbacoa - shred for street tacos (Hank Shaw - Hunt Gather Cook website)

This is currently moving from "next new prep" to new favorite. I have half a shoulder in the crockpot with this recipe right now. Dinner is at 5:00 if you want to come over.

I modified the recipe a little. Instead of just dumping it all in the crockpot. I seared the meat in a skillet then set aside. Then I threw in my chopped red onion to get some color and then grated (Micro-plane) the garlic into the skillet for like 30 sec to a min to open up the flavor. Then I deglazed the skillet with some of the stock.
 
This is currently moving from "next new prep" to new favorite. I have half a shoulder in the crockpot with this recipe right now. Dinner is at 5:00 if you want to come over.

I modified the recipe a little. Instead of just dumping it all in the crockpot. I seared the meat in a skillet then set aside. Then I threw in my chopped red onion to get some color and then grated (Micro-plane) the garlic into the skillet for like 30 sec to a min to open up the flavor. Then I deglazed the skillet with some of the stock.

Dinner is at 5:00, you say?.....
 
Some excellent choices, @Bama_Xander! Hank Shaw and Steven Rinella are two of my favorite wild game cooks. I've made and love the osso buco and barbacoa recipes you mentioned. A couple to add to your list:

Bulgogi (Korean BBQ) - Hank Shaw's recipe from Petersen's Hunting is excellent. I like to make thin slices of a thick steak or roast, put them on skewers and marinade them in this sauce for a bit, then grill them quickly on high heat. Excellent finger food for a BBQ. https://www.petersenshunting.com/editorial/8-best-venison-marinades/272945

Steak, guiness and cheese pie or with dumplings - Jamie Oliver has recipes for this as either a pie with phyllo dough, or as sort of a stew with dumplings on top. I prefer to follow the pie recipe for the filling and then do the dumplings instead of the pie dough. This takes a couple of hours to cook down to the right consistency, so plan accordingly. Really good though.


Hank Shaw and Steven Rinella are my spirit animals. They are awesome wild game cooks. Danielle Prewett (Wild + Whole) is rising in the ranks too. She is collaborating at Meat Eater and is making a lot of their new recipes. I have been very pleased with several of her recipes.

Thanks for the suggestions! I will add them to the list.
 
Yup. I’ve done this with shanks, front legs and a neck but now I’m running low on those cuts and it’s still 4 months until hunting season! Have you tried any other cuts for this? Wondering how my stew meat would do (generally scraps from the rear legs)....


I keep a spreadsheet of my Wild Game Freezer Inventory. I felt really good at the end of the season, but doing the math, I am going to be coming in close for deer season. We are having a baby in early November so I am going to have to be really successful real early. I like to put 3-4 in the freezer.
 
Mine is extremely similar. I'll grind a few different roasts from here and there just to get more ground yield because my family eats a lot of ground as taco meat, meat sauce, chili type stuff for quick weeknight dinners.

One I can add is the bottom round is also a great cut to shave thin for cheese steaks and bistec style tacos
 
Way more fancy than I typically go. We run through a lot of ground and cubed. I make some bacon-burger as well. Backstraps are typically cut into larger pieces for grilling.

My new favorite is to can the meat though. Once canned, I heat in a skillet in it's own juices and a pack of dry mushroom gravy mix. Serve over rice or mashed potatoes and it is insane. I canned 30+ cans last year and they were gone before season was out.
 
I definitely want to try canning. Since having kids and generally working longer hours our cooking has gotten a lot simpler as we try to do more of those super quick, prep in advance, easy cleanup weeknight meals supplemented by a lot of chic fil A. Oh the days when I could loaf around all evening and have a gourmet dish done at 8 PM, sometimes I miss them.
 
I definitely want to try canning. Since having kids and generally working longer hours our cooking has gotten a lot simpler as we try to do more of those super quick, prep in advance, easy cleanup weeknight meals supplemented by a lot of chic fil A. Oh the days when I could loaf around all evening and have a gourmet dish done at 8 PM, sometimes I miss them.


This is the link that I used to get me started. It doesn't look real appetizing in the can when done, but it is off the chain.
 
This was a great idea. After blending I took half at regular (thin) consistency and half I reduced down to a thicker sauce. Money!

Ya exactly. There is far more than you need, but I make lager batches, then shred and freeze packs of the meat for future dinners. I then freeze small pouches of the liquid for each of those.

Sorry I didn't make it over for dinner!
 
This thread is making me sad because I’m down to just ground meat and a little chip steak and deer season is still months away.
 
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