Category: All Purpose

Venison Breakfast Sausage

Add 1 tsp per ¼ lb of ground meat, and —poof— instant fresh breakfast sausage! Make up a batch of this spice mix ahead of time to use as needed.

Basic Brown Stock

This is a basic recipe for brown stock, using bones and meat from just about any seafood, game, or livestock. Click here for a detailed treatise on stock.

Poultry Brine

Brining improves flavor, reduces toughness, and adds moisture. Most meats benefit – but lean, tough meats (like game) benefit most of all.For wild birds brining opens up vast cooking options that otherwise may produce dry, tough meat.

Refried Beans

Ok, ok. It’s beans, not wild meat. Hey, it uses venison stock. And it’s so good it’s a perfect side dish for many other recipes.

Cocktail Sauce

It’s disappointing that many restaurants no longer accompany shellfish like shrimp and crab with this traditional American dipping sauce.  Nowadays it comes with something with no zing, apparently generated by an app designed to impress foodies rather than people. In V1 it was ketchup and Read More …

Poultry Stock

Of course this works best with wild birds like turkey, pheasant — or even a big mess of quail. Don’t just “breast ’em out” and toss the rest — all those bones and meat are the ticket to great stock!

Moose Munch

OK, it’s not wild game. It’s hard to work game into desserts. Besides, it does have “Moose” in the name. You could use it to say “OK kids, eat all your venison and daddy will make moose munch.”

If popping your own from kernels, keep in mind that freshness matters — Not because popcorn kernels go bad, but because over time they lose some of the moisture they need to pop properly. If it’s been on the shelf for a year just buy a new batch.

Preparing Poultry for Stock

With processed chickens, the whole weight will equate to about 52% boneless meat, 20% skin and 28% bones.

Game birds will be different but not dramatically so – except that they will have much less fat.

So, for instance, to get 12 lbs of bones you may need over 40 lbs of poultry.

Regardless, save the skins! Tremendous flavor there – even from store-bought critters. Of course with game that means you need to do a thorough plucking job… which can be a big hassle!

Normally your limiting factor for the number of “Servings” is one of two things: the weight of bones you have available, and the size of your largest stock pot (unless you split it into multiple pots).

So fiddle with the pot size below until you come up with a number that is both a) not bigger than your biggest pot and b) not more bones than you have on hand. All of the other ingredients will fall into line.

Chipotle Mayo

A spicy, delicious condiment that makes things pop!

Pickled Red Onion

A versatile condiment — limited only by your imagination. It’s native home, however, is the taco.

Sausage Dressing—with some tricks!

This is a fairly standard stuffing/dressing recipe, but with some tricks that make a difference: Use poultry fat instead of butter. Reserve 1/3 of the celery raw until final mix before the oven step (adds crunch). Don’t brown the sausage crumbled. Form it into thin Read More …

Working man’s Mai Tai

This is not the “ultimate” Mai Tai, an endlessly elusive target the pursuit of which can be complex and expensive — though always fun. But this is fast, easy and cheap, kind of how I like my [content edited]. Anyway, enjoy!

Clarified Butter Sous Vide

Clarified butter is a common kitchen term for butterfat – which is what is left after you remove the water and milk solids from butter. Traditionally it is made by heating butter to a temp like 260°F or a bit higher until the last of Read More …

Russian Dressing

For venison Reubens, etc. Less “meh” than Thousand Island.

Caesar Salad

It is NOT hard to make excellent Caesar Salad! The big secrets to making it “pop” are anchovies, good fresh crisp romaine, and properly emulsified dressing. The other ingredients are important too… but those three are where most people take shortcuts that make the result Read More …