Category: Wild and foraged

Spicy venison meatballs in a tomato sauce

I made this with some left-over roast venison, but you can also make it with venison mince. I have found that having a mechanical mincer is a game-changer. I think this would also work really well with minced beef. The recipe is from Norman Tebbit’s book, The Game Cook. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 450g minced venison
  • 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 50g breadcrumbs (I used panko)
  • 1 tsp ground cumin
  • 1 tsp ground coriander
  • 1 red chilli, finely chopped
  • 1 egg
  • ground black pepper
  • chopped parsley
  • salt 
  • olive oil
  • Another onion, finely chopped
  • 1 can of chopped tomatoes
  • 4 tbsp tomato puree
  • 300ml red wine
  • 2 tsp sriracha sauce, or 1/2 tsp paprika and 1/4 tsp chilli powder
  • salt and pepper

METHOD:

  • preheat the oven to 180C
  • Start making the tomato sauce. Fry one of the chopped onions in olive oil over a medium heat. 
  • When the onion is soft and beginning to brown, add the tomatoes, tomato puree, red wine and sriracha sauce. Season with salt and pepper if required. Simmer over a low heat while you make the meat balls. If it looks too thick, add a little stock or water. I like to blend the sauce with a soup blender. 
  • Mix the minced beef with the onion, beaten egg, cumin, coriander, chilli, chopped parsley, salt and pepper. Mix well by hand and then mix in and combine the bread crumbs. 
  • Form the mixture into golf-balls (or slightly smaller). Fry in olive oil until browned. They should be handled carefully as they have a tendency to fall apart.
  • Put the meatballs in a casserole dish with the tomato sauce, put the lid on and cook in the oven for around 40 minutes. 
  • Serve over spaghetti, with a green vegetable on the side, and a grating of parmesan on top. 

Roast Venison with red wine and rosemary

I’ve made this twice now, using a large piece of loin from a red deer. This is a very easy and quick recipe, good with mustard mashed potatoes, and green vegetables. The timings given are for a rare to medium rare roast. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 3 tbsp olive oil
  • 700 to 800g venison loin or haunch
  • salt and pepper
  • 2 to 4 carrots, peeled and cut into large chunks
  • 1/2 celeriac, peeled and cut into large dice
  • 1 red onion, peeled and cut into 8+ wedges
  • 2 tsp red current jelly
  • 1 to 2 large sprigs of rosemary
  • 100ml red wine
  • 250ml stock
  • 1 tsp cornflour (optional)

METHOD:

  • Preheat the oven to 220C
  • Heat the oil in a large oven-safe pan, and brown the meat on all sides, and season with salt and pepper.
  • Pack the chopped vegetables around the meat, and roast in the oven for 15 minutes
  • After 15 minutes, turn the heat down to 180C and roast for another 20 minutes (less for a smaller cut of meat)
  • Remove the pan from the oven, and take the meat out. Put it on a dish and cover with a lid or tin foil.
  • In the pan, add the wine, redcurrant jelly and rosemary to the vegetables, and bring to the boil, stirring to mix in any bits of meat from the bottom of the pain.
  • Simmer for a couple of minutes, and then add the stock and cornflour. Simmer for another ten minutes and adjust the seasoning.
  • Serve the venison sliced with the gravy and vegetables, mustard mash and a green vegetable such as cabbage or broccoli.

Sicillian Rabbit Cacciatore

Another recipe to add to my quest to find good recipes for wild rabbit. This time, my rabbit arrived skinned but whole, so I followed the directions here: https://www.jamieoliver.com/videos/how-to-joint-a-rabbit/ – if the liver is still there, separate the lobes and remove the central gristle as this is a good addition to the stew. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 1 wild rabbit, jointed, 
  • 1 onion
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • 1 stick of celery (optional)
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 2 tbsp olive oil 
  • a bunch of mint, chopped
  • 350ml wine
  • 2 tbsp tomato puree
  • 100g chopped green olives
  • freshly ground black pepper

METHOD:

  • Heat a little oil in the pan, salt and add the rabbit joints, until beginning to brown. Remove and set aside on a plate
  • To the same pan, add more olive oil, with chopped garlic, onion, celery, and fry gently until beginning to brown. 
  • Add the mint, red wine and the rabbit, and the liver if this is available. Bring to a simmer. 
  • As the wine reduces, add the chopped olives, pepper and tomato puree, and bring to a simmer
  • I cook at a low heat in the oven for a couple of hours, at around 140C. 

We had this tonight, with potatoes and steamed broccoli

 

Venison in red wine

This is a recipe from Elizabeth David ‘French Provincial Cooking’. We are making our way through the prodigious quantities of food in the freezer, and this time I hauled out a stew pack of venison. This was easy and tasty, I used the timer function on my oven to cook it slowly through the afternoon. 

INGREDIENTS: 

  • Around 900g to 1kg venison. If it is in one piece, tie it to a sausage shape
  • 4 tbsp full-bodied red wine
  • 4 tbsp balsamic vinegar
  • 4 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tbsp flour (I used gluten-free flour)
  • salt and pepper
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 3 rashers of streaky bacon 
  • 1 onion, sliced

METHOD:

  • Put the venison in a container with a lid, and add the red wine, vinegar and olive oil. Leave to marinade overnight. 
  • Put the meat in a smallish casserole dish with the marinade. In a small cup, mix the flour with a little marinade to make a paste, and stir that in, also add the bay leaves and salt and pepper. 
  • Over the top of the meat, layer slices of onion and then streaky bacon. 
  • Cover, and cook at 150C for four hours. 

We served this with fried mushrooms and potato and celeriac mash. 

Rabbit with prunes and nuts

Another great rabbit recipe, this time from the north east coast of Spain. I cooked this in two stages. Simmering the rabbit slowly helped the meat to fall from the bone. Thank you to the supplier of rabbit. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 1 rabbit, jointed
  • 6 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 large onion, finely chopped
  • 1 large peeled tomatos, finely chopped
  • salt and pepper
  • a pinch of dried thyme
  • 1 bayleaf
  • a glass of red wine
  •  12 ready-to-eat prunes (or soaked prunes)
  • a handful of pine nuts
  • a quarter of a lemon
  • 12 blanched almonds
  •  a large clove of garlic
  • 3 peppercorns
  • 1 tsp seasalt

METHOD:

  • Fry the rabbit in the olive oil, browning them. Set the rabbit aside until later
  • Simmer the finely chopped onion in the same pan, for around ten minutes.
  • Season with salt and pepper and add the chopped tomatoes. Cook slowly for half an hour, crushing the tomatoes to make a thick sauce
  • Add the rabbit back to the pain with thyme, the bayleaf and cover. Cook in a slow oven, around 140C for an hour and a half. Add the glass of red wine to keep the dish moist, about an hour into the cooking. If you are going to do this in two stages, you can pause here and chill until you are ready to finish the dish. 
  • Meanwhile, simmer the prunes in just enough water to cover, along with the pine nuts and the lemon. This should take half an hour.
  • Chop the almonds, and put them in a spice grinder or mortar and pestle, with the salt, and then add the peppercorns, and finally grind in the garlic.
  • Add the almond paste to the stew, stir in and cook for another fifteen minutes. Then, add the stewed prunes and stir well. 

We had this with new potatoes. Any other potato dish would be fine, as well as a small salad or green vegetables. 

Slow-cook shank of venison

I made the weekly raid on the freezer for my birthday evening meal, and pulled out a shank of red deer venison. I hadn’t cooked this cut before, so I did a bit of googling, looked at the ingredients in the fridge and then made this braised venison. I think it would have worked well for up to two shanks, so we have ended up with a very tasty gravy for a second meal. 

I’ve got really into using gluten-free flour as a thickener for stews and soups, the consistency of the gravy is good, not gluey at all. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 1 or 2 red deer venison shanks (see above)
  • 2 shallots or 1 small onion, finely chopped
  • 1 large carrot, peeled and diced
  • 2 small or 1 large stick of celery, diced
  • approx 50g butter
  • olive oil
  • 1 can chopped tomatoes
  • a bay leaf
  • 1 tsp dried thyme
  • 250ml red wine
  • 250ml vegetable stock
  • salt and pepper
  • 2 tsp juniper berries, bruised in a pestle and mortar
  • 1 tbsp gluten-free flour

METHOD:

  • Season the venison well with salt and pepper. 
  • In a pan that is big enough to cook the shanks, melt the butter in the olive oil. Set the oven to 150C
  • Over a moderate heat, brown the shanks, one at a time, and then set aside. 
  • Reduce to a low heat, add the onions, carrots and celery to the same pan, and cook until softened.
  • Add the red wine, and reduce 
  • Add the stock, bay, thyme, and juniper and tomatoes and cook down for around 15 minutes. This will give a better consistency and taste at the end. 
  • Add the venison shanks, bring back to a simmer and then cook in the oven for 4 hours. For the last 30 minutes of cooking, prepare any side dishes such as mash, cabbage, etcetera. 
  • At the end of cooking, remove the shanks from the pan, and mix the flour with a spoon or two of the gravy before adding to the pan and bringing to a simmer for around 5 minutes. 

And serve. 

Venison back strap (loin) with a red wine and chocolate sauce

I have used red wine and chocolate before, in a stew with beef, served with fried potatoes and prunes in brandy, stunning. This I tried after watching a videoclip of Gordon Ramsey cooking venison backstrap. No quantities were given, but I have found some clues elsewhere. I added rather too much chocolate the first time. I also struggled to find all of the ingredients he used, so I had to substitute a little. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • Venison back-strap – allow a piece of meat around 5cm x 5cm x 2.5cm, approx 200g or similar for each person. I took one piece of the back-strap and cut it into three. I used local red deer venison.
  • salt
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • 3 tsp butter
  • 3 shallots or one white onion if shallots are not available – finely chopped
  • 1 clove of garlic – finely chopped
  • 2 bayleaves
  • 5 sprigs of thyme, or a tsp dried thyme
  • 12 black peppercorns, ground
  • 1 tsp balsamic vinegar (the original recipe uses raspberry vinegar, but not available locally
  • 300ml chicken stock
  • 300ml red wine
  • 30g unsweetened dark chocolate, finely chopped or grated. 
  • 100g smoked pancetta or streaky bacon

METHOD:

  • Heat the oven to 220C. Cut some grease-proof paper, one section for each serving, and large enough to wrap up a portion of venison. 
  • Lightly season the venison with salt. Heat the oil in a pan until it is very hot, and then sear the venison on all sides. 
  • For each portion of venison, place on a piece of grease-proof paper, add a teaspoon of butter, wrap and put onto a small roasting tray. Put into the oven for eight to nine minutes. 
  • To make the sauce, fry the onion and pancetta in a small pan with a little olive oil , thyme, bayleaves and black pepper. As it starts to brown, add the garlic until that too is cooked. 
  • Add 300ml red wine, and reduce to a thick sauce by simmering. 
  • Add 300ml stock, and reduce by simmering. 
  • Strain out the solid ingredients. To the hot sauce, add a teaspoon of vinegar, and then whisk in the grated chocolate over a low heat. Do not bring back to the boil, just hot enough to melt the chocolate and no more. 
  • Take the venison from the oven, slice and then pour over the red wine and chocolate sauce. 

I served this with roasted brussels sprouts and mashed potatoes. This is definitely good with mash and green vegetables. 

Rabbits, apples and cider

We had this tonight, either this was an exceptionally tender rabbit, or the recipe was just fab. I think the latter. As it was midweek, I did my trick of doing the main cooking last night, and then reheating and cooking for another 15 minutes tonight. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 1 rabbit, jointed
  • seasoned flour
  • 50g butter
  • 1 onion, finely chopped
  • 2 sticks of celery, finely chopped
  • 1 cooking apple, peeled and diced
  • 1 good pinch of dried thyme leaves
  • a good grating of nutmeg
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 200g pancetta or diced smoked streaky bacon
  • 300ml dry cider
  • salt and pepper

METHOD:

  • Heat the butter in a saucepan, and fry the chopped apples, onions, bacon and celery together. When the onion is soft and beginning to brown, set aside, and add the herbs and nutmeg. 
  • Dip the rabbit in the seasoned flour. Add a little more butter to the pan and fry the rabbit until the joints are browned. 
  • Add the cider and the fried onion mixture, bring to a simmer and season to taste. 
  • Cover and put into an oven heated to 150C for around an hour and a half. 

We served this with mashed potatoes and braised cabbage. It would be excellent with parsnips too. 

Easy venison casserole

This is a basic venison casserole that could be made with meat from the shoulder, or other cut suitable for stewing. It is very simple and tasty. You could vary the vegetables a little to your taste. I have posted a similar recipe in the past, I think, but with a few more exotic ingredients.

INGREDIENTS:

  • 700 to 900g venison, in 2cm cubes, trimmed of potential elastic bits
  • 2 tbsp plan flour, seasoned with salt and pepper
  • 2 tbsp rapeseed oil
  • 2 onions, chopped
  • 2 sticks of celery, chopped
  • 4 carrots, peeled and diced
  • 1 neep/turnip/swede, peeled and diced
  • 200g smoked pancetta or bacon
  • 1 bunch of parsley, finely chopped
  • 1 tsp dried marjoram
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 1 tsp dried thyme
  • 300ml stock
  • 300ml dark ale
  • salt and pepper to taste. 

METHOD:

  • Set the oven to 150C. Prepare the meat and vegetables. Dip the cubes of venison into the seasoned flour. 
  • Heat the oil in a large casserole dish and brown the venison in stages, so it cooks in a single layer and browns easily. Put this in a dish for adding back to the casserole later. 
  • Fry the onion, celery and carrot together with the bacon until the onion is beginning to brown. 
  • Add the herbs, and stock, bring to a boil and add the ale. Bring back to the boil and add the meat and neeps. Adjust the seasoning at this point. 
  • Cook for 2 1/2 hours at 150C. You can cook it for a couple of hours and then set aside for reheating and a final half hour of cooking the next night. 

We ate this with mashed potatoes and brussels sprouts.

 

Rabbit cacciatore

I reserve the right to edit this recipe from time to time. I have been testing out a few variations on this theme, and this one is the best so far. It has taken a bit of experimentation and quite a few rabbits. Thanks to those of you who have been supplying me and to those who have butchered them for me. I’ll need to learn how myself one day. 

INGREDIENTS:

  • 1 rabbit, jointed
  • 15g plain flour
  • salt and pepper
  • mustard/rape-seed oil
  • 100g smoked pancetta
  • 1 carrot, diced
  • 1 onion, diced
  • 2 sticks of celery, diced
  • 2 cloves of garlic, chopped
  • 1 red chilli, chopped
  • 2 sprigs of rosemary, chopped
  • 200g mushrooms, sliced
  • 1 red pepper, chopped
  • 75ml red wine
  • 2 tbsp tomato paste
  • 500ml stock
  • 20 black olives, stoned
  • chopped parsley

METHOD:

  • Preheat the oven to 180C
  • Season the rabbit meat and flour with salt and pepper. Dust the rabbit with the flour.
  • In a large oven-proof pan, heat the oil and fry the rabbit in stages, browning on all sides, and setting this aside when done.
  • In the same pan, add the onions, garlic, carrots, celery, peppers and pancetta and cook slowly until soft. 
  • Add the rosemary, wine and mushrooms and cook for a further five minutes, evaporating off any surplus moisture
  • Mix the stock and tomato paste. 
  • Add the olives and rabbit to the pan, and pour over the stock. Put a lid on the pan and put it in the oven to cook for around an hour. 

Best with mashed or baked potatoes.