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What do you do if you love to hunt but are not fond of venison? I was never faced with this as I started out hunting to supplement my parents food supply. I beamed at every meal when my venison was served. I was asked by a new hunter what to do as he was the only family member to dine on the meat. I suggested he give a package or two of meat to each landowner who extended him the privilege. What do you guys do if you have success beyond your immediate need to consume?
Teach people how to cook it. If you don't like venison, you're not cooking it right. It's better than beef and leaps and bounds better than chicken. The only orthodox meat that holds a candle to any kind of venison is bacon.
Don't get me wrong I love venison. I know how to make it inedible but I was not talking about that. To make inedible venison I have a simple recipe. Shoot the deer several times over a two day period . When You have broken it down enough to finally kill the beast put it on your car hood. This works best in warm weather. Next report the animal if required. Drive a couple days showing off your kill then field dress it. This requires a strong stomach. The next step is to hang it in a warm place to age. This treatment also works for farm raised animals. With this method you can get people to swear off pork and beef too. Sorry guys ;My sense of humor got the best of me. I would only consider giving venison away to those who would appreciate it and as such am very fussy in my processing.
My fiancé had a strict no venison mindset when we first started dating. 2 years later and she says bear is her favorite cheeseburger, she takes her elk steak medium, and requests a steady supply of deer jerky.
An open mind towards it and proper preparation goes a long ways. And if they’re still not a fan, then sausages, salami, and jerky are always a crowd pleaser.
greenmountain, that's a very true post, but field prep is only 1/2 of it. Cooking, no matter the food, is an art. And there is good food and there is bad food and a lot in between. If you want a few easy recipes to start people off on, let me know. Be warned, you'll have to do them yourself. It takes someone vested in the meat do it right, but the people you serve will be sold.
I can say the buck and doe that I killed last Nov in Iowa (corn and soybean feed) tasted the best ever.
The deer I kill down here in Alabama (not corn or bean feed) taste a bit different. Not bad tasting, but definitely not as good as the Iowa hogs.
Start a jerky business! Potential is enormous.
If you like your beef steaks medium rare, you need to cook venison to rare.
Anyone who can't stand to see pink in their meat is likely going to say venison tastes "gamey".
I always ate venison because I liked to hunt. The meat seemed ok but nothing special to me. Now I’ve learned a lot more about cooking, largely in part from cooks like Hank Shaw. No more over cooked, drown in cream of mushroom soup meat for me. Now it’s absolutely the best red meat. My kids don’t want other red meat, my neighbors and their kids don’t want any other red meat. I know I could serve it at the nicest restaurants. Partly because I learned a lot about cooking and combined that with dry aging at the same time. Even if it’s just the idea of a family member not liking it, a single person can easily eat 4 or 5 deer a year by themselves without even trying. My wife is a life long vegetarian and my daughters are young, so they aren’t eating as much as an adult.... I still need 6 whitetails to get me through the year.
There are plenty of people out there that have never eaten venison but are happy to try it. But then, there are some folks that no matter what, will not eat it. My wife is one of the latter. So be it, more for me. But whenever I show any of these photos to people that do eat meat but don't eat venison, they all say, oh hell yea, I'd eat that!
But to answer your question directly, find a program for meat donation. Organizations like Farmers & Hunters Feeding The Hungry are doing tremendous work getting the meat distributed. It's a great way to help people in need, it's a great way to help promote hunting and it's a great way to utilize the high quality organic protein you are producing, so it's a win-win all around.
It’s been said above. Four variables will dictate how well deer and ungulates taste.
First is field care. You gotta get it cooled ASAP. No and, if’s , or but’s about it. If the weather and humidity prevents that, plan accordingly. Because without this, it isn’t going to be nearly as good as it could have been.
2nd is, keep it cool until processing it. Once again, plan accordingly.
3rd thing is to cook it properly. Which means rare. If you cook it rare and don’t eat it quickly, it will cook through medium while resting on the plate.
This might be the most misunderstood variable here. People use their experience with beef as a guideline for cooking wild venison. Which means they’ve automatically over cooked it. Just explain to them that under cooked meat is purple with no juice. When deer meat leaves a juicy “blood” on the plate, it’s just right. Anything else is over cooked.
The fourth and last is to know how to cook the cut of meat you are working with. Get a Rinellia cook book for that.
Russel, I have to agree, the IA deer I've shot have been some of the best I've had.
I'll try to answer the question.
If I don't want or need the meat at the time, I either: (a) Donate to Hunters for the Hungry, or Share the Harvest, or whatever the MO equivalent is called (been a while since I've done this) (b) Give the deer to someone else. I live a quarter mile from a gob of Amish, they're usually happy as can be to take a deer. (I did this just a couple weeks ago) (c) Have the deer processed into summer sausage and give it away to family and friends that don't hunt, or my landowners (d) Have the deer processed into summer sausage for myself
I like deer meat. I LOVE elk meat. But sometimes you can't eat it all. The best option is to start making a long list of people who would be happy to take one.
Nice pics, Busta! Ghost Pines Cab is a staple of my diet. Venison, when prepared right, is fantastic. When we first started dating, my girlfriend was shocked when I told her it had been years since I purchased red meat from a store. Such a healthy way to go.
I've accepted that some people will never get past the mental/visual barrier of eating a rare steak. Luckily, there are ways around it, and it starts with a Jaccard tenderizer.
Various meat sticks. Every kid in the neighborhood will come over daily until your supply is gone.
What Idyll said in post #2. Gospel truth right there.
My wife used to like “well done” (yuckyuck). Over the years, by disguising myself as a romantic, and “dimming the lights” and lighting a candle when I brought the meat to the table I have successfully converted her to a medium rare gal and pretty well rare on venison. This was a slow progression LOL. And now, we both LOVE venison. We didn’t ten years ago though