Month: September 2019

I grew up in a small town in Michigan; my father didn’t hunt but many of my male relations; uncles, cousins, etc did go deer hunting. Genuine wild venison was a feature of the autumn in my childhood. Cooking venison was focused on two things; moderating the game taste and getting the best from genuinely free range lean meat. Slow cooking is one great way to accomplish both of those things.

Much commercially available venison is close to ‘ranched’ but if you’ve got your hands on genuine wild venison, this is your recipe. I suggest a cut with the bone in – venison shanks do amazing in this recipe but monitor the cooking time. The more bone and connective tissue, the longer it will need to cook.

I had a piece of boneless venison haunch and I probably cooked it for an hour longer than it needed. Still tasted great but the meat got a little bit drier than it should have.

There is no browning of meat here – why brown meat you’re going to cover in herbs, dark beer, vegetables and stock? It is very easy to make your venison tough when browning. If it makes you feel better, roll the meat in a little flour before putting it in the slow cooker.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 3-4 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 onions, chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 200 grams bacon lardons
• 2 large or 4 small carrots
• 2 beef stock pots or 4 stock cubes
• 1.5 to 2 kilos of venison, either whole or cut in chunks. If on the bone, leave on the bone, this really adds flavour
• Cooking brandy
• 1 large bottle (or can) of Guinness Extra Stout or other dark stout. I had a bottle of chocolate stout (who knows why) that I used
• 1 tablespoon brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon dried rosemary leaves
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 square of bittersweet chocolate
• 1 cup of pearl barley

Instructions

• Get your slow cooker ready and put the meat in it on high heat while you are prepping the sauce and vegetables.
• Use a large deep frying pan, heat the olive oil with a small pat of butter to medium high heat.
• Add the onions, garlic and carrots. Cook over medium high heat for two minutes. Then add the bacon lardons. Cook until the onions and garlic are softened.
• Throw a couple of tablespoons of cooking brandy on the vegetables, turn up the heat and burn off the alcohol.
• Turn the heat back to medium, add the beef stock cubes or stock pots and soften.
• Pour in the dark stout, again turn up the heat to burn off the alcohol. Get it to a nice burble, then add the brown sugar, the herbs and the square of chocolate.
• Once all the above are incorporated, add some water (not too much). Once back to a slow simmer, pour all the sauce onto the meat in the slow cooker.
• Cook for 4 to 6 hours on high, depending on the cut of meat you’ve used. This is not exact but the bigger the piece of meat and if it has a bone in it – the longer it will need to cook. A shank will take longer to cook than a piece of boneless haunch. Keep checking the meat for tenderness, when you can see it is falling apart or you can stick a table knife in, it’s ready. About 90 minutes before your expected finish time, add the pearl barley. (Or add the pearl barley after 3 hours). It absorbs the excess sauce, cooks up beautifully and makes this a direct to the bowl meal.

I hope you enjoy this as much as we did. Keep on cooking, baking and commenting. Let me have your feedback and requests.

You don’t need sourdough starter discard to make this recipe, I’ve included a version below without starter. With the sourdough starter – it is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. Without the starter, it’s still great and will make better crackers than you can buy. The recipe is infinitely flexible; you can change the type of flour, the type of fat, the seasonings, the type of seeds and the toppings. I suggest that you make it as per the instructions the first time to get the technique down.

I made this several times, altering the seasonings each time until arriving at this recipe. The Davinator said ‘write that one down quick so you don’t lose it’.

Is this recipe easy? It requires some technique. This is a good recipe to practice your rolling technique and working with parchment paper because the ingredients are inexpensive. There are a couple of gadgets that make it easier and quicker. But you don’t need the gadgets. Useful gadgets for this recipe; a marble rolling pin, a spike dough roller and pizza cutter.

The good trick in this recipe – roll out the dough between two sheets of parchment paper. You can roll thin and even and make lovely crackers.

Recipe

Ingredients (see all the flexes below)

• 350g sourdough starter discard
• 100g whole wheat flour
• 100g all purpose or bread flour
• 60 mls olive oil
• 1 Teaspoon salt
• Water – a couple tablespoons as needed to bring the dough together
• 1 teaspoon of chilli flakes, crushed ( I ground in a small mortar)
• 2 teaspoons of Italian herbs
• 2 teaspoons of sesame seeds
• Salt grinder for topping
• All purpose flour for rolling out

Method

1. Pre-heat your oven to 160C fan (180C with no fan) (350F)
2. Put all the ingredients except the water in a bowl that fits your mixer. Mix well, then use the dough hook and ‘knead’ in the mixer for 3 minutes or so. You’re not trying to develop gluten here so longer isn’t better.
3. If the dough has formed into a ball, you’re ready to roll out. If not, add cold water a tablespoon at a time and knead for 30 seconds until the dough comes together in a ball. Should take one or two tablespoons at the most.
4. Cut parchment to fit your baking sheets. I used four baking sheets to bake these crackers, you can rotate yours. You also need at least one additional parchment sheet to use as a cover.
5. Place a sheet of parchment on your rolling surface. Flour the parchment, place about 1/4 of the dough on the sheet. Flatten with your hands, and flour the surface. Roll the dough flat and as thin as your nerve will tolerate. This is where the heavy rolling pin comes into its own – focus on getting the middle part flat and then the edges.
6. Flip the parchment with dough over and peel off what was the bottom piece (easier than peeling off the top piece). Using a fork or your spiky roller punch a lot of holes in the dough. Puncturing the dough keeps your crackers from getting puffy. Take your pizza cutter or a knife and cut the crackers into pieces. You do not need to separate the crackers on the parchment.
7. Slide the parchment onto a baking sheet and place in the oven for about 20 minutes on the upper shelf. I put the first sheet in and then roll out the second. At 10 minutes, I move the first sheet to the lower shelf and put the new sheet in on the upper shelf. Or prep two, rotate them half way through.
8. 20 minutes is a guide – keep an eye on the crackers because the edges will usually be thinner (especially in the beginning) and will brown more quickly.
9. Remove from the oven and let them cool on the baking sheets if you can so the crackers get just a little crisper. If the crackers feel soft or chewier – put them back in the oven for 3 minutes at a time.
10. Let cool before eating, In theory, these will keep for 10 days to 2 weeks. In this house, there have never been any left after 48 hours.

Flexing this recipe

There are so many ways to customise this recipe. Here are some suggestions:

1. No sourdough starter? Use 175 grams of flour (whole wheat, bread, all purpose) and 175 mls of water instead. You won’t get the sourdough tang but still really lovely crackers.
2. Vary the mix of flour in the recipe. Use rye, more white, less white, more whole wheat. I haven’t used any alternative flours like blue farina or spelt but it’s worth a try. Keep an eye on how much water you need.
3. Use different types of fat. I’ve used butter, bacon fat, sesame oil (very strong taste). We’ve settled on olive oil. Your fat should be liquid when mixing the dough so melt in advance.
4. Go wild with the seasonings. You can use up to 6 or 7 teaspoons of small seeds – sesame, black sesame, flax, hemp. Rosemary. Black pepper. Cumin. Oregano. Garlic or onion salt. Use combinations that you like and what you have in the cupboard. I found three open containers of chilli flakes – hence the chilli in this recipe.

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