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The MacDonald tradition. Traditional meat pie with made from scratch eggnog on Christmas Eve. I have had every meat from rabbit to squirrel to moose to venison in this meat pie. I have experimented with all kinds of seasonings and spices. Back to basics with beef, pork, salt and pepper — a little Belgian beer for moisture. The crust makes the meal with salt, pepper, and paprika liberally disbursed within it. Diced meat not ground.

Sort of finger food night. Venison eye of round Carpaccio with the other EOR seared and sliced rare. Grilled octopus as the “veg”.

Ducks for two. My oldest son and I really like wild duck. Tonight we had seared Mallard breast with confit’d legs and hot roasted teal. Red currant based reduction as a dipping sauce.

Sous vided the legs from two ruffed grouse for 12 hours in butter and thyme before browning them in the pan and roasted the breasts and served with a sauce made from grouse stock, blackberry jelly and port. Also had some 6/8 per pound jumbo prawns just tossed in oil and garlic and fired hot cast iron in a hot oven for 5 minutes. And caccio e peppe that I screwed up by letting is sit too long while fiddling with the other dishes.

I have SV them. They are good but I generally like them so rare that a minute per side right on the coals is all I need. I am currently SV ruffed grouse legs in butter and thyme for 12hrs though. We'll see how that turns out. You may be right but when I am comparing, I want to make sure all the same steps are followed for each cut. I'll try another time without opening the bag.

Wet aged venison experiment.. We shot a deer on the first day of the season in November when the temps were too warm for our typical aging regimen. So the venison was cut within 24 hrs and put into the freezer but I decided to keep back a outside round (bottom round or silver side -- depending on your location) roast and wet age it over 21 days. Vac-packed the roast and let it hang in the refrigerator for 7 days before opening it up and slicing off the top third which I repacked labelled and put in the freezer. Drained and dried the remaining portion and repacked to hang out for another 7 days before I repeated the procedure above -- except I cut the roast in half. The last third hung our for another 7 days before being opened dried and repacked to go into the freezer. I left them all frozen for 2 weeks before opening them all up for testing. Aprearance-wise, all three steaks looked the same. Odor-wise, the 7 day aged meat had almost no odor while both the 14 day and 21 day had a meatier aroma that was still clean and not off-putting in the least. All three portions were cut in half, given a simple salt and pepper treatment and pan fried in canola oil to an interior temp of 130 F. The center cut portions of each steak had a similar appearance. As for taste? Our panel of three expert carnivores (my sons and I) all agreed that the 7 day aged steak was fine but rather flat tasting compared to the others. It was also the toughest, despite coming from what is typically the most tender portion of the roast. Opinions were split as to which of the other two tasted better with a consensus that there wasn't much difference between them -- both were flavorful and much more complex than the 7 day portions. On tenderness, there was a 2-1 split in favor of the 21 day aged meat. The dissent may have come because one boy had their 21 day portion from the bottom of the roast, near to where it attaches to the femur, and that portion is typically tougher to begin with. Again, the difference was so subtle that it wouldn't have been noticed normally. Regardless, there were no leftovers. The verdict was that wet aging venison for up to 14 days can improve it's flavor and texture significantly. Beyond that doesn't seem to be worth the time or effort however. In the future, I will take the other outside round that is in the freezer, defrost it, drain and dry it and then repack it and let it hang out as a whole cut in the refrigerator for 14 days to see if the results are similar.

Made a nice stuffed breast of vension. Took the entire brisket off the deer -- both sides as one piece still connected. Gave it a light rub with salt, pepper, sugar and a little Ethiopian Berbere spice and let it set up overnight. Stuffed it with diced carrots, onions, garlic, celery and potatoes partially cooked in lots of butter and more Berbere spice. Tied it up and gave it a sear before simmering it covered in the oven for 3 hours in wine, venison stock, onions and a can of tomatoes with lots of butter and more Berbere. Let it rest, sliced and served over couscous with the remaining sauce having been blitzed in the vitamix. There were no leftovers .Definitely a keeper for the future.

Probably. This was my first time playing with it though and I always use high heat first so I can wrap my head around what I'm dealing with. This meat was more of a smooth muscle than the striated ones we are used to in other cuts.

I buy it. I found a little European deli nearby that now does mail-order due to COVID and they sent me three jars of the the jelly for the same price that I can source one jar from Amazon. Finding fringe ingredients in rural Canada is always a challenge.

Still experimenting with some little used venison cuts while they are still fresh. This is the thin layer of muscle that exists between the skin and carcass of animals. It gives that striped pattern to the back of properly skinned lamb and deer carcasses but most hunter pull it off accidentally with the skin. Slathered it with a thin layer of duxelles and thyme, salt and pepper and then rolled and tied them before searing and placing in a 450 degree oven for ten minutes. Sliced thickly and served with a port wine, venison stock and red currant jelly reduction and pomegranate seeds. Tasted like venison and mushrooms but had a texture like very tender, thin calamari. Interesting to say the least and I'd have to try it again with different flavourings before I could decide whether I actually like it.

Yesterday we butchered the deer we shot on Monday and I took the time to fish out smaller cuts that are kept on beef but usually hit the grinder in smaller deer. From the top in the first pic are flat irons, the lump that is attached to top round that we usually trim out because it contains a blood vessel (I'm sure someone has the real name), tri-tip and picahna. McIntosh apple is to give an idea of their size. Cooked them on a super hot 600 degree grill. Pictured from the top is picahna, top round lump, tri-tip and flat irons. The plate clockwise from top right -- picahna, top round lumpish thing, tri-tip and flat irons. Tri-tip had the best flavor but was the chewiest, the picahna was super tender and had great flavor so was the best overall, the top round lump (please someone give me a name for it) was good and the flat iron was strangely disappointing and not just because it got overcooked. Third time we have had them this year and I doubt I'll take the time to salvage them from the sausage pile in the future.

Farfalle with venison ragu.

Cannibal sandwich made from the chain that runs alongside venison tenderloin. Raw venison, raw onion, salt, pepper, parsley, a bit of olive oil and some parsley on pumpernickel. I'm stuck at home isolating so no worries about the bad breath.

Shot the last deer of the season on Monday. Tonight was grilled deer heart with grilled peppers and onions and oven roasted spuds. Embraced the bell peppers tonight. More char than I wanted on the veg. The Big Green Egg (knockoff) got too hot.

Venison (moose) sauce piquante from https://honest-food.net/venison-sauce-piquante-recipe/. Replaced the bell pepper with charred and skinless Poblanos though.

Venison tenderloin tartare.

Roasted ruffed grouse.

Have you used pine smoke before? I have a ceramic cooker and I'm active on the Komodo Kamado forum (http://www.komodokamado.com/forum). There, I've long advocated putting wood chips or chunks in a cast iron dutch oven with a few small holes drilled in the bottom, and the lid sealed on with flour paste. (This is to place on a charcoal fire, temperature controlled like sous vide by a PID controller.) The idea is to "distill" the most pleasant part of the smoke, making it one more flavor in balance. Even then, I prefer apple to stronger wood smokes for most purposes. I'm having trouble imagining that pine smoke would contribute a desirable flavor. A very light smoking with pine does depending on the recipe. Maybe a half hour at most.

Use a really big meat saw. I use this one on my homegrown pork and not a chipped bone to be found.

Hey Alex, Depending on how the moose was cared for, it can definitely benefit from a few days in the fridge. Was it hung for any amount of time before butchering? Old or young moose? If I've been forced to butcher an animal before the optimal hanging time of 14 days (I had to butcher my moose two days after taking it) I take my roasts and after defrosting them I put them in a large ziploc with a huge wad of paper towel underneath and leave it in the fridge for a few days. This improves the flavour and texture somewhat though not nearly as much as proper aging on the bone does. Sous vide works excellently with elk and moose. I recently did an elk roast sous vide for 12 hours at 130 F and it turned out perfect. For moose I would not go past 135 F (140 max). It is a lean lean animal and temps of 145 and higher are considered well done. 48 or even 24 hours of sous vide is sometimes too much for game like moose and deer. The meat stays nice and pink but the texture can get somewhat mushy -- almost chalky. Moose loin is of a much finer grain than other parts of the animal and more susceptible to this effect than beef. The pic below is of the sous vide elk roast. I Jaccarded it (I would NOT do this for loin), seasoned with salt and pepper and vac packed it in a bag with chiles, lime slices, red onion and olive oil and cooked it for 12 hours at 130 F (54.5 C). Seared it with a torch afterwards. 135 F would give a lighter pink and 145 F would be bordering on gray. The beautiful thing about sous vide is that you could go for 12 hours and then check for texture and doneness -- if happy, chill and rebag and simply bring it up to temp on the day of the meal. If not, rebag and place it back in the bath for more time. Smoking lightly afterwards and then searing should be fine. I liken moose to really beefy tasting beef, you notice that it is not beef but it does not have the tang that deer does, the flavour is deeper and rounder than venison. Big red wines and dark beers were made for it.

Sous vide elk roast on small white beans and split peas.

Pheasant and kale soup. Broth from pheasant carcasses and the meat from the drumsticks of the pheasants -- normally interlaced with bony tendons in wild birds like these.

The Canvasback was long considered to be the supreme being in the waterfowling world. In the market gunning days of the early 1900's a pair of Canvasbacks would fetch $7.00 at the butcher shop (roughly $200 today). The birds were nearly hunted to extinction at the time but have rebounded to become relatively common throughout North America and particularly common in Alberta. Prime male Canvasback Young of the year Canvasback (far left perfect for eating -- colorful plumage does not develop until second year). I don't get very many of these every year so I made a point of using this one to it's maximum potential. I skinned it and removed the breasts and legs as well as reserving the heart, liver and gizzard. Pictured are the breast fillets, the liver (bottom right), and the heart (top right). The breast on the bottom left had a bit more damage fromt the bird shot than I was happy with so I thought to use it differently. The gizzard I confitted in olive oil with garlic, juniper berries, peppercorns etc. I made a small pate from the liver and put together a puttanesca style tartare with the heart. The legs were seared and braised in soy, mirin and duck stock made from the carcass. The shot-up breast, I carefully trimmed and then hand chopped with some pork fat to make a slider topped with a bit of blue cheese and red onions. Whith the intact breast I prepared it veryl simply by salting it and searing it in a super hot pan for a minute a side before resting and slicing. Clockwise from top left: Canvasback slider, Confit Canvasback gizzard on Canvasback liver pate, Canvasback heart tartare, seared Canvasback breast , soy and mirin braised Canvasback legs. A lot of work and prep but so worth it.

Not Pastrami but corned moose tongue and heart.

One of the "benefits" to living in the frozen north is the availability of local ingredients uncommon elsewhere. This year we had the opportunity to put one of natures great delicacies in the freezer and a LOT of it at that. Enter a 900+ lb bull moose. 12 hours of work turned that into abour 600 lbs of component parts and pieces -- all nicely labelled for packing. One of the first meals. A seared round roast that was finished by wrapping it in the rind of a freshly smoked slab of homemade bacon before cooking to an internal temp of 135. This week. Corned moose heart and tongue. Steamed on on rye with saur kraut and swiss. Flavour wise, moose is like a "beefier" beef. It is like the flavour of oxtails but through the entire animal -- even when med rare. The shanks make for an amzingly rich stew. Will post more as we empty the freezer.