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Top Four Tips
01
Game is lean
It's super healthy, nutritious and delicious but doesn't have a lot of fat and can be dry if overcooked so lets avoid that.
Invest in a meat thermometer
:
54-57 degrees = Medium rare
57-34 degrees = Medium
02
Low and Slow or High and Fast?
Slow cooker
Game is ideal for one pot slow cooker recipes over 8-10 hours, especially for hocks or casserole.
Pan Frying
Steaks need a searing hot pan and cook faster than beef, we would recommend rubbing a little oil into the meat before cooking.
Braising or roasting
Saving time on slow cooking and ideal for certain cuts like shanks, haunches, blade roasts, rolled roasts. Needs more attention than slow cooker recipes to baste the meat hourly. Cooking times will be dependent on the size of the roast or shank but starting from 3-4 hours upwards. Put the meat thermometer to work.
03
Browning Game...
You only want to seal the moisture into the meat not cook through. Less in more when browning
04
Acid
Adding an acid of some kind whether cider vinegar, red/ white wine vinegar or mustard to your recipe as it cooks helps to break down the meat.
Buttermilk is also a game-changer for game birds in stir fry recipes, soaking in buttermilk tenderises the meat, we find this works especially well with pheasant.
Cooking Roasts
If you think cooking a roast is a little scary you're not alone, Granny wouldn't have batted an eyelid but roasts aren't part of every day cooking for most now so here's a helping hand.
A meat thermometer is great investment and saves you cutting into the roast wondering if it's ready or not (we have all been there). See above tips section for ideal cooking temperatures.
Bacon is your friend! if like us you're busy people and can't nip in to baste the meat every hour, cook lower and longer, lather some bacon over your roast, secure with tinfoil and it gives you the extra moisture and protection for the venison buying you more time between checks. We recommend this method for slow roasting cooking at 160-170 degrees for 85 minutes per kilo of weight. For extra large roasts (over 3kg) this cooking time can be reduced to 65 minutes per kilo.
Remember to cover and rest your meat, at least 20 minutes!
Hocks and Shanks
Traditionally used for soup, stock and casserole where the hock is large enough. Hocks are a hard working part of the animal and while full of flavour, need a lot of time to tenderise. We recommend slow cooking for a minimum of 10 Hours, or cook until meat is falling from the bone.
Hocks can have a second use once picked clean going into the pressure cooker to force out the bone marrow into a meaty stock.
Shanks and Hocks are different cuts, shanks don't work as hard as Hocks and need less than half of the time than hocks to cook. Exact times will be dependent on size but we would recommend shanks be braised in the oven for 4 hours or more until falling apart.