So Jamie shot a deer this past season, and now we have cuts and cuts of venison in our freezer. Which is great! Except that I don't care for venison. :) I can tolerate the summer sausage, but no matter how hard I try, all I can see is the deer strapped to the roof of the SUV with it's tongue hanging out.
Today, though, I am trying a venison recipe. Jamie's grandma gave me some venison recipes, and I am trying a "Dutch Oven Garlic-Rosemary-Studded Venison Rump". After looking at the total cooking time (about 2 hours) and the directions, I am thinking this recipe is about 45 min. of prep time. After buying most of the ingredients (could not find cippolini onions?) I started. First step, crushed garlic. After looking up how to do this on youtube, I tried it. Took about 15 minutes to cut, peel, and crush 8 cloves. My hands were sore from pushing down "just so" on the knife and dragging it across the minced garlic until I achieved a "pasty consistency". Then more work, and finally I came to working with the roast itself. "Remove sinew/silver skin," it says. Easier said than done. I think we need new, more sharpened knives. My back began to ache as I was hunched over the sink. Finally, I said "good enough."
So, now, THREE hours later, my roast is only 30 minutes into its 2 hours of cooking. My kitchen is a mess. I have brewed several cups of buillon/beef stock, cleaned, peeled, and cut celery, parsnips, carrots, and onions, minced and crushed garlic, proceeded to shove that garlic (along with rosemary sprig leaves) into little holes in the roast, rubbed the roast with olive oil, along with several other unintentional things that caught some oil remnants, burned vegetables twice in the Dutch oven (who has time to wait for 'sauteed' items?), washed the pot out twice just to use it again....
Here's the best part - the recipe calls for red wine. Only a cup. Wanna guess how the rest of the bottle will be put to use? Mmmm-hmmm....so I grab a huge wine glass, pour some merlot, take a sip....only to see a dead spider in my glass. Wine has been spit out and I am back to the coffee.
Next time I will try an easy recipe, not one that is for a champion chef at a wild-game lodge. Maybe the George Foreman and some seasoned salt will do just fine.
