All in the Family featured the curmudgeonly Archie Bunker. Archie was television’s most famous grouch, blunt, blustering, straightforward and untouched by the PC crowd. He was the archetype of the conservative male. Michael desprately tried to reeducate him, but he persisted in his breviloquence.



Looking back at the last 40 years, we realize: ARCHIE WAS RIGHT!

12/17/2015

For Lunch

This is a story over 20 years in the making.  Years ago I made a trip to Germany.  While there I stayed at an inn that made everything in house.  I mean everything.  The food was grown on the farm.  They had their own livestock and butchering facilities.  They had a bakery where they made bread and they brewed their own beer. 

My first night they served us a wonderful meal.  I knew that something was different and I (in my mind) innocently asked what the meat was.  This made my waitress very nervous.  She was afraid to tell the table full of Americans that in addition to growing and making everything in house, they also shot Bambi and offered him up to the tourists.  Eventually she fessed up.

I was delighted and told her so.  Not only was she relieved that I liked it, she was surprised to learn that I hunted and enjoyed eating venison.  This put me in remarkably good standing with my hosts and gained me preferential treatment the rest of my stay.

Last month I bumped into a casual acquaintance of mine.  Growing up he split his time between Fort Belknap and the white world.  We were talking about this and that and he asked me how hunting was.  That lead to a discussion about fixing venison.  I mentioned that I had this wonderful venison dish when I was in Germany.  He asked me to describe it, and then told me what it was.  Apparently his half Blackfoot and half German Grandmother used to make "the best mule deer sauerbraten in the world".

He gave me some pointers, and today I enjoyed the result of 5 days worth of marinating and slow roasting Bambi's younger brother.  Not only was he fall apart tender, he literally melted in my mouth.  I'm not claiming to be on par with my buddy's grandmother, but I've got an idea of where to start working on it.

8 comments:

  1. That inn must have been used to more liberal anti hunt types of customers previous to you.

    When my daughter and I took our road trip from Oregon to Colorado a number of years ago, there was a motel in SE Idaho that had a restaurant that served all kinds of game meat like venison, antelope and even buffalo.

    I chickened out on trying any of it, but I thought that was very cool of them to cater to folks who like that kind of stuff.

    There are a number of big websites which actually offer recipes for cooking game. I am glad your recipe turned out.

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  2. WaterBoy12:49 PM

    Please post the recipe, if you can. We just came into an entire deer's worth of venison, and I'm itching to try some different dishes.

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    1. How much damage did it do to your car?

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    2. WaterBoy8:20 AM

      Hehehe. No, this was one of WaterGirl's clients. They had more than they could store themselves, and since you can't sell it they just gave it to her.

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    3. Susan1:44 PM

      Just from a little googling, it appears that your crockpot is a great option for cooking venison.

      To about 3 pounds or so of boneless venison, you could add:
      Onions, garlic, mushrooms, maybe some wine, tomatoes, Lea & Perrin W.sauce, maybe cream of mushroom or chicken soup, and maybe some neutral stock.

      Venison sausage is another tasty option to go for too. I bet Res has a great recipe for that. Would be a good alternative to pork sausage for breakfast.

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  3. This post is useless without recipes.

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  4. I have a deer to thaw out and butcher you know.

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  5. Black asked for the recipe too. I'll have to type it up.

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