A French club was coming in for dinner, and I was told they would expect escargot. The only problem was snails weren’t on the menu, and the party was coming in the next day. Fresh out of helix snails in cans, I gathered a party to excavate the deep freeze of the French concept/restaurant I…
Carnivore
Halibut Cheeks with Wild Peppermint, and Watercress
A few years ago I was reading a book on Venetian cooking when I came across something interesting: a dish of scallops cooked in a simple pan sauce with peppermint. Along with watercress and teeny nettles, peppermint is the first wild herb I start to see in the Midwest. The mint seems to cry for…
Maple Sugar Venison Bacon
Venison bacon is a thing, a smoky, delicious thing. But I don’t see many people making it. Do a google search for venison or deer bacon and what you’ll find is definitely not bacon, they’re basically recipes for a sort of spiced meat loaf made with pork. Calling something like that bacon, to me, is…
Lobster Mushroom Burbot with Crayfish Butter
Burbot was one of those interesting local fish, like sunnies, crappies and perch that were hard to source through fish purveyors, no one seemed to carry it. Eventually I got to try my first after someone was nice enough to grab me a couple packages from a fish shop up in Cumberland, Wisconsin. I knew…
Smoked Venison Ribs with Spicy Wild Plum Glaze
If you’re a hunter, and you throw away the ribs, all I have to say is you’re missing out, and you might consider taking them sometime, because they’re a helluva meal. As a chef, I never had time to hunt. Now, freelancing, consulting, and doing my own thing, I do have more time, and although…
Smoked Venison Shanks Glazed with Birch Syrup
I don’t know if there’s anything more satistyingly primal than a whole venison shank. I got to have a couple of them this year, braised and glazed with wine, or reduced grape juice, like I did with goose confit. Really though, my favorite way to have them is glazed with their braising juices reduced into…
Venison Rib Chops with a Black Trumpet Crust
The best part of butchering your own animals is the creativity, giving you the ability to make all sorts of things, and one of the grand daddy’s of them all is a rack of venison. If you want to know how to cut a rack, just search you tube, there’s lots of info out there….
Desert Stew
Learning to forage food in my backyard in Minnesota and Wisconsin has made me do a lot more than find food where I live and learn about my environment. Now, whenever I travel, I find myself going on the same sort of culinary scavenger hunts wherever I go. Barrel cactus fruit were the latest desert…
Jaegerschnitzel with Leccinum Gravy and Acorn Spaetzle
The snow is quickly melting, and I’ve been working hard to use up my stores of 2018 preserves. I have a lot of mushrooms and game (mostly venison), but, it was a great year for acorns too-I discovered a new white oak that gave the best acorns I’ve had yet. Thinking of how I could…
Hotch Potch
The “green holiday” is coming tommorrow, and, while I won’t be eating corned beef and cabbage, or drinking beer with green food coloring in it, I do have a fun Scottish recipe for you, and, a video replete with Scottish themed music at the end to go with it. It’s not Irish, but it’s close…
Hunter’s Borcht with River Grape and Wild Caraway
Winter, also known as “clean out the freezer” season for foragers. If you’re a chef, have game in the freezer, or buy large quantities of meat from a local producer, you’ll experience with the scenario of having a little of this, and a little of that. last week, what I had, was one lone Canadian…
Venison Pot Roast with Chanterelle Stuffing
I was a good mushroom hunter last year, and made plenty of chanterelle duxelles for the Winter, both to save freezer space and as I love having a seasoned concentrate around. There’s lots talk about making duxelles, but definitely not as much illustating the actual uses of the finished product. With that in mind, I…
Lotus Root Confit Stuffed with Sausage
Funky water tubers with their air-channels stuffed with sausage is my favorite go-to recipe with lotus root confit. The air channels are basically begging to be stuffed, and although you’ll need commercial, and not wild lotus root, unless you got some huge pond monster. It’s a great way to use these funky things, especially if…