Been offered venison

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irishteabear

Master of the Pit
Original poster
OTBS Member
SMF Premier Member
Sep 22, 2008
4,185
14
Downingtown, PA
Hubby and kids are camping for the weekend. He just called to tell me a fellow camper bagged a deer but can't use the meat due to an overly full freezer. If I heard correctly I've been offerred a whole hindquarter.
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What does that include? What do I do with it?
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Steaks and roasts Dawn, steaks and roasts!!!!! mmmm good!!!!
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Just don't over cook it. No more than medium rare or it will be like filet of soul....with the heel.....lol
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That would be good for steaks. It could be used for a lot of things, but my personal favorite is to get it made into "dried beef". Actually dried venison, but since you are from PA, it would be exactly like "dried beef", only better. Brooks Meats, on Rt 100, in Bechtelsville could make it for you---Theirs is great. You could make it yourself, but I think it's a really long process of injecting, brining, curing & smoking. I'm not ready for that, but Brooks is.

You could debone it yourself, and take the big side to Brooks, and keep the little side (the turtle) for yourself to butterfly into nice little steaks.

LOL---My 2 cents,
Bearcarver
 
Jerky. steaks, stew meat, roasts ka-bobs, grind and add fat for burgers or sausage. 1/2 venison 1/2 pork butt and make Breakfast or Italian. Possibilities are endless
 
Lots of possibilities. You could do a couple roasts, some stew meat, maybe a couple steaks, smoke it whole, grind it all into sausage, grind it into burger. Just depends on what you want to do with it
 
I have smoked deer meat many times and have found Hickory to be the perfect smoke flavor for it. Trim ALL the fat off! and brine in salt water over night to remove blood and help the meat stay moist and water smoke it. I only use a little salt and pepper to taste. Hope this helps!
 
I agree with WV the reason I have never smoked a leg of venison is the Fat. Its isn't fat like you see on pork or beef where you get nice marbled fat that tasts good. We are very picky with our venison we trim ALL of the fat off or tallow we call it before we eat it. My dad tells me horror stories about when he was little his uncles would bring a venison roast over with all the fat on it and cook it and it made him want to puke. He hated venison for many years until he started butchering his own. We butcher 10-20 deer a year and if it isn't tallow free it doesn't go into our meat.
 
Hubby didn't make himself clear on the phone yesterday. The guy will be going hunting this coming saturday. His freezers are full. Whatever he bags is up for grabs except for the tenderloins, lol. I can request anything I want and he'll try to get it for me.

Suggestions?
 
We bagged 4 deer this year. I cut up the hind quarters for pastrami. Made 2 so far and it was fantastic. If you have the whole deer minus the tenderloins to choose from, take the rest and grind it up for burger or cut up for stew, jerky or sausage.
 
On another note, make sure the local game laws allow him to donate that much meat to you. Every state is different, but it's worth checking. Here in Colorado, you can only donate 20 lbs of meat unless you take it to their house personally, or they have an unfilled tag for that species and sex. Wouldnt want your other half getting stopped in the field with meat he has no license for.
 
No offense to that fellow camper, but it wasn't too many years ago that you were only allowed one deer in PA----Either a buck or a doe. I would think if the guy's freezer"s" are full, he would clean & oil up the old blunderbust and put it away for the year.


Bearcarver
 
Can harvest all the deer he has legal tags for. The SE of PA has SRA's (special regulation areas) with mutiple tags & extended seasons.(Philly area)I don't hunt this area just know some of the regs. All ideas are great advice but just like to add remove that nasty silver skin. I personally like to separate the large muscle pieces,(2 at the top of 1/4) clean all fat & silver skin off. Use these for roasts or slice down for small steaks. Use the rest for buger or stew meat.
 
Congrats Dawn. You could send it to me and I could do q/views on everything that I do with it so you will know next time. No? Oh well it was worth a try.
It is very lean meat and very tasty. Like some stated in an earlier post, -do not over cook-. Deer, like elk, buffalo, pronghorn, etc are from the wild and are not injected with all the chemicals/drugs that beef and pork are so you have nothing but pure, clean and nutritious meat there.
You could also just grind it up for burger. My way is 3/4 lb of deer to 1/4 lb pork fat. And even at that, it seems really lean when you cook it.
Just my 2 cents worth.

Enjoy.
--ray--
 
I realize what the regs are. I live in Southeast PA "5C" area. My son gets at least 2 or 3 tags every year, but he never shoots more than our freezers will hold. I'm sure if we had a friend who asked him for a lot of deer meat, he would get him some, but we wouldn't go around trying to find someone to take deer meat, just so he could go out & shoot another one. I realize you can legally shoot as many deer as you have tags for.
We try to stay with the "Eat what you kill" rule.

BC
 
Check out this site. http://www.fhfh.org/Home.asp

Its a great program and i am a local coordinator in Ohio. Where i live we can take up to 6 deer, over population is a real problem in many local areas/farms. I myself can only finish off about 2 deer per year, but the last 2 years i have shot as many does as i can and donate to this program. First year for our county is in this program and it has been a big hit, over 100 deer donated so far. Again, its a great program...especially with all of the farmers having crop damage tags around here. So, the meat doesnt go to waste anymore!
 
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