Are you game for these recipes?

[Kevin]

Are you game for these recipes?
DNR officials share some recipes for vension, birds, beaver

By Carol Kugler 331-4359 | ckugler@heraldt.com

Rex Watters, wildlife specialist with the Indiana Department of Natural Resources, recently shared some of his beaver stew. Yes, beaver.

Watters procured the meat in a rather unusual way. Early on an October morning, he was in his white pickup driving to the Stillwater Marsh area near Lake Monroe. It was really early — about 4:30 or 5 a.m.

All of a sudden, Watters saw a young beaver pop his head up from along the side of the road.

“This 1-year-old beaver walks out and sticks his head up and says ‘Hi,’” Watters said. “Unfortunately, I was doing 40 mph.”

The beaver’s head connected with the rear differential of his pickup and died. Watters stopped his truck, picked up the beaver and threw it into the back of the pickup. He filled out the roadkill permit he needed to keep the animal and headed off to the marsh, where volunteers were waiting to camouflage blinds for the waterfowl season. While there, Watters skinned and gutted the beaver and put the meat into a cooler.

That wasn’t the first beaver of the year for Watters. A larger beaver was food for dinner at the annual Heritage Days event at Lake Monroe in the summer. For that event, Watters slow-roasted it over an open fire for about four hours.

“It was like prime roast beef,” Watters said. “I had a line waiting to get some of it.”

For the beaver stew, Watters said he used the formula that works for most wild game stew: a quarter to a third of the stew is meat, the rest is seasonal vegetables. For the beaver stew, Watters included turnips, parsnips, potatoes, carrots, broccoli and mushrooms. If it’s earlier in the year, Watters always includes peppers, too.

For the volunteers that helped with the waterfowl blinds, Watters made another of his stews, a Friendship Stew, that included venison, duck, goose, squirrel, beef and pork. Again, he included more vegetables than meat and let it stew over a fire for a long time.

Watters said his favorite wild game is probably venison, “because I get to eat it more often.” He also likes beaver and squirrel. As far as waterfowl, Watters prefers wood ducks, then mallards, followed by teal.

He also offered that people who hunt merganser, a duck that migrates across Indiana, should like the bird’s flavor if they like fish, because “they have that fish oil throughout their system.”

More wild recipes

Another Indiana worker who shares her recipes for wild game is Brenda Louthain, conservation officer in Cass County. She’s compiled two cookbooks of wild game recipes that have been sold to help various state projects.

“The first one I put together was called Indiana Conservation Cooking Tips because it was used to pay rewards for people who turned in poachers,” Louthain said. “The second was for the Indiana Conservation Officers Organization, mainly for assisting with the youth camp, the Karl E. Kelley Memorial Youth Camp.”

The second cookbook is still available from various DNR locations in Indiana and online at the e-store at www.in.gov/dnr, with funds going to help with the camp, where youth ages 15 and younger spend a week learning about hunting, boating, trapping and what a conservation officer does. And some of the recipes from the cookbook are used to feed the kids at the camp.

Some of Louthain’s favorites include the Apple Smoked Pheasant and the Goose Kabobs, also favorite with campers and counselors, Louthain said.

But Louthain doesn’t rely on just the cookbook. This past week she cooked up a stir-fry using duck legs.

“Most people, when they go waterfowl hunting, only breast the birds out. But the legs are good for eating too.”

To stir-fry the legs, Louthain used a Chinese wok with some canola oil and once it was heated, tossed in the duck legs that she had cut into chunks. She stir-fried them with broccoli, zucchini, sweet peas, water chestnuts, yellow squash and asparagus. She also used Shoup’s seasoning, which is manufactured in Franklin and also is good with pork roast, according to Louthain.

No matter what wild game meat is used, Louthain has some advice: “The main factor with cooking wild game is to remove all the fat, and you don’t want any silver skin on it because that gives it the gamey flavor. Any time you fix a duck or goose, make sure you get all the silver skin off of it.”

Louthain said her favorite wild game is squirrel. “The meat is kind-of sweet tasting. I just like it, and I like to hunt, too.”

Both Louthain and Watters say to properly prepare squirrel, you must remove the glands underneath the armpits and behind the knees. Watters said there are sometimes glands in what looks like a fatty layer between the shoulder blades that also need to be removed.


Tips for preparing small game

The taste and texture of small game is dependent on the age of the animal. Young squirrel and rabbit are excellent when fried, but older animals would be more palatable when stewed or simmered.
Pressure cooking is an excellent tool for precooking all small game. Cook at 15 pounds pressure as follows:
• Young squirrel: 15 minutes
• Old squirrel: 20 minutes
• All rabbits: 20 minutes
• Young raccoon: 20-25 minutes
• Old raccoon: 30 minutes
Another method of tenderizing small game is to prepare it using a recipe that requires a moist and slow-cooking method. As with larger game, the small game meat flavor is very dependent on how the meat is taken care of in the field. Immediate removal of entrails is recommended: also known as field dressing. That is a very appropriate term — and waiting until one arrives at home is not considered field dressing.
Source: The Indiana Conservation Officers Organization presents Wild Hoosier Home Cooking



Hasenpfeffer

2 rabbits, cut up
1/2 cup flour
8 slices bacon, cut up
8 ounces fresh button mushrooms, quartered
1 cup chopped onion
3 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sour cream



Marinade

2 cups red wine
1 cup water
1/2 cup cider vinegar
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary
1/2 teaspoon dried marjoram
10 whole black peppercorns

In a large glass bowl, combine rabbit pieces with marinade mixture. Cover and refrigerate for two days, turning rabbit pieces daily.
Remove rabbit from marinade and pat dry. Strain and reserve 11/2 cups marinade. Place flour on waxed paper. Turn rabbit pieces into flour to coat. In Dutch oven, cook bacon until almost crisp. Add mushrooms and onions, cooking until tender. Remove vegetables with a slotted spoon and set aside. Add butter to pan. Add rabbit and brown on all sides. Return mushrooms and onions to Dutch oven. Add salt and reserved marinade. Heat to boiling. Reduce heat and cover. Simmer for at least an hour, until rabbit is tender. Remove rabbit to heated serving platter and keep warm. Blend sour cream into cooking liquid. Cook until thoroughly heated, and serve sauce over rabbit.
Serving suggestion: Serve rabbit with hot, buttered egg noodles.
From Brenda D. Louthain, conservation officer, Cass County.




Goose Kabobs

2 goose breasts, cut into bite-size chunks
1 package Taco Bell fajita seasoning
1 cup cold water
1/3 cup Italian dressing
1/3 cup lemon juice
1 teaspoon liquid smoke
1/2 pound bacon, cut into bite-size chunks
Onion, cut into chunks (optional)
Bell pepper, cut into chunks (optional)
Mushrooms (optional)
New potatoes, cut into chunks (optional)
Your favorite seasonings (Cajun, barbecue sauce, Lawry’s seasoned salt, etc.)
Wooden skewers, soaked in water

Completely remove all the skin and fat from the goose breasts. Cut into bite-size chunks and marinate in a mixture of Taco Bell fajita seasoning, water, Italian dressing, lemon juice and liquid smoke. Overnight is best, but one to two hours is OK. Place goose chunk, with a piece of bacon next to it, on a wooden skewer. Add whatever optional ingredients that you like. Having different colors (red, green, yellow, orange) of bell peppers presents a festive look. Continue adding meat, bacon and other ingredients in an alternating pattern until each skewer is full. Cook on grill or broiler until meat is done.
Variation: Duck may be substituted for goose.
From Deland “Spanky” Szczepanski, conservation officer, Vermillion County.




Apple Smoked Pheasant

5 to 6 chunks apple wood
4 pheasants, cut into serving size pieces
1 bottle soy sauce
1/2 bottle Worcestershire sauce
4 to 5 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 teaspoon mustard powder
Sliced jalapeno peppers (optional)
1/3 cup lemon juice (optional)
4 to 5 apples, quartered

NOTE: If apple wood is not available, hickory works just as well.
Soak apple wood in water overnight. Check pheasant pieces over, making sure all fat has been removed (especially true for pen-raised birds). Combine soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, garlic, jalapeno pepper slices and lemon juice in a marinating dish. Marinate pheasant overnight in refrigerator. Turn dish several times throughout.
Use apple wood in smoker, along with quartered apples in water in the water pan. Once smoker has heated up and is smoking well, place pheasant pieces on grill inside the smoker. Let smoke for at least 1 1/2 hours.
From Brenda D. Louthain, conservation officer, Cass County.

Cookbooks for wild game include the “Wild Game Cookbook,” right, which is out of print, and the “Wild Hoosier Home Cooking,” available at the Paynetown office at Lake Monore and online at the www.ind.gov/dnr e-store.
David Snodgress | Herald-Times