Venison is the meat of a deer. Like beef, it can be categorized into specific cuts, including roast, sirloin, and ribs. To cook venison, both dry-heat and moist-heat methods work well. For higher-quality cuts (loins, rumps) dry-heat is best, while lesser-quality cuts do well with moist-heat cooking methods to make things such as stews and meatloaf.
With dry-heat cooking, try to keep the meat rare to medium rare– venison is low in fat and doesn’t have much juice. For moist-heat cooking, you can opt for well-done meat. Generally, dry-heat cooking doesn’t take long for venison, while moist-heat cooking involves several hours for it to toughen up and then become tender again.
If you’re dealing with a mature buck, consider marinating venison to help take away the gamey taste. Marinating venison in vinegar or buttermilk overnight works well. If you plan on making skewers or kabobs, though, marinate the meat for just an hour or two.
For those who like to roast their meat, venison can be roasted in an uncovered pan at 200 degrees for 20 minutes per pound. Utilize a meat thermometer to check to see how your venison is doing. You’ll want to take it out of the oven when it’s about five to ten degrees under the temperature you want. To give you some perspective, rare is 130 degrees, medium is 140 degrees and well done is about 155 degrees.
Want to make venison steaks or chops? Consider pan frying it, using a heavy pan. Add butter, oil and/or bacon fat to the pan, cooking the venison over high heat. After blood rises to the top, flip it over and wait for that to happen again with the other side.
As for browning ground venison meat to be used in chili or stew, add about one tablespoon of canola oil per pound of meat. Heat the oil in a skillet first and then add your meat. Stir your concoction until the meat is fully cooked. For stews, you can use less tender cuts (like shank or neck meat), cut it into little inch cubes, and add it toward the end of your cooking process so it’ll stay tender.