The venison was a gift and we were really excited about
cooking it, as Tim loves venison and I hadn’t had it before. Turns out the
venison shot in our area is amazing. It is grain fed because we are surrounded
by wheat fields, and if I hadn’t known it was venison I would have thought we
were having beef tenderloin, it was that mild and tender. We got the recipe
from a website that I am now regularly referring to: Hunter Angler GardenerCook. He has a lot of amazing recipes and information for using wild game and
foraged foods.
For the rice I checked out a few recipes and then combined
them into what I wanted. I sautéed the white part of 3 green onions, thinly
sliced, in some oil and butter. I added a little carrots and celery, also
finely sliced. Once the vegetables started to soften I threw in a cup of
basmati rice and let that start to toast. Once the rice was toasty I added 1 ½ cups
of chicken stock, two sprigs of fresh thyme, and ½ cup of fresh cranberries. I
brought that to a simmer, lowered the heat and covered the pan. 15 minutes
later the liquid was absorbed so I took out the thyme sprigs and stirred in ¼ cup
of dried cranberries, ¼ cup of walnuts and the green tops from the green
onions. The rice had a faintly purple hue, it was sweet, tart, nutty and very
delicious. I will definitely be making rice like this again.
For the green beans, I wanted the flavors of green bean
casserole without a big, gloopy casserole so I caramelized half a yellow onion,
thinly sliced, threw in some thinly sliced mushrooms and some fresh green beans
and sautéed it all together until the vegetables were cooked through. Finish it
with a little butter and it was perfect. Honestly, the squash was mostly to use
up some extra butternut squash I had. I peeled it, cubed it, tossed it with
olive oil and salt and roasted it at 350 degrees until golden brown and
delicious.
For Christmas day we went a little more traditional. We had
spiral ham, mashed potatoes and gravy, sausage stuffing (or dressing, if you
like, since it wasn’t actually stuffed inside anything), Brussels sprouts with
bacon and cranberry sauce.
The ham was store bought, but for a glaze we did a riff on
Alton Brown’s ham crust. We used honey, molasses, brandy, whole grain mustard,
and some crumbled molasses cookies. (Alton’s original crust uses bourbon and
ginger snaps, but I didn’t have either of those.) Cooked down a bit and brushed
on the ham it created a glaze that was sweet and spicy and complemented the ham
really well.
Even though we were doing a ham, both Tim and I wanted
stuffing, so I cubed up half of a Tuscan style loaf of bread then sautéed some
sausage with mirepoix (onion, carrots, celery) and fresh sage, then tossed it
together with some chicken stock. We packed it into a casserole dish and baked
it alongside the ham. It turned out very good, but next time I will remember to
butter the inside of the casserole dish, the bread stuck pretty badly.
Brussel sprouts with bacon is easy and so delicious. Just
trim the bottoms off of some sprouts, halve them, then dunk them in some
boiling water for 2 minutes to blanch them. Drain them, then slice up several
slices of good bacon. In a good sized skillet or cast iron pan cook the bacon.
When the bacon pieces start to crisp, remove them with a slotted spoon so most
of the fat remains. Toss in the blanched brussel sprouts and cook over high
heat until the sprouts soften and start to char in spots. Remove, season with
salt and pepper, and top with the bacon pieces. So yummy.
Finally my cranberry sauces wasn’t too inventive this year
since I’m still missing most of my pantry. Whole fresh cranberries, zest and
juice of an orange, brown sugar, a little cinnamon, and a pinch of salt.
Well, hopefully that gave you a feel for our holiday feasts. Not too shaby for our first Christmas alone, huh?
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