Be still my yummy heart...

I'm at the final leg of wrestling with this silly plague. Last night, I was in need of something to boost my system and get healthy once and for all. You can keep your echinacea, your tinny flavoured zinc tablets, your chalky Vitamin C lozenges and your wimpy herbal teas.
I ATE A HEART!

Well, not the whole heart. But a good chunk of it :)

I am currently having a love affair with reindeer meat.

I have a couple of reindeer hearts hoared in my frozen meat stash. At $5 a heart, they are the cheapest cut of meat up here. And it's from a local free range herd. Win-Win!

Technically, the heart is not an organ meat. It's a muscle, a beautiful, finely grained, lean muscle.

I trimmed all the excess fat and gristly parts and gave it to the pups'.

gristly top of the heart

The rest I sliced into 1/2 - 1/3 inch slices.

I was tempted to marinade or do a spice crust or make a wine reduction but I opted for a simple dusting of salt and pepper and seared the pieces.

I wanted taste the flavour of the heart without adulteration. 

The slabs of heart were seared (in bacon fat, of course) for about 2 minutes on each side over medium high heat. I wanted it medium rare. For such a lean cut of meat, you don't want cooked anymore or else risk a dinner of shoe soles. You want to still see the muscle fibres slightly quivering with echoes of their former lub dub lub dub

Here's Lyra about to chow down on some raw reindeer heart and kibble (yep, spoiled stinking rotten):

Here's my plate of reindeer heart with roasted cauliflower and shichimi yams:

Yeah, that's all for me. I'm a growing girl :P
The reindeer heart was done just right with mild gamey flavour. The finely-grained meat was tender enough to cut easily with a butter knife. I did add a dollop of horseradish and whole grain mustard as condiments to my plate. Nice and simple.

That said, I could see this meat doing really well in a garlic and fresh herb marinade and grilled on the bbq. Another future experiment would be reindeer heart satay. The walls of the hearts could easily be seperated with sliced into thin strips for that.

I'm also wondering if I could utlitize the chambers of the heart for stuffing other yumminess into it and baking or braising it. Oh, the possibilities!

For dessert, sickly sweet photos of dear, dashingly handsome, darling husband snuggling with Loulou:

Have a yummy week!

Reindeer + Bacon Fat = Belly Love

I know. I've been a bad blogger.
This last while has been absolute mayhem at work thanks to the annual sheepbang that is 'End of Fiscal Year'.
I've also been hit with the joyful craziness of family weddings and the not not so joyful plague.

Prior to all this craziness, I made a batch of Reindeer Carnitas that I've been planning to share with everybody.
Traditionally, carnitas is made with fatty cuts of pork slow cooked for hours until it's bathing in its own lardy goodness. It continues to cook in this pool of splendid fat slowly until it's browned and absurdly yummy.

It is quite simply, genius.

I had purchased a couple of boxes of reindeer meat from a local herder. I got everything from hearts to ground reindeer to a bunch of roasts.
I threw a couple of the frozen roast in the crockpot with a liberal grinding of sea salt. Set it to low and walked away. I let it cook overnight.
Yes, I did NOT add any liquid. I am a reckless crockpotter. It's how we roll up here :P
Reindeer is a pretty lean meat and the roasts did not render out enough fats for browning. Especially since I scooped the marrow out of the bones and ate it straight on its own. I am a greedy pig I know. I did let the puppies lick the grease off my lips.

So I added my fave fat: BACON FAT.

This is my perpetual pot of bacon fat. It kinda looks like ice cream

  I have this super awesome killer crockpot that has a stovetop safe insert. I broke up the meat into smaller chunks and plopped the lard into the crockpot then finished it all over low heat on the stove.  I let it cook until all the liquid was gone and the meat got all brown and crusty on the outside. One pot cooking at it's best!

Served on a bed of shredded lettuce, with a dollop of salsa verde and homemade guacamole.
Yes, it was stupidly good. The meat was crispy and caramelized on the outside and tender on the inside. The flavour of the reindeer was deep and rich without being too gamey and the bacon fat provided a nice boost of unami. 
Probably one of my favorite ways to cook beast.

For dessert, crazy sweet photos of cute puppy-monkeys:

Have a great spring!