Easy Crock Pot Venison Stew

There are many yummy sounding recipes for venison stew involving various marinades, wines, spices, etc...but when you're fiance calls from the grocery store while you're in the middle of crazy work week and asks for ingredients that will make a quick stew that he can throw into the crock pot - you make something up and cross your fingers that it's edible.  Thankfully, this stab in the dark turned out delish! 

Easy Crock Pot Venison Stew

- One ziplock full of venison (in other words, I have no idea how much meat there was but use enough to feed your family and balance out the veggies) ... Prep:  I can't remember where I read it, but for SUPER tender (and not at all gamey) venison - defrost in fridge for a few days and when it's thawed, sprinkle with salt and soak in ice water and ~1 cup white vinegar for about an hour.  Rinse and either cook it immediately or refrigerate for one day or less (needs to be used pretty quickly after it's thawed)

- Peel and chop enough carrots and potatoes to even out your meat. 

- chop one onion (not sure whether Glenn added garlic or not...but a little or a lot of garlic never hurts!)

- 1 large can cream of mushroom soup

- 1 packet of ranch dressing mix

- 2 cans chopped tomatoes

Dump everything into the crock pot.  Cook on low for 10 hours (I think ours actually cooked for more like 12 or 14...so extra doesn't hurt it!).  Glenn forgot to add the tomatoes in the morning, so they ended up getting added a couple hours before we ate.  Either way is probably fine. 

Nothing fancy...but yummy and great on a cold rainy fall day after football games and parent teacher conferences! 

The Definitive Venison Stew

The original recipe can be found here (the part where it says it's quick and easy should be completely disregarded as laughably false), but as the cooking progressed, the recipe and I didn't agree on several points. So this is my version with important contributions of both help and ideas from Aunt Kathy and Pam.

Ingredients:

2 pounds venison, 1" cubes
1 medium onion, cut into 8 chunks
3 medium carrots, cut into 1/4" slices
1/4 cup finely chopped celery
3/4 t salt
1/2 t ground white pepper (black can be substituted)
2 t dried parsley
1/2 t dried thyme
1/4 t dried rosemary
1 1/4 dry red wine
1 can beef broth
5 slices of bacon, chopped
1/4 c all-purpose flour
1 t tomato paste
1 package cleaned, quartered mushrooms
2 large potatoes (next time I will strongly consider throwing in more potatoes)
1 T corn starch (as needed)


Marinade:
Remove all tendons, fat and silvery skin from the venison (removing this will help get rid of any gamey flavor). Add the venison, onions, carrots, celery, salt, pepper, and the herbs to a glass bowl or casserole dish. Pour 1 cup of red wine and 3/4 cup beef broth over the venison and marinate in the refrigerator for 8 hours, or overnight. Do not marinate for over 12 hours or your meat will turn to mush.

Cooking:

Strain out the marinade and set aside for later. Separate the meat from the marinated veggies. Throw the meat in a large ziplock bag with the flour, shake to cover evenly. 
In a large saucepan over high heat, cook the bacon until it turns crisp.* Transfer the bacon to a paper-towel-lined plate to drain. Pour all but 2 tablespoons of bacon grease from the pan (Note: if you need more grease, augment with vegetable oil). Saute the onions, carrots, celery and potatoes in the bacon grease for 5 minutes, until the vegetables turn soft. Transfer to a large stock pot.

*Venison meat has little or no fat, the bacon is important.

Brown the venison in the remaining bacon grease in two batches and add to the stock pot. With the remaining wine, deglaze the pan, scraping the bottom, add in the remaining broth until heated. Add pan juice, the reserved marinade, mushrooms, bacon and tomato paste to the stock pot. Add enough water to barely cover the stew. Simmer on low for 1 hour until meat and vegetables are tender. If sauce is not thick enough made a paste of 1 T cornstarch and 1 T water. Add to pot and stir until thickened.

This recipe makes 6 to 8 servings.

Indio Viejo

This recipe is well over 600 years old, which makes my inner history nerd extremely happy. Also, it's delicious, so my mouth is pretty jazzed as well. It's basically a thick meat stew that can be made with any or all of beef, chicken, and pork. Normally this is served with rice and tortillas or boiled green bananas, 'cause there is no such thing as too much starch.

1 whole chicken breast, cut into chunks
1/2 lb soft beef, like flank steak or skirt steak
1 packet chicken consume (10g or possibly one cube of bouillon)
1 small onion chopped fine
Bunch mint chopped fine (you can substitute cilantro if you hate mint)
3T butter (or margarine if you're poor and/or lame - I am both, for the record)
1c maseca (instant corn flour, do not use corn meal)
2-3 limes

Boil chicken and beef with the consume in 3 to 4 cups of water. While cooking, skim off oogies. When meats are soft, cut up into bite sized pieces, discard bones (this is my cat's favorite part), set aside. Set cooking liquid aside to cool for later.

Melt butter in large pan, add onion and herbs, fry until onions are soft. Add meat to herb mixture, fry for a couple minutes. Meanwhile add some of the cooled meat juice to maseca, whisk until smooth.  Add maseca mixture and the rest of the juice to pan, add lime juice, adjust seasoning. Cook until maseca is smooth and no longer mealy. You may need to add more water to cook the corn without sauce becoming too thick. 

Serves 6.

Crock Pot Red Wine Stew

Ingredients.

1 small package (1 lb or so) Beef stew pieces. I get the cheap kind, cause I cook it so long it just falls a part in your mouth!

5-6 small potatoes, peeled or not, diced.

1/2 an onion, diced

2 carrots, I don't peel mine, sliced.

1 can tomato paste

1 cup (or so) dryish red wine. I used some leftover Lemberger.

Flour and spices (Creole seasoning, garlic salt, salt and pepper) for dredging.

2-3 Beef bouillon cubes

A bit of butter



Directions.


Cover the bottom of crock pot with hot water and add 2 bouillon cubes.

Cut up potatoes and carrots and throw in crock pot.

Saute onion in butter.

Throw flour, spices and beef into a Ziploc bag and shake.

Toss beef into pan with onions, brown.

Pour a little red wine into pan when beef is just about done browning, sizzle.

Put browned beef into crock pot.

Add a bit (about half a cup) of red wine and one can tomato paste.

Add another beef bouillon if necessary.

Stir.

Cook on high for at least 8 hours. This gets the soup nice and thick and makes the meat SO TENDER! I make it in the morning after a cup of coffee...and let it cook all day.

Serve with Fun Buns (Pictured with soup. Recipe to follow!) and a nice glass (or two) of red wine.

The Creole seasoning gives this soup a nice bite! So beware.

Foods of The World - Potluck

This is a savory dish, wonderfully complemented by sweet amarillos, the recipe for which also follows. It may seem a little strange--rice and potatoes?!--so let me just say, a Puerto Rican diet is not for the faint of heart, or for those watching their carbs! But trust me, once you get a whiff of this while it's cooking, you won't care how many calories or carbs are in it. If you feel the need to assuage any guilt, though, serve it with a salad.

Pollo Guisado con Papas
Stewed Chicken with Potatoes

6 chicken pieces (I use boneless, skinless thighs, but it's your preference)
2 or 3 large Russet potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 large sweet onion, cubed
6 - 12 cloves garlic, minced (depends how much you like garlic!); can substitute minced garlic you buy in a jar
12 green olives (you can always pick them out if you don't like them, but cook with them for flavor)
1 8-oz can tomato sauce
1 Cup white cooking wine
1 Cup olive oil (if you're concerned about the amount, you can reduce it, but I wouldn't go less than 1/2 a Cup)
1/4 Cup white vinegar
1/4 - 1/2 tsp salt

Combine everything in a large pot, stirring to coat the chicken and vegetables with the sauce mixture. Push the chicken down, covering it with the vegetables, to keep it tender and ensure it cooks through.

Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium high. Keep at a steady boil, uncovered, for 30 minutes. Reduce heat to medium and stir, ensuring the chicken is covered again. Cook 30 more minutes. Check potatoes for tenderness; if necessary, cook an additional 15 minutes. If you don't serve it immediately, reduce heat to low and cover.

Serve over white rice with amarillos on the side.

Amarillos
Fried Plantains

These sweet, fried plantains (platanos) are called amarillos in Puerto Rico, and maduros in Cuba. Amarillo means yellow in Spanish, and maduro means mature or ripe, so they're both apt names for the ripe, yellow plantains used to make them!

Ripe plantains (also known as green bananas), 1 plantain per 2 people should be enough
Olive oil (or vegetable oil, if you prefer)

Allow plantains to ripen at room temperature until yellow with black spotting, to the point where they almost look spoiled. Depending on how green they are when you buy them, this could take a week or more, so plan accordingly. You can speed the ripening process by storing the plantains in a brown paper bag with a small apple. Just be sure to keep a close watch on them to prevent spoiling! This is what they should look like.

Using a very sharp knife, cut off the ends of the plantain and split the skin down the length of it. The fruit inside should be pinkish-yellow. Carefully peel. A plantain's skin is thinner than a banana's, and it adheres a bit more to the fruit when it's ripe, so it's not as easily peeled as a banana. Cut off any bruised spots.

Pour oil into a shallow frying pan, about 3/4 inch deep. Heat oil over medium heat. While the oil is heating up, slice plantains into wedges, about 1/4 inch thick.

Place plantain wedges in oil but do not overlap them.

Fry, turning once, until deep golden brown. Drain on paper towels.

Serve and eat together. The two flavors mixing and melting in your mouth...heaven!

You can reheat leftover pollo guisado in the microwave or on the stove top, but I recommend reheating amarillos on a lightly greased or foil-covered baking sheet in the oven or toaster oven at about 300 degrees for just a few minutes.

I hope you enjoy this meal as much as I do. ¡Buen provecho!