HOW TO COOK DELICIOUS DEER HEARTS
BY:JESSE JAMES PIONTEK
HAVE A HEART THIS HOLIDAY SEASON!
Two years ago, I finally became curious enough to save a deer heart when I shot a young 8 point whitetail buck during the Wisconsin Gun Season. I had always thrown the heart away with the rest of the nasty entrails at the deer hunting crime scene. The heart looked so veiny and gross on the outside, so it didn’t look like something that I wanted to eat next to my herb-infested baby red potatoes. Boy, was I wrong about deer heart. After making them for the first time, now I save them everytime for a fresh delicious treat right after harvesting a deer. Here is my recipe and advice on how to impress your deer camp with delicious, fresh deer heart:
Step #1. Have your dad buy really good hunting land. Have him and your Uncle go to schooling to learn how to manage the property so you end up with the coolest hunting land ever. We are talking food plots, drainage ditches, thousands of planted pine trees to hide the hunters accessing the stands, homemade deer beds, selective harvesting of mature trees, etc. Make sure this land is located where deer actually exist. Pretty much the land south of Highway 8 in Wisconsin near heavy farmland will do well. Not areas north dominated by predators with a lack of cropland. The Farmland zones are great, because with a healthy population, if you choose to trophy buck hunt, you will still see a lot of does, fawns, and young bucks, and can (and should) take a doe or two every year with a farmland zone harvest tag to even up the buck:doe ratio, to keep the herd from getting too big, and to have more fun because shooting does is AWESOME!!
Two years ago, I finally became curious enough to save a deer heart when I shot a young 8 point whitetail buck during the Wisconsin Gun Season. I had always thrown the heart away with the rest of the nasty entrails at the deer hunting crime scene. The heart looked so veiny and gross on the outside, so it didn’t look like something that I wanted to eat next to my herb-infested baby red potatoes. Boy, was I wrong about deer heart. After making them for the first time, now I save them everytime for a fresh delicious treat right after harvesting a deer. Here is my recipe and advice on how to impress your deer camp with delicious, fresh deer heart:
Step #1. Have your dad buy really good hunting land. Have him and your Uncle go to schooling to learn how to manage the property so you end up with the coolest hunting land ever. We are talking food plots, drainage ditches, thousands of planted pine trees to hide the hunters accessing the stands, homemade deer beds, selective harvesting of mature trees, etc. Make sure this land is located where deer actually exist. Pretty much the land south of Highway 8 in Wisconsin near heavy farmland will do well. Not areas north dominated by predators with a lack of cropland. The Farmland zones are great, because with a healthy population, if you choose to trophy buck hunt, you will still see a lot of does, fawns, and young bucks, and can (and should) take a doe or two every year with a farmland zone harvest tag to even up the buck:doe ratio, to keep the herd from getting too big, and to have more fun because shooting does is AWESOME!!
Step #2. Get an Outdoor Edge SWING BLAZE knife. They make gutting so much better. The knife swings to a gut ripper, it opens up the deer cavity like a zipper on a jacket. Save the heart, dump the blood out, place in a plastic freezer bag, and refrigerate. Hang your deer, weigh it, take pictures, and celebrate with your family & friends at camp!
Step #3. Use a small knife for boning meat. Place the heart on a cutting board. Looking at the heart vertically, cut all of the top 20% of the heart off and discard. Slice the heart in half, and the insides will look like beautiful steak meat. Thinly slice off the very outsides of the heart. Thinly slice off any arteries connected to the meat. You can then proceed to slice the remaining high quality meat into steaks in sizes that you prefer. Cut them about ¼” to 1/3” thick. This will allow them to cook properly over a fire.
Step #4. Ingredients. If you want your deer heart to be top notch on the dinner plate, you need to get yourself some ingredients that will seal in the juice, and bring out the goods, INSTEAD OF MASKING THEM. Venison is probably the most delicate meat to cook, as far as being very easy to mess up. I think almost all hunters that don’t like to cook pretty much turn venison into a dry, tasteless, shoe tongue that you have to wash down your throat with a glass of milk just to prevent choking. If you like meat medium or medium well, don’t even eat deer meat. It is disgusting medium or more. You would be better off with grass-fed beef or bison. Deer meat is a delicacy for people that love meat cooked properly. The PROPER way to cook fine cuts of meat is rare to medium rare. I stick with medium-rare on most steaks, but on backstraps, tenderloins, and hearts, it is between the two. There is a very FINE LINE between perfect venison and dry, nasty, meat. The ingredients needed are below:
-OLIVE OIL (To keep the meat from drying out – seals in the juice)
-GARLIC CLOVES (A MUST whenever cooking ANY meat or fish)
-NATURE’S SEASONS SALT (This stuff goes great on any wild game or fish)
-WEBER’S CHICAGO STEAK SEASONING (Used to be called Canadian Steak Seasoning. Any steak rub or seasoning intended for Venison will work here)
-WORCHESTERSHIRE SAUCE
-FRESH THYME SPRIGS (A MUST with red meat!!)
-FRESH ROSEMARY LEAVES (Adds a lot of herb flavor to venison)
-GARLIC POWDER
-MUSHROOMS 8 OZ
-PEPPERCORNS (Peppermill)
-ONE BIG, BEAUTIFUL FRESHLY HARVESTED DEER HEART
-BUTTER (REAL butter, no fake plastic substitutes!)
-OLIVE OIL (To keep the meat from drying out – seals in the juice)
-GARLIC CLOVES (A MUST whenever cooking ANY meat or fish)
-NATURE’S SEASONS SALT (This stuff goes great on any wild game or fish)
-WEBER’S CHICAGO STEAK SEASONING (Used to be called Canadian Steak Seasoning. Any steak rub or seasoning intended for Venison will work here)
-WORCHESTERSHIRE SAUCE
-FRESH THYME SPRIGS (A MUST with red meat!!)
-FRESH ROSEMARY LEAVES (Adds a lot of herb flavor to venison)
-GARLIC POWDER
-MUSHROOMS 8 OZ
-PEPPERCORNS (Peppermill)
-ONE BIG, BEAUTIFUL FRESHLY HARVESTED DEER HEART
-BUTTER (REAL butter, no fake plastic substitutes!)
Step #5. Prepare the marinade. The first thing to do is put olive oil in a frying pan. Then add rosemary and A LOT of thyme. Cook this on low heat until you see a tiny simmer starting. Immediately turn the heat OFF. Cut up some tiny garlic pieces from your cloves and add them to the olive oil herb mix. Put the heat on the lowest setting and cover. When the garlic is soft, remove immediately from the heat source and let it sit. Garlic becomes very sweet when fully cooked, but tastes nasty if it browns. The marinade that you just made will be used for dipping your venison before seasoning. Its best to let it cool down awhile so the venison doesn’t “cook” at all during the dipping process.
Step #6. Bring the venison heart out of the refrigerator and let it rest at room temperature around 20 minutes while preparing the mushrooms. You can dip it in the marinade at this time. Lay the raw heart steaks in the oil mixture for a second or two, flip and repeat. Then place them on a plate.
Step #6. Bring the venison heart out of the refrigerator and let it rest at room temperature around 20 minutes while preparing the mushrooms. You can dip it in the marinade at this time. Lay the raw heart steaks in the oil mixture for a second or two, flip and repeat. Then place them on a plate.
Step #7. Cook the mushrooms. For the venison meal, I season the mushrooms with herbs that match the herb seasoning for the venison. So place a stick of butter in a pot. Melt the butter. Once the butter is melted, add a small amount of fresh rosemary leaves, several sprigs of fresh thyme, a lots of garlic powder, and a few good shakes of Nature’s Seasons. Do not over load it, if you do the mushrooms get so salty you can’t stand them! Add the slices of mushrooms on tip and stir. Once the herbs are mixed, cover the mushrooms and boil on medium for a few minutes, until the mushrooms reduce in size about 50%.
Step #8. Start a wood fire outside. I like to use my Weber Little Joe grill. I put an electric charcoal lighter with small chunks of wood on top. You need a good flame before you are ready to start cooking.
Step #9. Season the heart steaks. Start with the Weber Steak Seasoning. Apply a fairly good amount – there isn’t a lot of salt in this. Follow next with cracked peppercorns. Then sprinkle a decent coating of garlic powder, and a light coating of Nature’s Seasons salt. Top with a dousing of worchestershire sauce. Flip each piece and repeat all of the seasonings.
Step #10. Remove the mushrooms. Place them in a bowl and cover. Take the left over butter/herb liquid and pour them all over the deer heart steaks.
Step #8. Start a wood fire outside. I like to use my Weber Little Joe grill. I put an electric charcoal lighter with small chunks of wood on top. You need a good flame before you are ready to start cooking.
Step #9. Season the heart steaks. Start with the Weber Steak Seasoning. Apply a fairly good amount – there isn’t a lot of salt in this. Follow next with cracked peppercorns. Then sprinkle a decent coating of garlic powder, and a light coating of Nature’s Seasons salt. Top with a dousing of worchestershire sauce. Flip each piece and repeat all of the seasonings.
Step #10. Remove the mushrooms. Place them in a bowl and cover. Take the left over butter/herb liquid and pour them all over the deer heart steaks.
Step #11. Place the hearts on the open flame. Let them flame up huge for about 20 seconds. This will cook the bottom and seal in all of the juices. Do not touch the meat to push on them with a cooking tool. Cover the grill to snuff out the flames and prevent burning. Cook the meat about 30 Seconds. Take the cover off, and wait for a small flame to arise again.
Step #12. Once a flame is present, flip all of the heart steaks. This time only cook for about 10 seconds, to seal in the juice. The flames should get decent sized again. Cover the grill, and close the holes to create a smoke show and make the neighbor’s jealous. Cook the meat covered for about 20-30 seconds. This should get you to past rare but under medium-rare.
Step #12. Once a flame is present, flip all of the heart steaks. This time only cook for about 10 seconds, to seal in the juice. The flames should get decent sized again. Cover the grill, and close the holes to create a smoke show and make the neighbor’s jealous. Cook the meat covered for about 20-30 seconds. This should get you to past rare but under medium-rare.
Step #13. Remove meat, place on plate. Let rest for about 30 seconds. Sample a piece and see if it is cooked enough. Always lean your cooking times into a fashion that will undercook. You can always cook them longer, but you can never take back the cooking from a nasty, over-done piece of venison. If it is cooked enough, serve them promptly on a place. Cover them in your mushrooms. Serve with a red potato and a glass of cold whole milk. Devour and live longer and happier.
