Lora's Cocina

Processing and cooking Javelina: I can't tell you how many times I have been talking to someone about Javelina, and they say something like, " I've never tried them, but I have been told they can't be eaten." Or, " I tried Javelina once, but I didn't like it at all - it was awful!"

Well, I cook and eat javelina on a regular basis. I have served Javelina at parties, and had people tell me that they didn't believe how good it was!

Much of the flavor of the finished product has to do with how the animal is cared for in the field; just like any other game animal, the carcass must be handled correctly. (Most bad-flavored game meat is due to improper handling. If you shot a steer in the field, didn't field-dress it properly, and brought it home by driving with it on the hood of the truck, the resulting beef would not be very tasty, either!)

Suffice it to say that your animal will be treated with respect by our guide/s and/or outfitter.

An old male will probably not taste as good as a young adult female, but that it true for most game animals, or domestic animals. Think of the difference in flavor between a young cow elk and a big bull in rut. The cow will have better-tasting meat.

Javelina is a VERY lean meat. You need to cook it either moist (roast, stews) or very quickly (medium-rare or less). You should also add fat, either on top (wrapping with bacon, beef or pork fat) or by inserting fat into the meat (larding).

Javelina makes excellent sausage and other ground meat. If you want to cook hamburgers on the grill you will need to add fat. I usually use 2/3 meat to 1/3 fat by weight.

BBQ SAUCE

I have 'created' a sauce my family (and others) really like, by just combining bottled KC Masterpiece and Ketchup, equal amounts. Heat it, and adjust seasoning to taste. Add honey, or salt or pepper, or chopped onions, garlic, bell pepper and so on. If the sauce is too thick, add water; if too thin, cook a bit.

NO HOT STUFF?

Due to a severe allergy to capsacin (the oil in hot peppers, such as habenero and jalapeno, that makes them hot)(the oil is throughout the pepper, even though mostly concentrated in the seeds) I do not add any hot pepper or pepper powder to my recipes. However, please add these wonderful flavors to your cooking if you like them!

Sweetened Condensed Milk

I found this recipe in an old magazine. I used it the first time because I didn't have any Eagles' Brand. After that, I continued to use it because the finished product taste so much fresher! This recipe makes one can's worth of milk. Use in any recipe calling for Sweet Condensed Milk.

1 cup powdered milk

2/3 cup granulated sugar

1/3 cup boiling water

3 tablespoons melted butter (DO NOT USE MARGERINE!)

Put all ingredients into a blender and mix at high speed until smooth. Use care because it is very hot! allow to cool before using in a recipe.

Please contact me if you have any questions about how to cook game, or if you would like to see any recipes!

YOU CAN MAKE YOUR OWN FLOUR TORTILLAS!

There are now tortilla mixes, available in most grocery stores. The mix I use is Paloma White Wings, but there are others. The mixes make it easy to make your own tortillas! The trick is to roll the tortillas out VERY thin - you want to be able to see through them. You can make 8 big tortillas in about 30 to 45 minutes.

Beer-Braised Pork Shoulder

I have used this recipe on many different meats - from domestic (and wild) pork shoulder, to elk, to my own hair sheep, and beef brisket. The meat comes out tender and does not taste like beer! It does work better if you do not use a lite or non-alcoholic beer. The alcohol burns off during cooking. Plan on fixing 8 to 12 oz of uncooked meat per serving.

Use less-tender cuts, such as chuck or shoulder. Cut into cubes about 2 inches across, 3 to 4 inches long, and 1 inch thick.

12 to 24 oz beer

1 tablespoon flour

seasoning of your choice (sage, garlic, etc)

2 to 4 tablespoons olive oil or bacon drippings

2 tablespoons real unsalted butter

In a large skillet, brown the meat in the oil. Do not crowd the meat - you may need to sear the meat in several batches. When all the meat is browned, return it to the skillet, and add the seasonings. VERY SLOWLY, add the beer, enough to just barely cover the meat. (If you add the beer too quickly, it will foam up and make a real mess!) reduce the heat to a medium simmer, and cook till the meat is tender and the beer is reduced to about 1/2. This will take about an hour, more or less. Turn the meat over every so often, so it will cook evenly.

About 1/2 hour after you have started to cook the meat in the beer, start your grill. (Propane may be different time-wise from wood or charcoal)

Pull the meat from the skillet, and grill just until the meat has crisped and has grill marks on it. This happens VERY quickly! It may take as little as a minute to a minute and a half per side. (It is helpful if you have 2 people doing this - one person to grill the meat, the other to make the sauce. If you don't have 2 people, make the sauce first, then grill the meat.)

Sauce:

In the skllet, whisk the flour into the juices left from cooking. Cook over medium high heat, whisking constantly, until the sauce has thickened. Add the butter and stir till it melts. Adjust seasoning to taste.

NOTE: If you don't have a grill (or don't want to use it for whatever reason) add about a tablespoon of maple or maple-flavored syrup to the meat at the same time as the beer. When the meat is almost done, watch carefully! because the extra sugar will cause it to caramelize very quickly - and will burn.

Jackrabbit

We hunt Jackrabbits on the Javelina hunts. Long-ears are incredibly fun to hunt with the 22's and archery as well. We have a rule that we do NOT waste meat. So, what do we do with all them rabbits?

Well, for one thing, a Jackrabbit is not a rabbit, it is a hare. Cottontails are rabbits, and have a white meat, like domestic rabbits (like chicken...). Jacks, being hares, have a dark red meat, like beef. My Dad, who grew up in the Depression, called them "The Poor Man's Venison". And that is how I treat the Jackrabbit meat harvested on the Ranch - like deer meat.

The backstraps are cut free and cut into medallions, seasoned, and used as a breakfast meat. I use the meat from the back legs in stews, or grind it and use just as I would any ground meat - up to and including smoked sausage; I won 1st place for my JR smoked sausage 2 years ago at the Comal Co (TX) fair. That's New Braunfels, the heart of German Texas!

I take the front legs and cook either on the stove or in a crockpot, till the meat falls off the bones. Mix with your favorite BBQ sauce (or even "MANWICH") and you have some of the best chopped meat sandwiched you have ever eaten!

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Stewed Ram

3 1/2 lbs older HAIR SHEEP ram meat, cut into bite-sized chunks

2 onions, cut in half lengthwise and then cut into slices

1 large can stewed diced tomatoes

2 tablespoons each Italian seasonings and adobo seasoning

1 tablespoon each mesquite cabrito seasoning, paprika, and unseasoned meat tenderizer

about 1/4 cup oil

about 2 cups water

A tablespoon of flour

About a half of a cup to one cup dry white wine

Season the meat with above seasonings. Brown the meat in about 6 batches.

First batch - put 3 T oil in skillet, and brown. Move meat to stewpot. 2nd batch - add meat and brown, then deglaze the skillet with about a cup of water, and pour juices into the stewpot.

Repeat with the 3rd and 4th batches.

Add the rest of the oil and brown the last 2 batches of meat, moving the meat into the stewpot after browned. This time, though, before deglazing the pan, put the onions in the skillet, along with a bit of water and salt, if needed.

After the onions have softened but not caramelized, pour them into the stewpot. Deglaze again. (You don't want to lose any of the flavor!)

Pour the tomatoes into the pot, juice and all. Add the wine. If needed, add just enough water to almost cover the meat.

Bring to a boil for a few minutes, and then lower heat to a simmer and cover.

Stir every once in a while.

After about 2 and a half hours, sprinkle the flour over the meat, and stir in. Let the meat cook for about another half hour. This thickens the juice.

Serve with (or over) mashed potatoes

This is stewed meat, not meat stew. The meat is very tender and flavorful. This is also good for deer meat, elk, etc. Probably it would be good with goat but I have never tried it . . . This would actually be good for any cut of meat from an older animal, domestic or not.

BASIC BRINE/MARINADE

I have used this marinade for everything from javelina to turkey to bobcat. This recipe makes enough to brine about 20 lb of meat.

1 lb sugar

1 lb non-iodized salt (Iodized salt has additives in addition to the iodine that will react with the rest of the ingredients. Don't use rock salt, but sea salt, Kosher salt, or plain non-iodized table salt are OK.

1 gallon vinegar (either white or flavor of your choice; cider or wine vinegars work well)

1 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup mixed pickling spice

1 gallon hot (185 degree F ) water

cold water

In a clean 5 gallon bucket, mix dry ingredients with vinegar and hot water. Mix until the salt and sugars have (mostly) disolved. Add one gallon of cold water and stir. Let solution cool to room temperature.

Meanwhile, prepare the meat. You can bone the hams of pork, javelina, or venison, or leave the bone in. Poultry can be skin on or skin off. Be sure the meat is clean and game meat should have as much fat as possible removed.

Place the meat into the solution and add cold water to cover. Stir. I put a plate on top with a pint jar filled with water on it, to keep the meat under the liquid. This may be refrigerated, but unless the outside temp is really hot, it isn't needed, as the salt, sugar, and vinegar will act as a preservative.

Stir every few hours. If you have large pieces of meat, you may want to remove pieces and rotate them. Smaller meats, such as chicken pieces, cornish game hens, quail, squab, or backstraps, you can just stir.

The length of time you leave the meat in depends on several factors:

The amount of meat

the type of meat (poultry or red meat) red meat takes longer

the size of the meat (quail will only need about an hour; cornish game hens might need 2 or 3 hours; a couple of 10 pound turkeys might need overnight)

the method of cooking (slow, cool smoking will need longer brining time than rotisserie or grill)

When done, pull the meat out, and air dry or pat dry with paper towels. Cook as desired.

For example, a bone in javelina ham will probably weigh 3 to 4 pounds. I would probably let it soak for a couple of hours. I like to then wrap the ham in bacon or other fat, then in foil, and put on the grill for about an hour, or till the meat registers about 155 on a thermometer. I then open the foil and let the bacon crisp, and pull the ham from the grill, cover, and let rest for 1/2 hour. This will let the juices go back into the meat, and should raise the internal temp to 160 degrees.

Or, you can cook the ham on the rotisserie. I have a basket on mine, and I place the boned ham in the basket, wrapped in bacon. I cook for 12 minutes per pound.

This brine will give the meat the pink color associated with smoked meats, so dont go by meat color to determine if it is done. Use a thermometer, it needs to read 155 to 160 for javelina or pork, and 140 or above for beef or venison. Poultry should read 180. Check in the largest part of the meat, away from bone.

Throwing in my two cents here, but it is really amazing how good nearly any meat tastes when done this way. Randall

How to cook whole carcasses

Since many folks have been getting so many young feral hogs, I thought that I would include a few ideas on ways of cooking them whole.

I have made up a rub that I have been using on pork, ram, beef, and deer and it seems to work very well. I take Italian seasoning and either Adobo Seasoning (an Hispanic spice mix that comes with or without pepper; don’t use the Adobo mole which is a sauce for tamales) or Cabrito Seasoning. Mix them one-for-one. To every 4 or 5 tablespoons of that mix, add 1 tablespoon unseasoned meat tenderizer. Rub the meat all over.

The larger a piece of meat is, and the more uneven, the harder it is to cook. If you have a whole carcass of pork, beef, or lamb, you can very well end up with meat that’s raw and charred, all on the same animal. So if you do plan on having a whole pig for a cookout, plan on standing there at the pit all day and good luck, I wish you well.

Even if you plan on burying it, I would suggest quartering the animal and getting it into a more compact parcel. That way it will cook more evenly.

Many folks want to ‘just put it on the smoker’. OK, if so your best bets are to cut it in half (splitting down the backbone) or quartering it. Splitting will make it more manageable and less likely to burn than the whole carcass.

Randall and I ‘quarter’ an animal 2 ways. The first one you really get 4 quarters; we cut it right down the center of the backbone, then again crosswise right behind the last rib, leaving the flank (bacon) attached to the ribs. The other way we ‘quarter’ actually gets 9 pieces. We cut off the 2 front legs and shoulders; then Randall cuts crosswise, just above the hip bone, and splits the 2 back legs down the tail. Then he cuts the 2 rib plates, with flank attached. Finally, he cuts the loin, back, and neck.

I find it is easier to cook the smaller parts, as each part of the animal has different thicknesses of meat. Remember that feral pig is not as fat as domestic pig, so you may have to cover with bacon or other fat, and/or cover with foil.

Another way to cut the whole animal is to cut the animal in half just behind the last rib. Cut off the ‘arms’ of the carcass at the joint. Season inside and out, season the shanks, and slide the loin end into the rib section, then put the shanks in. You can then season, either wrap in foil for cooking in the ground or on the smoker, or place in a roasting pan in the oven.

If you want to pit-cook the carcass, have either a fire ring or a pit. You need to have a good bed of coals, and enough hot coals to bury the package. I usually start my fire in the morning, and continue adding wood till you are ready to put the meat on. Use the shovel to move the coals aside, and place the WELL-WRAPPED meat on the hot ground. Then cover the meat with more coals. Walk away. Do not add more coals. When you smell cooked meat, it’s ready (can be 5 to 8 hours, depending on the size of the carcass and the heat of the coals.)