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Jan. 20, 2010
By Milli Gilbaugh
NORTH LIBERTY LEADER
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| Milli Gilbaugh |
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I recently came across a cookbook given to me by a neighbor several years ago. Its title is "Indian Cooking" as in Native American cooking. While I find some of the foods described faintly familiar, some are so exotic that they make me shiver. When a recipe says to "mix well with grease" or "pack with plenty of wood ashes" I lose interest real fast!
I did, however, enjoy reading about all the different ways to prepare wild game. It seems natural, as the Native Americans were cooking wild game long before God invented the supermarket. I didn't find one recipe for game that sounded nearly as good as the way my mother cooked it. My dad was an avid hunter and a respectable proportion of the meat on our table was the result of his patience and marksmanship.
Dad didn't like to hunt alone (a wise choice, since hunting accidents can happen to the most careful hunters and hunting is usually conducted in remote fields and woods where passersby are unlikely to stumble across a hunter in need of help.) He had three or four regular hunting companions and at least one of them would be available at nearly any time Dad had the urge to go after some rabbits, squirrels or pheasants. Their luck was usually pretty good and, when it was spectacular, there would be a flurry of dressing out and preparing the meat for the freezer. I particularly remember a whole washtub full of squirrels he and his buddy Benoni harvested one weekend day. I even have a photo of the two of them having what appears to be a tug-of-war pulling the skin off a squirrel. And, I remember dozens of skinned rabbit carcasses hanging on the clothesline one winter day when he and Nick came back from a particularly successful hunt.
My mother always appreciated the fact that Dad believed the hunter was responsible for cleaning the game and it always came into her kitchen ready for the pan. She had several favorite ways to cook the results of the hunt, mostly floured and fried similar to the way she cooked chicken - with older, tougher critters put in a roaster with onions, carrots, bay leaves and some water, then steaming away in a slow oven until the meat was tender.
I've found that garlic and carrots are especially good with most wild game and I've added a few extra touches of my own over the years.
After my husband could no longer hunt and my sons grew up and quit bringing me the results of their hunting trips, there was precious little wild game in my kitchen for several years but, recently, my granddaughter's husband surprised me with a plump, tender young squirrel and I decided to give it the royal treatment with all the best tricks I'd learned over the years. If you should be so lucky as to have a squirrel or two to cook, you might want to try my method - it turns a squirrel into a real treat.
MILLI'S BRAISED SQUIRREL
For each squirrel (dressed but left whole):
Place cavity side down in roasting pan and cover the thickest parts of the meat with strips of bacon - about two strips per squirrel. Roast in 350° oven until bacon is crisp.
Add to the pan, (per squirrel) 1/2 cup chopped onion, 1 bay leaf, 2 cloves of garlic crushed. Add liquid to about ½ inch depth in pan (half water and half dry wine or chicken broth with 1T of wine vinegar per cup.) Cover and return to oven for 30 to 40 minutes, reduce heat to 300° and replenish liquid as needed. When meat is nearly tender, add ½ cup thickly sliced carrots per squirrel and ½ cup sliced mushrooms, cover and continue roasting until carrots are tender.
Remove squirrels and remove meat from bones. Discard bones and bacon. Thicken juices with flour or cornstarch* to make thin gravy and adjust seasoning with salt and black pepper if needed. Return meat to gravy, heat through and serve over mashed potatoes or hot biscuits.
*Stir small amount of cold water into flour or cornstarch until smooth. Add more water to consistency of light cream. Gradually stir into hot pan juices and simmer until thickened. 1T flour or ½ T cornstarch thickens 1 cup liquid.
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