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Small Game - Rabbits, Squirrels and other critters

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Hasenpfeffer German-American

2 lb. rabbit
5 slices of chopped bacon
1 mid size onion diced
2 Tablespoons flour
2 cups water
1 Bay leaf
1/2 cup red wein
Salt, Pepper, Sugar to taste

Wash the rabbit and cut into one inch pieces. Fry up the bacon in a Dutch oven or large pot. Add in the onion and rabbit and brown on all sides. Sprinkle the flour over it and saute another minute or so. Add water and cook until thickened. Season with salt and pepper, add bay leaf, cover and cook slowly for 1 1/2 hours. Just before serving add the red wine and a dash of sugar.

Submitted by Badwind
 
Lapin la Moutarde (Rabbit with Mustard) FRANCE

1 lg Rabbit, about 4 lbs, cut into serving pieces
1/2 c Dijon mustard
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
2 tb Unsalted butter
1 sm Onion, finely chopped
1/2 c Dry white wine
1 Bouquet garni
1/3 c Creme fraiche
2 tb Chopped fresh parsley


Spread the pieces of rabbit with the mustard.
Heat large skillet with the butter in it over medium high heat. Brown the rabbit, turning often until the pieces are quite brown, about 15 minutes. Remove to platter.

Pour wine into skillet and scrape up the brown bits. Reduce heat to medium and place the rabbit back in the skillet. Add the bouquet garni. Cover and simmer till the rabbit is tender, about 35 to 40 minutes.

Submitted by Badwind
 
MORTE DELLE STRADA

Three or four good sized squirrels, brined and thawed, or two rabbits
Olive oil
Honey
Italian Salad Dressing
Fresh Garlic, 1 clove
Salt, Pepper, etc.
What you do:
Heat a large skillet over medium heat and cover the bottom with olive oil, a couple of tablespoons of honey and add about a 1/3 cup of Italian salad dressing. Adding these together will prevent splattering later. Slice up the garlic glove and add the slices to the mix. While this is heating up, prep your game.
Start off by cutting the squirrels (or rabbits) into pieces: legs and back meat, which is arguably the best part as it is always the tenderest, but for some reason people miss it. Rub a little salt and pepper into the meat.
Once the garlic starts to fry and the salad dressing begins to boil, stir it back together with a wooden spoon, and then carefully add the meat. Since this is probably a little damp be mindful of spatter.
Brown the meat and add more salad dressing as needed to keep the meat from frying too much. Cover the pan and let cook for about fifteen minutes. Do NOT let this cook down yet! Wild game has little or no fat and needs outside assistance to stay moist and tender. After you have let the meat fully cook and really soak up the juices, remove the lid and turn up the heat a little. This will help cook down the dressing/honey/olive oil mixture. When the mix has nearly cooked down, add another teaspoon of honey for each piece of meat in the pan. Coat completely and allow the honey to caramelize just slightly on each piece.
For anyone who just raised an eyebrow at
 
Squirrel

7-8 Squirrels (or more if you like), debone the meat and cube into small pieces, just a touch smaller than you would if using beef.
4 carrots peeled and sliced
4 potatoes peeled and cubed
1/2 large onion roughly diced
1/2 Jalepeno finely diced, use the whole thing if you like it spicy.
3/4 cup frozen corn
3/4 cup frozen peas
8 ounce tub of mushrooms, they come sliced. Not the canned ones, but the ones in the produce section.
1 packet of beef stew mix
Crock pot, and it's KEY.

Now what I do to prepare this is mix the stew mix and water in the crock pot, then add the prepped veggies. Cook on HIGH for roughly 30 minutes or so, give or take. Then add the squirrels and turn to LOW and slow cook it for 3-3.5 hours stirring periodically. Season with salt/pepper to taste. The squirrel meat comes out so unbelievably tender and tasty, it's unreal.

Submitted by KyFlintlock
 
WA’s Chicken Fried Beaver

1 beaver, cut to serving portions
2 Italian sweet onions
4 oz. saltine crackers "1 sleeve"
1/2 cup shortening
1/4 cup bacon drippings
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1/2 teaspoon paprika
salt & pepper to taste

Parboil beaver in salted water with onions until tender. Heat shortening and bacon grease in a large heavy skillet. Mix thyme, paprika, salt, and pepper, rub into beaver, coat well. Crush crackers to fine crumbs. Roll beaver pieces through cracker crumbs to coat well. Cook real slow with pan 1/2 covered until browned and tender. Serve.

Serves 6-8

Submitted by: Walks alone
 
Hot Sauce Deep-Fried Turkey Breast


Cut one half of a turkey breast up in pieces about 1/2" thick, pat it dry and put it in a big bowl. Stir in about half a big bottle of Frank's or Durkees hot sauce (don't worry about using too much) and let it soak for at least 15 minutes---30 is better. Pour off any liquid that comes to the top. Then dump in a big splash of buttermilk and 1 beaten egg and stir it in well. When you are ready to fry, just roll it in a 3 to 1 mixture of bread crumbs and self-rising flour (with a little salt and pepper added) and drop it in when your grease is around 350-355 degrees. A 3 to 1 mix of cracker crumbs and flour is good too.
Deep frying in peanut oil seems to work best. It's a lot faster too if you're feeding a bunch of folks, and the oil doesn’t burn as easily. When it gets done it'll float to the top. Don't overcook it or it'll get dry and

Submitted by: Jeff aka. FW707
 
"Squirrelenpheffer"

Boil your old squirrels in lightly salted water until the meat will fall off the bone. Pick all the bones out and discard them. Reserve the meat until you have prepared the following.

Dice potatoes into 3/8ths inch cubes,...cook in the same skillet you did the squirrel in. Stir/sauté in half a stick of real butter until potatoes reach a consistency you prefer. You may want to adjust the amount of salt at this point and I love lots of black pepper added at this time...

Add squirrel back into the skillet with the potatoes and stir until well mixed and all ingredients are nice and hot again.

Serve onto plate or into bowl. PLACE A LARGE DOLLOP OF SOUR CREAM ON TOP OF IT! This is the part that really livens up the dish.

I do this same dish with rabbit and call it Hasenpheffer....since this is squirrel I call it "Squirrelenpheffer".


Submitted in memory of Two Shadows
 
Grandpa's Hasenpfeffer

Ingredients:

5 lbs. rabbit meat
1 cup vinegar
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 lemon, sliced
1 large apple cut in chunks
6-8 prunes
3/4 cup raisins
2 medium onions, sliced
2-3 tablespoons pickling spice
5-8 dried red peppers
Browned flour (rue)
sugar, vinegar and salt to taste

Preparation:

Place meat in large kettle. Cover with water (over meat). Add rest of
ingredients and lets stand for 24 hours.
Boil until meat is nearlydone, take out only the meat, and cook the rest until
apple and prunes are well cooked.
Strain thru a fine sieve, mashing all ingedients to save the juices.
To the juice add the browned flour to make a thin gravy.
Add meat and simmer till meat is fully cooked.Add vinegar, sugar and salt to taste.
More water may be needed depending on the toughness of meat.
Serve over rice, mashed potatoes or bread.

Submitted by Snake-eyes
 
Whistle Pig Pie

Ingredients:

1 Woodchuck (whistle pig)
2 small potatos cut into small cubes
2 carrots also cubed
1/2 cup of peas frozen or canned
1 small onion
1 clove of garlic
1 1/2 cups of Bisquick mix
3/4 cups water
1/2 tsp of basil
salt and pepper
2 cans beef gravy

Preparation:

After dressing and skinning the woodchuck soak over night in salted water. Drain and cover with fresh water, simmer in a large pot for at least an hour and a half until meat is tender and pulls off the bone easily.

In a seperate pan boil potatos and carrots until tender and peas if they are frozen. Saute onions and garlic until tender. Place onions,garlic,carrots,potatos and peas in a 9x9 pyrex baking dish and add gravy then the meat from woodchuck,add basil and salt and pepper to taste and mix all together.

In abowl add Bisquick and water and mix completely, a few lumps is OK. Batter should have consistancy of a thick cake mix. Pour over top of other ingredients and spread so it is all covered by batter. Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes or until crust has a nice medium brown color.

The woodchuck is very mild and tastes great in the gravy with the veggies poured over the biscut crust topping. I like it better than squirrel.

Submitted by Don
 
Fried Squirrel

Flour and season the pieces, fry like chicken. When nice and crispy add a glass of water and cover skillet with a lid. Cook on a low heat until the pieces start to fry the second time after the water has evaporated. Remove from the skillet, pour off the excess grease and make gravy from the pan crumbs and a little flour. Salt and pepper the flour that you are browning in the skillet, add a touch of hot sauce. When the flour turn the color you desire add water to the contents and stir until the gravey is formed. Thin with more water to the desired thickness and stir until finished. Great with mashed potatoes, biscuits, rice, or just plain bread.

Submitted by: Jblk
 
Brunswick Stew

Ingredients:

7 squirrels - boiled and deboned (get those pesky pieces of shot out too...)
1 large can whole stewed tomatoes - drained
1 small can tomatoe sauce
1 can creamed corn
1 can early peas - drained
1 package frozen lima beans
1 package frozen corn
1/2 to 1 bottle of barbeque sauce
1 can of chicken (optional if your tree rats are on the small side...
1 onion (or you can use dried minced onion as it will have plenty of time to rehydrate)
garlic to taste

Preparation:

The night before, boil and bone the squirrels. In the morning, put the ingredients in a large crock pot on the low heat setting. Start with just a half of a bottle of barbeque sauce. My suggestion is to NOT get a sauce that is really sweet as it will overpower the rest of the ingredients. Kraft original will work fine. I started ours at about 7am and we had dinner that night at 6:30. It was bodacious! I put a dash of Louisana hot sauce in mine, and we served it with homemade corn bread. YUMM!!

Submitted by Pork Chop
 
Rabbit in 40 cloves of Garlic

Ingredients:

Rabbit, cut in half or fourths, enough to cover the bottom of your Dutch Oven.
Enough Olive oil to cover the Rabbit half way.
6-8 sprigs of fresh thyme.
1 sprig of Rosemary
40-50 cloves of peeled Garlic.
salt & pepper

Preparation:

Pre-heat the bottom of your Dutch oven enough to brown the Rabbit.
Depending on the size of your Rabbit, cut into halves or quarters, not too small, about the size of a chicken breast.
Season the Rabbit with salt and pepper on all sides.
Add enough olive oil to your pre-heated Dutch oven to cover the bottom.
Brown your Rabbit pieces on both sides until lightly brown.
Toss in the galic cloves and distribute them between and on top of the Rabbit.
Pour in enough olive oil to come up about half way to the top of the Rabbit.
Put your sprigs of Thyme and Rosemary on top of the Rabbit.

Cover the dutch oven and remove from the bottom heat source. Put enough charcoal on the lid to keep the oven around 325-350, (your oven will vary).
Cook for at least an hour. Resist the temptation to open the oven. "If you're lookin' you're not cookin".

The Rabbit should be falling apart when it's done. Serve over potatoes or rice.
Extract the now roasted garlic cloves and spread them over sliced bread. They'll have the texture of soft butter.

* You can substitute the Rabbit with cut up Chicken, squirrel or small game birds.


Submitted by Mr. Gray
 
Jeff's "Kiwi" Bunny

Ingredients:

2 rabbits, boned
2 teaspoons minced ginger
1 teaspoon dried Corriander
2 gloves garlic
salt and pepper to taste
1 1/2 pints chicken stock
1 large onion
flour
olive oil

Preparation:

Coat meat in seasoned flour and brown in olive oil over high heat. Into slow cooker or dutch oven add onion coarsely chopped, garlic, ginger, corriander, salt, pepper and stock. Cook at low heat for 6-8 hours.
Add root vegetables as an option. Some thickening may be required.

Submitted by JeffinNZ
 
Roast Rabbit/Hare (18th-19th century)

Ingredients:

(2) rabbits,
Half a loaf of bread,
Parsley
Sweet marjoram
Thyme
Salt
Pepper
Nutmeg
(4) ounces of butter
Cream
(2) eggs
Butter
Parsley
Many of the old recipes had no amounts for items used, just common knowledge of the day.

Preparation:

Rabbit or hare was an esteemed dish in the 18th and 19th century, so much so that cooks occasionally doctored beef to try to make it taste like hare.

After casing (skinning & gutting) two rabbits, skewer their heads with their mouths upon their backs, stick their forelegs into their ribs, skewer the hind legs doubled (this approved position in which 19th century rabbits appeared at the table); next make a stuffing for them of the crumbs of half a loaf of bread, a little parsley, sweet marjoram and thyme-all cut fine, salt, pepper and nutmeg, with (4) ounces of butter, a little good cream and (2) eggs; put it into their bodies, and sew them up; dredge and baste them well with lard; roast them about an hour. Serve them up with butter and parsley. Chop the livers, and lay them in lumps around the edge of the dish. (serves 4-6).

Note: a rabbit and a hare are different, according to Harpers Magazine, a rabbit being raised and a hare being wild. Wild hares in some areas are reported to have a disease and may be harmful if eaten. Harpers’ 1853.

Submitted by buck conner
 
Grouse with Wild Rice

Ingredients:

2/3 c Wild rice
2 c Chicken broth
1/4 c Butter
8 Grouse breast filets
3 Eggs (beaten)
1 c Flour
Garlic salt, oregano, and basil to taste
2 tb Butter
1/2 c Chicken broth
4 oz Mozzarella cheese (sliced)

Preparation:

Combine the wild rice with 2 cups of broth and 1/4 cup butter in a saucepan, cover and cook until tender. (keep warm)

Rinse grouse filets and pat dry. Pound the filets between waxed paper with meat mallet until tender, then combine with the eggs in a bowl. Let stand for 1 hour.

Combine the flour, oregano, garlic salt, basil, and pepper to taste in a bowl and roll the filets in this flour mixture, coating well.

Brown on both sides in 2 tb butter in a skillet. Then add enough broth to cove the bottom of the pan and simmer filets, covered, for 10 min.

Place 1/2 slice of cheese on each filet and cook until cheese is melted. Serve with the rice.

Tastes so good, it'll make you want to slap your Mama!

Submitted by flintlock62
 
BBQ pulled squirrel

Ingredients:

1 squirrel
1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon of seasoning salt
1/2 teaspoon of mesquite seasoning
Sweet baby rays BBQ sauce

Preparation:

Clean squirrel and boil in water until meat is white and can easily be pulled off the bone with a fork, shred meat with fork until stringy. Place meat into skillet and add garlic powder, seasoning salt and mesquite seasoning and stir in and lightly sear meat, then add sweet baby rays BBQ sauce to liking and serve on your choice of bread. one squirrel = one serving, more squirrels the better! enjoy!

Submitted by Sam86
 
Rabbit in a Roaster

Ingredients:
1 rabbit
2-4 slices of bacon
1 sliced onion
2 carrots diced
2 potatoes diced
2 stalks of celery sliced
1 cup chicken stock

Preparation:
Put the potatoes on the bottom of the roster pan than put the rabbit on top with back facing up put the carrots celery around the rabbit now pour in chicken stock last but not least put as much bacon as you want on the rabbits back cover and bake on 375 for 2 hours or until the rabbit is tender.

Submitted by: Woodsroamer
 
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