Buffalo Steaks with Blue Cheese and a Bourbon Glaze

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If you ask someone to name the Big Five game, they’ll probably tell you: lion, leopard, elephant, rhino and and hippo.  But they’d be wrong.  Through some horrific injustice some idiot decided that buffalo deserved to be in there instead of hippos.  Buffalo!  Glorified African cows!  Can you believe that?  Buffalo wouldn’t even deserve to get into the big five game of Scotland, let alone Africa…

…hang on…

  1. Highland Cow
  2. Deer
  3. Horse
  4. …stoats
  5. …

Alright, it’d get on there.  But only just.

Anyway, buffalo, they’re rubbish.  They’re basically just cows.  They’re clearly going to taste like cow, but let’s find out anyway:

Blind Taste Test

Stu – “Is it buffalo?”, I said, looking at the plate.  “It looks a lot like beef…” I continued, taking a bite, before adding “and tastes a lot like beef.”

“No.” grimaced Suze.

Cue me listing a dozen or so other animals, from giraffe to kudu… before Suze eventually admitted it was buffalo.

So… buffalo tastes a lot like beef.  Maybe leaner … and therefore less tasty, but with a slight sweetness that you don’t get from beef… but, yeah… basically beef.

The Recipe – Buffalo Steaks with Blue Cheese and a Bourbon Glaze – Serves 2

Suze – The thinking behind this recipe was pretty straightforward.  Buffalo makes me think of the US, and so does bourbon.  Job done.  The fact that Stu associates buffalo with Africa didn’t put him off the scent, however!  The internets indicate that people (Americans) can get pretty wound up about a bourbon glaze – what should and shouldn’t be included etc – but I think this one tasted pretty good.  Let us know if you agree!

Ingredients

2 buffalo steaks
80ml (1/3 cup) bourbon
80g (1/3 cup) soft dark brown sugar
a tablespoon of dijon mustard
Juice of half a lime
splash of Worcestershire sauce
tabasco sauce or cayenne pepper to taste
blue cheese to serve

Method

  1. Mix together the brown sugar, bourbon, mustard, lime juice, Worcestershire sauce and tabasco or cayenne together until the sugar dissolves.
  2. Put the above together with the steaks in a tupperware box or plastic bag and shake so that the meat is thoroughly coated.  Refrigerate for at least 2 hours, overnight if you like.  Shake it every now and then.
  3. When you’re ready to begin, take the meat out of the fridge for about 40 mins so it can come up to room temperature.
  4. Pre-heat and oil a grill pan.  Pop the steaks on, and cook to your liking.  We had ours pretty rare.
  5. Meanwhile, pop some of the leftover glaze into a saucepan and heat to thicken it up.
  6. Serve with the warmed glaze poured over and some blue cheese crumbled on top.  We also had a green salad and some panko-dusted sweet potato fries with ours.

Buffalo Steaks with Blue Cheese and a Bourbon Glaze

The Verdict

This was a bit of an anticlimax, wasn’t it?  The thing that’s basically a cow tastes a lot like cow.  A tad leaner, a tad sweeter… probably not as good, but basically a cow.

Well, that got rounded up a bit faster than usual… what now?  Anyone got any cow jokes?  (Suze Edit – How do you know which cow is going on holiday?  It’s the one with a wee-calf!)

I knew a guy who was scared of cows.  He saw eating beef as part of his ongoing war on cows.  I wonder if he’d be scared of buffalo?  It’d be a marginally less tasty war for him…

Camel Tagine

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Vegetarians*, when not on their high horse about animal cruelty, often get back on their high horse about the environmental impact of meat.  All that climbing up and down can’t be good for the horse or them, especially when they’re already not getting enough protein.  Admittedly, meat production does require comparatively more water and land to produce than an equivalent amount of non-meat… but then, meat is awesome.  So shut up, Clarence.

So, when an opportunity arises to shut the veggies up, it’d be remiss of us not to take it.

Enter: camels.  There’s almost half a million feral camels roaming around Australia, slowly

Hurhurhur, geddit?

Only the finest cuts of meat were used, don’t worry!

eating everything in their path and pumping out CO2 in their wake.  Someone noticed we could kill two birds… and presumably a few camels, with one stone if we ate the buggers.  So that’s exactly what we’re going to do.  And if those veggies want to stop us and damn the Aussies to a hot and barren land that’s barely habitable… well, even more hot, more barren and that’s even less habitable… then now who’s the monster, Clarence?  Now who’s the monster?

At the very least, the veggies can use the high camels for a while and give all those high horses a break.

*- You know, those pale, sickly looking people who pretend to like kale.  They’re usually called Clarence.

Blind Taste Test

Stu – As ever, I had no clue what it was.  It just tasted like beef, but maybe a touch tougher, but with a hint of lamb.  The only thing I really figured out during the blind taste test was that this whole section of the meat reviews could probably go in the bin.

The Recipe – Camel Tagine – serves 2

Suze – Seeing as we were having camel, I thought a North African dish would be appropriate.  This subtlety was lost on Stu, however, and didn’t help him guess what creature he was consuming.  Only when I entreated him not to “take the hump” did he eye-rollingly get the correct answer.

The mix of spices used largely reflects what I had to hand – you can adjust to your own taste.  If you can get your hands on some ras-al-hanout, a traditional mix of spices from North Africa, then substitute that instead, although you may still wish to add some cumin and paprika.

Ingredients

350g diced camel steak
1 teaspoon cumin
½ teaspoon sweet paprika
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon ginger
½ teaspoon ground coriander
½ teaspoon ground tumeric
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
¼ teaspoon grated nutmeg
¼ teaspoon salt
freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil
1 small onion, roughly chopped
1 clove of garlic, sliced
½ beef stock cube
200g tinned chopped tomatoes
200g tinned chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 medium sweet potato, peeled and cut into 5cm chunks
prunes
a large cooking apple (if using an eating apple, reduce the amount of honey below)
1 tablespoon clear honey
toasted flaked almonds

Method

  1. If your meat is in a plastic package, take it out, rinse it and pat dry with kitchen paper.
  2. Mix all the spices together in a bowl, put the meat in and mix thoroughly so it is coated well.  Cover with cling film and pop in the fridge for a few hours, or overnight.
  3. Heat some olive oil in a frying pan and brown off the camel meat for five minutes or so.  If necessary, do this in batches.  Transfer to a flameproof casserole when browned.
  4. Now add a bit more oil to the frying pan and fry your onions for a couple of minutes until they soften.  Then add the garlic and fry for a couple more minutes. Tip into the casserole.
  5. Make up 200ml of stock.  Put 50ml of water in your frying pan and scrape up all the spices.  Tip both the spicy water and the stock into the casserole.
  6. Put the tomatoes and chickpeas into the casserole, stir in the honey, and bring to the boil. Reduce to a simmer, put a lid on and cook for 2½ hours, stirring now and again.
  7. Carefully remove the casserole lid, and stir in your sweet potatoes, apples and prunes.  Cook for another hour, stirring now and again and adding a splash of water if it looks dry.
  8. Check that the meat is tender (it should flake apart – if it doesn’t, cook for longer). Adjust your seasoning to taste, and add a little more honey if it tastes sharp.  If it’s a bit liquidy, simmer for 15 mins or so with the lid off to reduce.
  9. Scatter over the toasted almonds and serve with lightly seasoned couscous, rice or bread as you prefer!

The Verdict

We certainly both enjoyed camel, and Stu took the leftovers into work the next day where it was even more tender.  Certainly any recipe that requires something vaguely beefy would take to this brilliantly.  Mince, stew and even a steak would all work.

Grouse

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Grouse probably isn’t the most exciting animal in the world, but sometimes people forget that the exotic butcher they planned to go to has shut down.  And sometimes, when people only have four hours until they’re supposed to be serving other people an exotic meat, standards get lowered.  I’m not saying that’s what happened here… but it didn’t not happen here.  Besides, it’s exotic if you’re from somewhere where there isn’t grouse…

Anyway… grouse!  It’s like a fancy pigeon that sells whisky!

If this was XKCD, this would be funny.

Sell out.

Let’s do this!

Blind Taste Test

This time, it was Suze who did the blind tasting.

Suze – I was able to narrow down the grouse to being a bird pretty easily, as Stu served it whole.  The size also let me know it was a smallish bird.  To taste, it was very succulent (a nice grousesurprise as Stu had worried it might be dry) and had quite a gamey flavour – somewhere between turkey and wood-pigeon.  It reminded me of pheasant, and I randomly guessed guinea fowl as I’ve never had that.  I’m reasonably pleased with that as a guess!

The Recipe – For a Starter

One whole grouse – purchased from the Edinburgh Farmer’s Market
Two or three rashers of bacon
Butter
Side salad and dressing

  1. Preheat the oven to 200°C, 400°F, gas mark 6.
  2. Grease the inside of the grouse with a knob of butter.
  3. Wrap the grouse in rashers of bacon so that it is completely covered.
  4. Cook for around 20-35 minutes (based on size of bird).
  5. Share the grouse between two with a side salad.

The Verdict

There’s not a lot of eating on a grouse, but what there is is pretty tasty.  It’s worth a try if you’ve never had it before, so long as you can forget that it’s the same cute bird as in the adverts. Stu- You needn’t worry about eating the famous grouse.  He died years ago from liver disease after a long battle with alcoholism.

Mahi Mahi with a Tropical Salsa

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Our wars on mammals and birds are well under way, but we noticed fish floating over there, looking all smug and wet.  They look like they need eaten as well.  Napoleon found out you should never fight a war on two fronts, but we’re up to three now, so we should be ok.  Anyway, how big and scary could a fish possibly be?  …turns out, “quite”.  Mahi Mahi might be a familiar term to some of you, particularly if you live somewhere warmer than Scotland, but it was a new one on us.  I mean look at the bloody thing:

Mahi Mahi

You wouldn’t want to meet one of those down a dark alley.

Anyway, on to how this scary-looking fish actually tasted!

Blind Taste Test
Stu– I didn’t actually realise I was eating fish at first, as it was a large, meaty and tough fish.  I think that not-knowing slightly put me off at first, as my brain couldn’t quite comprehend what it was I was eating.  This wasn’t helped by the fact that it was fairly tasteless, with the only real enjoyment coming from the “tropical salsa”… which I’m not convinced is actually a thing.

Suze – it’s worth saying, that for once, I disagree with Stu.  His comments on texture are bang-on, but I actually liked the flavour, and would have this again.

The Recipe – Mahi Mahi Topped with a Tropical Salsa (Serves 2)
Suze – I remembered seeing Mahi Mahi around when we were on our honeymoon in Hawai’i.  Sadly, we didn’t try it at the time but I thought I’d try and channel some of that experience by using pineapple and mango in the recipe.  This is a really easy dish to make, and one I would definitely try again, even if we can’t get ahold of a fish as exotic as mahi mahi.

Ingredients

2 fillets of Mahi Mahi
juice and zest of 2 limes
½ a cup fresh pineapple, cut into small chunks
½ a cup fresh mango, cut into small chunks
a red chilli, deseeded
1tsp brown sugar
½ a cup dessicated coconut

Method

  1.  Preheat the oven to 350°F, 180°C, gas mark 4.
  2. Line a baking tray with tin foil, lightly oil it, and pop the mahi mahi fillets in the centre.
  3. Mix all the other ingredients, except the coconut, in a bowl and then spoon the mixture over the fillets.
  4. Fold up the tinfoil so that the fish is in a parcel – leave some room for air to circulate.
  5. Cook for about 10 minutes.
  6. Take the fish out of the oven, open the parcel, and cover the fillets with the coconut.
  7. Return the fish, uncovered, to the oven for another 5 minutes or until it flakes easily.
  8. Serve!  We had ours on a bed of buttery samphire, but I think this dish would go beautifully with rice.

Mahi Mahi

The Wine

vouvray

The folks at Oddbins helped us out once again – this time with a Vouvray.  This French Chenin Blanc had delicious honey and tropical notes, without being too sweet, so it complemented the pineapple salsa whilst still being able to take on the meatiness of the fish.

The Verdict

This probably wasn’t one of our more daring meals – we both eat fish regularly and this wasn’t the most exciting of fish.  It was, however, good to eat something that we are unlikely to come across in our every day meals.  Suze enjoyed the fish more than Stu did, but we both enjoyed the recipe.  Perhaps we could try it again with a different fish.

Spiced Horse Casserole

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Our mission to eat as many animals as possible is not for everyone – there are plenty of neighsayers.  It can stirrup some strong emotions.  The mane thing to remember is, if you don’t agree with our blog, you don’t hoof to read it….

Ahem.  This week we ate horse.

…and that’s the last time Suze gets to write the intro – Stu

Blind Taste Test

Stu- This tasted somewhere between venison and beef, and rather lean.  Not the most tender of meats, although I’ve since read that older horses are more tender, so perhaps we’d been foaled into buying a younger horse… sorry.  Much like llama, this is a pretty reasonable substitute for beef… but then, thanks to Birdseye, Tesco et al, we already knew that.

The Recipe – Spiced Horse Casserole

Suze – I had read a lot about horse tasting a lot like beef – not surprising really, as here in the UK there has been some scandal recently about some “beef” products (like cheap lasagne) containing a fair whack of horse meat.  Anyway, this led to my decision to cook the horse in a simple casserole.

Ingredients

25g plain flour
1 tsp salt
Good pinch pepper
1 tsp ground ginger
700g diced horse meat
Some light, flavourless oil, e.g. vegetable
450g tin kidney beans
225g can peeled plum tomatoes
2 tbsp. soft brown sugar
Tabasco sauce
A carrot, peeled and sliced
150ml beef stock (or horse stock if you can get it!!)
2 tbsp. cider vinegar
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 bay leaf
1 red pepper

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to 160°C, 325°F, Gas mark 3
  2. Mix the flour, salt, pepper and ginger together in a bowl.
  3. Coat the horse in the floury mixture.
  4. Quickly brown the horse in a frying pan using the oil, then put in a large casserole dish with the kidney beans
  5. Put the tomatoes, tabasco, sugar, vinegar, stock, garlic, mushrooms and bay leaf into a saucepan and bring to the boil.
  6. Pour over the horse and beans, put the lid on the casserole and cook in the oven for 2-3 hours.
  7. De-seed the red pepper and cut into rings.  Add to the casserole and cook for half an hour more.
  8. Check the meat is tender—if not, cook for longer.
  9. Remove the bay leaf, and serve with crusty bread brown rice, or mash!

 

 

The Verdict

Horse Casserole

We might be stretching the definition of “exotic meat” by including horse, especially as it turns out a lot of us have been eating it under the guise of beef for the last few years, but it’s vaguely topical, so what the hell.

The casserole was tasty, and very similar to a beef casserole.  That hint of gamey flavour would probably be unnoticed, if we hadn’t thought to look for it.  Because of this, it wasn’t very exciting, but as horse meat is a lean, healthy meat, and arguably more environmentally-friendly (less methane emitted in the farming process), if it was more readily accessible, we’d definitely eat it regularly.

Pan Fried Llama Fillet Steaks

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Hope those of you that celebrate had a great Christmas, filled with lots of tasty food.  If you’re tired of turkey, then we have the antidote….

Purchased from Kezie Foods, the most recent critter we have consumed is a llama… not all of it, just a couple of fillet steaks.  Llama fact: in the past, llama was sometimes spelt as glama…

Glama - a glam llama

… moving swiftly on.  Llamas are probably the cutest animal we’ve eaten so far, but they’re natural spitters, and nobody likes a spitter.  Some of them even use spitting as a way of disciplining other, lower ranked llamas.  Bad llamas!  Onto the grill pan with you.

Llama fillet steak

Llama fillet steak

Blind Taste Test
Stu– At first this both tasted and smelled a lot like beef, perhaps a slightly rougher textured cut, like a skirt steak.  But after a while it became apparent there was a distinct taste that set it apart from beef.  I’m going to say “ever so slightly gamey”, but I’m not convinced that’s entirely accurate.  Personally I really liked it and would be very keen to try it again.  It’s warming to know that, should we ever accidentally eat all the cows, we can always turn to llama as a pretty adequate replacement.

The Recipe – Pan Fried Llama Fillet Steaks
Suze – As this was our first llama-related experience (at least, that we’d be willing to admit to…), I thought we should keep to a simple recipe that let the flavour of the meat come through.  So, I simply cooked it in the way I would a beef fillet steak:

  1. If the steak has been refrigerated, allow it to come up to room temperature (45 minutes should do it, in Scotland at least – your mileage may vary!)
  2. Heat a frying pan to a medium-high heat.
  3. Pat the meat dry with kitchen paper.
  4. Rub some oil which isn’t too strongly-flavoured (e.g. vegetable, or canola) into the meat, then season it.
  5. Pop the meat into the dry pan, and cook for 2-3 minutes on each side.  This gets the meat medium-rare, which suits us – you might prefer more or less.
  6. Seal the edges of the meat.
  7. Leave the meat to rest on a warm plate for 5 minutes whilst you make the sauce of your choice – we had a lovely red wine jus.
Corbières - La Volière des Ollieux

Corbières – La Volière des Ollieux – delicious red wine, perfect with llama!

The Wine
The folks at Oddbins helped us out once again – bless them for accommodating our weird requests.  This time, they recommended a Corbières – La Volière des Ollieux. It was, quite frankly, delicious. We would have happily drunk it on its own… and probably will do so in the future. It was rich and fruity and was more than capable of taking on the game-y (ish – Stu) flavour of the llama.

Llama steak

Mmm, tasty…

The Verdict

I think we might have a new overall favourite odd-meat. Not the hardest thing to achieve given how few we’ve had, but we both really enjoyed it and it’ll take some beating.  Certainly it stands up to eating on its own as a steak, but would be versatile enough to be used in all manner of different recipes that would otherwise call for beef.  So if you’re a llama: watch your back… also well done on learning to read.  I mean, really, that’s incredible.

Crispy Fried Python Strips

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Python

It can eat a deer whole… which offers a pretty interesting turducken opportunity….

Our first victim was a python, which we purchased from Kezie Foods.  Apparently there are seven species of python… and we have absolutely no idea which one we got, or what country it came from.  What we do know, however, is that they definitely can’t catch a frisbee. On removing the meat from the pack, the first noticeable thing was the smell.  It was odd.  Not fishy, but not a million miles away – an unusual, but not unpleasant, smell.  This disappeared entirely on cooking. Unsurprisingly, there didn’t seem to be too many snake/python recipes out there, but those that we found seemed to agree on one thing – snake is pretty tough.  Makes sense, really – all that muscle is well-used.  Anyway, if cooked properly, we read it was supposed to have the texture of squid, or scallops.

Blind Taste Test
During most tastings, one of us won’t know what we’re eating.  In this case, it was Stu.

Frankly, I thought it was a lot like terribly cooked pork.  It was tough and chewy and didn’t have a huge amount of taste.  I’d place it somewhere between pork and turkey, but significantly tougher. –Stu

The Recipe – Crispy Fried Python Strips

Ingredients
250g (½lb) python fillet
a beaten egg
plain (all purpose) flour
dry polenta
oil suitable for deep frying (e.g. vegetable oil)

Method
1. Cut the python fillet into strips about 1cm (½”) wide, removing any sinew as you go.
2. Pour the oil into a deep-sided frying pan or wok, and heat on a meadium-high heat.
3. Dredge the strips in flour, then egg, then coat in polenta. Make sure that the polenta covers the strips completely.
4. Drop the strips in the hot oil and fry until golden brown.
5. Carefully remove the strips from the hot oil with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen paper.
6. Serve with the dip of your choice – we had garlic & lemon mayo!
7. If you can’t get ahold of dry polenta, breadcrumbs or ground almonds also work well. You can also add spices to taste.

Muros Antigos vinho verde

Muros Antigos vinho verde

The Wine
The lovely folks at Oddbins tried to help us find a wine to match with python! They came up with this lovely Portuguese Muros Antigos vinho verde which went with it perfectly – recommended.

The Verdict
Sooo… our python was pretty chewy. We both thought it a lot more like overcooked pork than chicken or fish, but it wasn’t unpleasant. Definitely one we’d like to try again, but maybe prepared in a different way.  An important factor is probably to minimise the sinews left in the meat.  Any left in during cooking were practically impossible to chew through. In short, don’t try this if you’re looking for a safe bet.

 

Please comment with what you think of this recipe, or if you have another python/snake recipe you’d like to share!

Watch this space….

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Welcome, welcome… we’re glad you’ve stumbled upon our corner of the internetz.

Very soon you’ll be able to join us on our mission to eat every animal on the planet.

We’ll give you recipes, reviews of what the meat really tastes like, hopefully a few smiles along the way and, with any luck, soon all the animals will be dead and the human race victorious.

Until then… practise your frisbee skills, lest ye become our next meal.