(Kind of a , not really a ) Cookbook post: Leg of Venison

O.K., I've already admitted I have a massive cookbook collection and want to go through them all for blog posts. So what do I make this week- a magazine recipe. I actually found this recipe while flipping through a Field and Stream magazine this past summer at the boyfriend's buddy's house. Here is a link: http://www.fieldandstream.com/articles/hunting/2010/03/how-cook-leg-venison

I hadn't really though about it again until this past weekend when I was enlisted to help my boyfriend and his friend butcher the deer they had gotten this past gun season. Luckily I remembered and requested that we just leave 2 of the hind legs intact.

I know it kind sound kind of gross to the squeamish, but I thought the butchering process was actually pretty interesting; finding all the cuts of meat, separating muscle from bone, etc...

Anywho, here's what went down. First I got all my spices together: don't they look pretty in their little dishes?

I didn't quite have enough black peppercorns for the recipe, so I substituted these pretty pink ones:

This recipe also gave me a reason to use the Juniper berries I bought awhile back: Their not just for gin anymore:)

Mixed peppercorns and juniper; purty:

And into the coffee grinder: (I find it easier than the crushing called for in the recipe)

My dry rub ingredients, I used dried rosemary and thyme because that's what I had in the house, I'm poor, and fresh herbs are pricey. (I used 1/3 of the fresh amount called for)

The haunch! That is a big hunk of meat.

I completed my rub with the olive oil (more than called for in the recipe, most likely because my herbs were dried and ground finer)and minced garlic, and gave the leg a nice invigorating massage (resist urge to make inappropriate happy ending joke)

The leg was wrapped in plastic and went onto the fridge overnight

And into the oven this bad boy went. In the recipe you bake for an hour, flip and baste, then roast for another hour and flip and baste again. After this you are supposed to pop it back in the oven for another 15 minutes before starting to check the temperature of the thickest portion (looking for 126-129 for rare to medium rare). Luckily I decided to check before continuing and saw that my roast already registered at 160ish- yikes! The roast "rested" for twenty-odd minutes where the potatoes (onion soup mix style) and my friend Nicole's awesome stuffed mushrooms (in the background below) finished up

My carving skills are pretty awful, but this was soooo good! Moist, tender, and delicious. I have heard complaints about venison from others, but honestly I have never had any that tasted off or gamey. I think it all depends on proper cleaning and good cooking. I don't think anyone would guess that this wasn't a lean beef roast without knowing beforehand. I'm sure the rub would work equally well with beef for those without access to venison.

I still have another leg in the freezer- I might just have to pull this one out for a special occasion (it is a LOT of meat); though now that I did this I am tempted to attempt smoking the other one on the grill.

Bottle of Vodka and a Pack of Smokes

Nothing says delicious birthday cake like a bottle of vodka and a half-burned cigarette, yummy:) I was thrilled to get the request for this one. Starting at the beginning, For the board I cut a piece of 1/2" thick foam core board to the size I wanted, wrapped in cake foil, and trimmed the edge with ribbon (strangely enough neither Micheal's nor Hobby Lobby stock alcohol or cigarette themed ribbon, and I had to settle for black with white stitching)

My next step was to lay out all my elements to get an idea of composition.

I wanted the bottle to look like it was actually lying on its side, instead of just a bottle cut in half, but I didn't think an all-cake structure would hold up. I decided to form the bottom half of the bottle with rice cereal treats (I use the recipe on the box, with just a little less butter. I have tried with no butter, but found it too dry)

I covered this in ganache:

I let it firm up a bit, then flipped it over and cut a cardboard to fit. For extra support I used three short dowel sections in the cereal treat part going up to the cardboard:

I stacked my cake layers on top of the cardboard:

I had cut two waxed paper templates the diameter of the bottle. I placed one on either side and used it as a guide for rounding out the shape:

Then I made the top and stem of the bottle out of cereal treats and covered with ganache. I used a long bamboo skewer to impale it into the cake:

I attached the neck, smoothed any gaps with more ganache, and set it in the fridge overnight, covered with a clean plastic bag

Now for the fun part: the details, all of which were made of modeling chocolate

I started with the pack of smokes. I tried to accurately measure all the parts, and cut the sides out individually:

I attached the pieces together with a little water, used gumpaste tools to blend the edges, and used a thin piece of foam inside to support it while it set up

I painted all the details using 190 vodka and powder colors, with black airbrush color for the lettering. I think I spent close to 2 hours on the cigarette pack alone

Then onto the ashtray. I mixed some blue and white modeling chocolate together for a nice marbled look:

For the ashes I mixed some black and gray modeling chocolate together and used my micro plane grater. Very touchy stuff. It looked great, but I had to carefully scoop it up with a knife blade or it just all clumped together

The martini glass is also modeling chocolate, with a skewer in the stem. To do the stem I stuck a sausage of MC onto the skewer first, then rolled it into a rope

Now time for fondant:( Actually it wasn't as bad as I had expected. I did the neck first, as I figured doing it all at once would be a futile and infuriating endeavor. The position of the bottle made it easy to hide the seam

For the body I measured out the piece I'd need, and carried it over to the cake on a piece of cardboard to minimize stretching

It went pretty good, although there were some gaps at the bottom:

To solve this I cut thin strips of fondant

and used a butter knife to tuck them into place:

Not perfect, but good enough since the bottle will be painted and the bottom edges won't be noticeable in the final product.

Painting time:) Which was worse than I expected:( I again used gel color thinned with 190proof vodka. I kept getting clumps that wouldn't dissolve, and it happened with all my shades of blue, both Wilton and Americolor- very frustrating

I just kept layering washes of blues, and sponging off colors to try and make it look translucent

While the blue was drying I decided to be bold (for me) and use poured sugar to make the spilled martini. I have bad experiences with cooking sugar (mostly my own stupid fault) including a stove-top covered in boiled over sugar/water while making baklava; what a mess!

I looked up a generic hard candy recipe on the magnificent interwebs, and combined some sugar, water, and corn syrup and cooked to 300-ish degrees

I poured spill blobs on a silicon mat and let cool

Then I started putting everything together:

I used just a little bit of corn syrup to attach the spills, and a little ganache for everything else

After I removed the foam, I crumpled my pack of smokes:

In the next picture you can see the piece of foam I cut to support the martini glass as it set up; I wasn't confident in its strength, so I sent the foam with the cake so it could be taken off right before serving, and sent a dollar store martini glass along just in case

My original idea for the bottle was for it to be open, with vodka spilling out, but I messed up some measurement, and my half-assed attempt at a opening looked, well, half-assed so I changed to a closed cap.

The end did not really look as mangled as the next picture implies, but my camera's flash only has a Hiroshima setting

This one was a lot of fun, and semi-ironic that I was so painstakingly handcrafting cigarettes and cigarette paraphernalia on just about the anniversary of when I quit smoking myself 6 years ago. Hope you enjoyed seeing the process.