If you were one of the lucky hunters who successfully harvested a deer this past hunting season, congratulations! Now it’s time to throw down in the kitchen and enjoy all the hard work you put in from summer to fall. Here’s a classic venison chili recipe that will warm you to the bones and have you reminiscing of the morning everything came together perfectly, which resulted in you walking out of the woods with a handful of tines.

This right here is some knuckle sucking vittles worthy of deer camp, or Super Bowl LIV. Crack a can of Miller High Life and you’re fixin’ to have a good time!

Ingredients:

• 2 lbs. ground venison
• ½ lb venison stew meat
• 1 yellow onion, finely chopped
• ½ diced red pepper
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 1 chipotle pepper, dried
• 2 tablespoons chili powder
• 2 teaspoons cumin
• 2 teaspoons paprika
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• 2 teaspoons salt
• ½ cup hominy
• 1 cup beef stock
• ¾ cup red wine
• 1 ¾ cup tomato sauce
• 1 14.5 oz. can fire-roasted diced tomatoes with juice
• 1 15 oz. can pinto beans with liquid
• 1 loaf rustic bread-sliced

METHOD:

Heat oil in large Dutch oven pot over medium high. Add onions, garlic and red pepper and cook for about 5 minutes until softened, stirring as needed.

Mix in garlic and cook for another minute.

Add stew meat to pot and brown. Add ground venison to pot breaking up into chunks. Brown beef for approximately 12 to 15 minutes or until no longer pink.

Add chili powder, cumin, paprika, oregano and salt  to venison mixture and continue to cook, stirring constantly, until spices begin to bloom and become fragrant, about 2 minutes.

To pot, add hominy, red wine, beef stock, tomato sauce, diced tomatoes, and beans with liquid.

Bring to a boil and then put lid on Dutch oven and transfer to a 275°F degree oven for approximately 2 hours.

Remove, uncover and continue to simmer over low flame until sauce is thickened.

Serve with griddle grilled homemade bread, sharp cheddar cheese, jalapenos, sour cream and a squish of lime.

No silverware required!

A NOTE ON MAKING HOMEMADE BREAD:

Don’t let baking bread scare you off. There are two super simple, well-known, no-kneading required recipes that I use all the time for stews, soups, and chili.

The quality of the finished product, along with the satisfaction it brings to have baked a beautiful crusty loaf of bread with a tender and moist inner crumb is really rewarding. You look at it and go, “Holy moly! I just made that gorgeous loaf of bread completely from scratch!”

Down side is, once your family tastes it spread with the goodness of  warm melty butter, they will demand this bread over any store bought impostor! The first recipe is called “Bread in 5” and the second is “No-Knead Bread” .

Need a good slicer that isn’t the size of a small lawn tractor? I’ll go on the record to say my Chef’s Choice Electric 665 food slicer is a masterpiece of form and function and fits in my cupboard! Handsomely styled, it is a rugged, commercial quality appliance. It has die cast aluminum construction and excellent stability and rigidity that allows for accurate slicing.

After my beautiful loaf of crusty homemade bread cooled I couldn’t wait to get it on the large-capacity, cantilevered food carriage of the Chef’s Choice slicer. And I wasn’t disappointed. The 665’s powerful, cool-running, high-torque motor and high-quality multipurpose stainless-steel serrated blade provided continuous, non-stop slicing, and made perfectly sliced bread of any thickness a breeze.

About the Author: Raised a Minnesota farm-girl in a hunting family, Krissie Mason (below) is an outdoorswoman, food enthusiast, and has been reconnecting with her culinary country roots and family hunting traditions of late. She is the brains and brawn behind Scratch + Holler media, and a regular contributor to several outdoor websites. Krissie fully supports a field-to-fork wild food chain, and especially enjoys expanding pantries and stretching wild game palates with her ambitious and delicious wild game recipes. Be sure to visit Krissie’s website to check out her blog and much more.