Towards the end of last spring, one of Andy’s co-workers sent him home from work with a goody bag. This co-worker is a hunter, and had heard that we were very curious about playing around with venison and bear meat. Historically I don’t have a good relationship with venison. I want to like it, but every time I’ve tried it, I take a few bites and then I’m done. I just really dislike that gamey flavor that is all too often present with venison. Bear meat, on the other hand, we’d had exactly once before and were surprised that it wasn’t gamey at all- it was like a richer variety of beef. Well, this co-worker sent both along, a few different cuts of venison, and a few cuts of bear meat. We were quite excited to play around with all of these and figure out the best way to prepare them.
Surprisingly, I found very little direction on cooking with bear meat. I hunted through game cookbooks at our library and many websites, but there was very little out there, with the exception that every source indicated that the bear needed to be thoroughly cooked, as it tends to harbor a dangerous parasite known as trichonosis. As I was looking and not finding an inspiring recipe anywhere, I recalled the blog known as Hunter Angler Gardener Cook, and I was sure that he would have something on his site about cooking bear meat. Sure enough, he did, but the one I was most attracted to was the Chinese Red Cooked Bear, though I had bear steaks and not belly to deal with. I’ll admit, though, I was pretty intimidated by the recipe itself. So I filed it away in my brain to consider, but then company came calling. And it was adventurous company, willing to try new things, and I just had to do it.
I did not use the preserved garlic called for in the recipe. We have several Asian markets in the area that I’m sure I could have found it at, but I decided to just leave it out and see what happened. Other than that change, I followed the recipe to the letter with the exception that I used less chilies- as we wanted the kids to enjoy it as well. I want to say I used two dried chilies, and there was very little heat in the end.
The toughest part of the recipe was the second step, where you heat the oil and sugar together. This turned into napalm very quickly- and it tends to spatter. My stirring arm still has scars from this cooking adventure- so be careful there. On my gas stovetop, the caramelized sugar happened within two minutes- not the ten indicated in the recipe.
All told, I think the bear cooked for about 90 minutes, instead of the two hours in the recipe, and I did end up taking out the whole spices after an hour. The end result was beyond spectacular. While the technique was new to me, making it seem more tedious at the time, it really wasn’t complicated or difficult once I had everything on hand. The Chinese Red Cooking was delectable. The meat was so tender and packed with flavor. We had it served with rice and another whole meal in case we didn’t care for the bear. Fortunately Andy had decided to snap a picture of his plate that day.
Maybe not the most artful display, but a display nonetheless. The bear meat really did cook that dark- it’s not burnt in the least. It was a great dish, and it could very easily be made with pork, beef, or other game as you see fit as well. I really think the recipe is highly adaptable to the meat you have on hand.
Rather than copy the recipe here today, I’m going to link you right to the recipe at Hunter, Angler, Gardener, Cook, as I changed barely a thing, so did not adapt the recipe enough to warrant a re-posting.
Chinese Red Cooked Bear.