What Is Deer and How Can I Use It?

Here's everything worth knowing about deer and how to pick it, what it is, how to store it, and what to use instead, plus 10 recipes to cook tonight.

Key Points

Deer meat, known as venison: lean, dark red, finely grained, with a deep, faintly gamy flavor.
Very little fat, so tender cuts want a fast sear to medium-rare; tough cuts want a long braise.
Cook tender cuts to 130 to 135°F (54 to 57°C); past medium it dries out fast.
An acidic marinade and trimming away fat and silverskin tame the gamy edge.
Elk and bison are the closest swaps; grass-fed beef stands in at the supermarket.

What is deer?

Deer meat, better known as venison, is the lean red meat of the deer, a staple for hunters and a growing favorite on restaurant menus. It is darker and finer-grained than beef, with a deep, faintly sweet flavor and a clean, earthy character often described as gamy.

What sets venison apart from beef is fat, or the lack of it. Wild deer carry almost no marbling, so the meat is exceptionally lean.

That leanness is its great virtue and its pitfall: cook it right and it is rich and tender, cook it wrong and it turns dry and liver-like in a hurry.

Cooking Venison

How you cook venison depends entirely on the cut. The tender loins and backstraps want fast, hard, hands-on heat.

Sear them and pull them at medium-rare, around 130 to 135°F (54 to 57°C), then rest, as in the steakhouse-style Deer Filet A'Tournedos Brennan.

The tougher shoulder and leg cuts want the opposite: long, low, moist braising. Crock Pot Deer Chili and a slow-cooked roast like Marinaded Deer Roast break down the connective tissue over hours, and the moisture compensates for the missing fat.

Because the meat is so lean, add fat back wherever you can. Bard a roast with bacon, work suet or pork into ground venison, and keep an eye on the pan so nothing scorches. Hawaiian Venison simmers cubes in a sweet-savory sauce that keeps every bite moist.

Ground venison behaves like very lean beef. It makes excellent chili and burgers once you cut in some pork fat. Venison also dries beautifully into jerky, where a soak in a marinade like Deer Jerky Marinade seasons the lean strips before they hit low heat.

Pairing and Taming the Gamy Edge

Venison loves bold, slightly sweet company with an acidic lift. Juniper, rosemary, thyme, garlic, black pepper, and red wine all flatter it, as does dark fruit such as cherry or currant, and a touch of sweetness rounds off the wild edge.

A marinade does double duty, seasoning the meat and mellowing its gaminess. An acidic soak in red wine or buttermilk, several hours to overnight, is the classic move for a strong-tasting roast.

The cardinal mistake is overcooking. Past medium the lean muscle squeezes out what little moisture it holds and turns dry and tough; for tender cuts, medium-rare is the target and a thermometer is your friend.

Much of the off-putting gaminess comes from sloppy field dressing, not the meat itself.

Trim away every scrap of silverskin and fat, since the deer's own fat carries most of the strong flavor.

Substitutes

Other lean game is the natural stand-in. Elk and bison are milder and a little less lean, and they cook almost identically. Where you can find it, antelope or moose behaves the same way.

If you have no game at all, grass-fed beef is the closest supermarket swap; it is leaner and more mineral-tasting than grain-fed, though still richer than venison. Lean lamb can echo the bold, slightly wild flavor in a braise or stew.

Buying and Storing Venison

Look for venison that is deep red, firm, and fine-grained, with no gray cast or sour smell. Most retail venison is farm-raised and milder than wild deer; hunters working with their own animal should keep the carcass cold and butcher it promptly for the best flavor.

Store fresh venison in the coldest part of the fridge and use it within three days, since the lean meat does not keep as long as fattier cuts.

It freezes very well, an advantage for hunters with a season's worth at once.

Wrap it tightly to guard against freezer burn, which the lean surface is prone to, and use steaks and roasts within nine months to a year, ground venison within three to four months.