A Deliciously Tasty Venison Soup Recipe
Whether you’ve recently been gifted some fresh venison or got the meat from a recent hunting trip, you have a great foundation for a delicious venison soup recipe. No matter what cut of meat you have, you can always make a tasty venison vegetable soup.
Prepare Your Venison
No matter what cut of venison you have, you need to prepare the meat before you start building your soup. Make sure your venison is thawed if it was frozen and is ready to be marinated for at least 12 hours. In order to pull out the gamey taste, you need to let the meat sit in either milk or mustard. Both of these ingredients have the ability to break down that gamey flavor so that it is not overpowering in the soup and will blend with the vegetables.
It doesn’t matter if you decided to go with milk, as you can use any kind. If you decide to use mustard, a whole bottle of traditional yellow mustard is all you need to coat the meat. Keep it refrigerated for at least 12 hours in this state before you start cooking the meat.
Purchase Your Vegetables
While your venison is at home being marinated, make sure you head to your local grocery store to get some fresh produce for your venison vegetable soup. Grab the following veggies and spices:
- 2 large carrots
- 4 ribs of celery
- 2 ears of corn
- 2 large russet potatoes or 1 small pack of red potatoes
- 3 can of crushed tomatoes
- 2 cloves of garlic or 2 tablespoons of minced garlic
- Salt and Pepper to taste
- 4 cups of beef broth
- 2 cups water
- 1-2 pounds of venison (ground or stewed)
You want to make sure you get all the veggies fresh so that they can be cooked together and cooked evenly in the soup. You do not want some cooked vegetables and other veggies raw.
Cook Down Your Venison
Once you are home from the grocery store, it is time to get your venison cooking for your soup. The best cut is to have the venison ground so that it cooks the fastest. You can cook the venison in about 20 minutes on the stovetop.
If you have roast pieces of venison, you want to get it in the oven at 350 degrees for two hours. After this time, you will add it to the soup to continue cooking with the vegetables.
Prepare and Cook Your Vegetables
The first thing you need to do is clean your veggies and make sure you get all the dirt out of the plants that could be lingering. Once you have finished cleaning your vegetables, it is time to start cutting up your vegetables so they can be cooked. You want to take your time on the cuts, getting them small and as even as possible. This allows even cooking time on the vegetables, so they break down and prevent some of them from being raw.
Once they have been chopped, take a large saute pan and some olive oil, and add the vegetables to the pan. You want to give them a quick saute and browning before adding them to the stock pot. After just a few minutes in the saute pan, it is time to add the vegetables to the large stock pot.
Add the vegetables, salt, and pepper, and then the canned tomatoes. Turn your stove to medium-high heat so that the vegetables will start boiling and continue cooking.
While the veggies are getting up to temperature, go ahead and add your beef broth and water, bringing them to a rolling boil before turning them down to simmer until the venison is finished in the oven for stew meat cuts. If you have ground venison, it should be done cooking on the stove and can be added immediately to the soup.
Mix With Your Vegetables
For stew meat venison, you will need to add it to the vegetables once the two hours in the oven are over. Because venison is so lean, you can add juices to the soup to enhance the flavor. If you are using ground venison, add it and any juice to the veggies, also.
No matter what type of venison you use, you want to turn the soup back up to medium-high heat until there is a rolling boil. Once the soup begins boiling, cover it and turn it back down to a simmer. The soup will still need to simmer for about an hour so all the flavors will blend.
Serve and Store
After an hour of the venison and veggies cooking together, you can serve this soup in a large bowl for a hearty meal. You can double this recipe or cut it in half if you need to yield less.
Should there be leftovers from the soup, you need to let it cool down first to room temperature. At that time, you can store it in air-tight containers in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. If you have a lot left over, you may want to portion it out to use for several meals.
If you have enough for another meal, just put it in the same bowl until you are ready to reheat it. At that time, take the leftover soup and add it to a large stock pot and turn the stove on to medium-high heat. Keep stirring your soup until it reaches a rolling boil for about two minutes. Turn the soup down to a simmer, cover it, and let it continue cooking for 15 minutes. It will be ready to serve and have a great flavor the next day.
Ingredient Additions to Amp Up the Flavor
One of the best ways to pull out the flavor of the venison is to add worscheshire sauce to your soup. About a tablespoon worth when you mix the venison and veggies will really improve the overall flavor.
You can also add some fat to the very lean venison by adding a pound of beef to the recipe. This will make the meal heartier and help disguise some of that gamey flavor in the venison.
