Wild game cookbook offers recipes from game in North, South Carolina

This book will make a wonderful gift for the hunter on your gift list. I have never seen recipes with such a broad range of game.

Quebec resident Jean-Paul Grappe, a hunter himself, is an award-winning cookbook author, a chef and owner of four major restaurants in Canada. He offers far more than the standard, venison, rabbit, duck, boar and the trendy bison. He includes old fashioned species such as squirrel, hard-to cook recipes such as bear, many varieties of fowl from quail to lark to goose and a number of other animals. Author Grappe is a chef and has authored several other cookbooks. Grappe dedicates this book to game meat, an edible he says “whose flesh is more substantial and flavorful than that of domestic animals.” One of the reasons he cites for the flavor and value of wild meat is the free range nature of wild game that feed on whatever they wish.

In the style of a true hunter, Grappe opens the book with a tribute to nature and a statement of respect for all life, especially for the animals that he will bring to table. He says, “Hunting is a privilege. An honor code should accompany it. Killing to collect only a few pieces of meat is an insult to nature.”

His book offers recipes that utilize all of the animal, even the organ meatsas well as many ways to use more familiar cuts such as roasts and chops of the animals in question. He offers information on the various cuts and defines general terms used in butchery so that the hunter and chef can speak in the same terms. He offers suggestions on food pairings and tips on how to prepare as well as cook game birds. The final section of the book is a cornucopia of marinade stock, roux and sauce recipes, giving added value to the book.

While he does not include information on obtaining a hunting license, or doing the hunting, the important game cooking features are discussed in detail. Grappe advises that some species he includes may be forbidden to hunters in certain areas, so before setting your cap for a certain met he wants you to check with your local game warden to make sure it is legal to hunt that animal in our region and that you are hunting in the appropriate season with the necessary licenses.

I admit I found it difficult to grapple with the idea of lark and seal as table meat, but these animals have been survival foods for many people in North America for hundreds of years. All of the species in the 164 recipes are for species found here in North America.

I think many folks will find the section on wild boar cookery to be particularly interesting in view of the damage that wild boar are doing to the farmland in the USA as a whole, including right here in the Carolinas. Hunters will enjoy it.

This story was originally published December 21, 2015 at 11:35 PM with the headline "Wild game cookbook offers recipes from game in North, South Carolina."