Venison Heart Fall Stew Recipe

This stew is made with a Venison Heart but it could be a young lamb or goat heart instead. Fall is hunting season and butcher season on the farms.  One of the things I have heard many times over the years is.. How do I use this?

When it comes to heart, if your family really does not like to eat it, the best trick I know is to wash it out well, trim it out and then grind it up and mix it with regular ground meat at up to a 20 per weight and use like normal.  Folks will tell you it’s very “rich” in flavour without knowing it comes from the heart.

In the books, the tradition is Stuffed Heart and its good but works much better in a larger heart like a Beef or Moose. Today however we are going to make a savory/slightly spicy fall stew.

Savory Fall Venison Heart Stew Recipe

• 1 Venison Heart (well washed, trimmed and cut into small bite sized pieces
• 1 diced onion
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 8 ox box of mushrooms or dried equal amount (pre-soaked)
• 4 cups of beef or mushroom based broth
• 3 large potato’s
• 1 cup of Butternut Squash
• 2 cups of finely diced greens (I used horseradish, but spinach will work just fine)
• 1 tbsp. of fresh grated horseradish (or 1 tsp of prepared horseradish)
• Salt, Pepper to taste.
• 1 TBSP of oil for fry pan

Ps, hubby says add one peeled, cubed carrot to this dish 🙂

So this is not a fast recipe, it’s a take the afternoon to make recipe. First Age out your heart at least 24 to 48 hours if fresh in the fridge, Wash well in salted water, and then trim it out and slice into strips and then into cubes.

In a pan add a bit of oil and heat it up on med heat, add in your heart.. DO NOT STIR IT.. let it sit until it is half-cooked and shows a bit of browning to it.. then add your onion, garlic and mix it up.. Cook just till onion is clear and off it goes into the baking dish that is big enough to hold the whole meal.

Add a cup of the broth and deglaze your pan. Add all the broth on top of the meat, onions, garlic and add your mushrooms at this time. Into a slow over of 250 for two hours.. you want this to just barely simmer.

Take out and check to see if you need to add another cup of broth (I did not need to do so) At this point I added 1 cup of leftover mashed butternut squash, but you can add fresh at this point as well.. mine blended in to the sauce due to it being mashed but there is nothing wrong with bites of it. Add your Potato, Carrot if you are going to do so and your spices.. Bake into the oven for another hour at 350 (turn up the heat) and once everything is folk tender (mine took about 45 -55 min), add your greens, stir in and let sit for another five minutes and you are ready to serve.

I did have the thought of adding a dollop of sour cream to this dish, we didn’t but I think it would work.. I also thought about adding a can of sweet corn. Both are idea’s that I will consider in the future.

Want to try some of my other recipes?

Black Current Stuffed Baked Pork Heart Recipe

Bacon Wrapped Stuffed Lambs Heart Recipe

Breaded Lambs Heart with Ranch Dipping Sauce