Venison Reuben

By: Jack Hennessy

PHOTO CREDIT: JACK HENNESSY

I know quite a few hunters who have always wanted to try corning their venison around St. Patrick’s Day but the concept, to them, seems complicated. If you are one of those folks who have wanted to partake in the aforementioned Irish tradition but have shied away in past years, I promise you this is one of the easiest ways to prepare and cook venison. Basically: if you can properly trim silver skin and add ingredients to a pot, you can corn and cook corned venison.

Please note though: A venison roast will take at least a week to cure. So if you’re reading this and thinking of serving for St. Patrick’s Day, you might need to get cracking ASAP.

This recipe is for a Reuben sandwich, largely based off the one made famous by my former stomping grounds, The Elk Public House in Spokane, Washington. Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives even covered this sandwichseveral years ago and during my time cooking at the restaurant, I always knew when a rerun had aired recently, because we would get slammed with orders for our Reuben sandwich. I couldn’t blame those ordering it—this is likely the best Reuben I have ever eaten.

Fun fact: The Reuben sandwich is actually not Irish. But the corned venison is, right? No matter—every sandwich is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day.

Certain steps in this recipe call for specific equipment. For example, you can sous vide cook the roast once it’s cured, but you don’t have to. I try to drop in contingency plans for steps, but if you want consistently sliced venison, you do need a slicer. Yes, you can indeed slice with a knife, but you’ll likely end up with thicker slices.

This recipe calls for an Irish red ale. I like to cook with (and tilt back while doing so) Walnut River’s Warbeard, but that is only available in Kansas, Missouri, and Wyoming, I believe. Feel welcome to use Smithwicks (available at most liquor stores nationwide) or something similar.

Lastly, you don’t even have to turn your corned venison into a sandwich if you don’t want to. If you just want to corn and cook your venison roast, go right ahead. Enjoy!

Ingredients (makes minimum four sandwiches):

• Corned Venison:
• 3- to 5-pound venison roast, thawed (top round roast works great)
• 1/2 gallon water
• 1/2 cup kosher salt
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon Instacure No. 1 (sodium nitrite)
• 1 tablespoon whole black peppercorns
• 1 tablespoon coriander seeds
• 6 bay leaves
• 1 tablespoon mustard seeds
• 1 tablespoon dried thyme
• 1 teaspoon caraway seeds
• 12 to 24 ounces (perhaps more) of a red Irish ale

Hard Cider Kraut:

• 1 large head of green cabbage, thinly sliced
• Minimum 24 ounces hard cider
• 1 cup malt vinegar
• 1 tablespoon freshly cracked black pepper
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt

Homemade Thousand Island:

• 1 cup mayo
• 6 tablespoon ketchup
• 6 tablespoons sweet gherkins (blasted in food processor)
• 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt

Bread and Cheese:

• Ideally thick-cut dark rye (quality stuff from the bakery)
• Quality thick-cut Swiss cheese

To corn venison, in a large pot, add all the Corned Venison ingredients other than the Irish red ale and the roast itself. Bring to a low simmer and stir until all the sugar, salt, and Insta Cure are dissolved. Add the pot to the refrigerator and allow to cool. As it cools, trim off any silver skin, fat, or fascia from the venison roast. Once the brine is cool in the fridge, add the venison roast to it and cure for 7-10 days.

Once venison has cured, to cook, you can place the roast in a large pot and cover with Irish red ale and simmer (at around 205 degrees Fahrenheit) for 4-5 hours, until the roast is tender, or you can seal the roast with a little bit of beer (using a chamber vac) and sous vide for 12-14 hours at 165 degrees.

Once the roast is cooked, remove it and pat dry. Reverse sear in a skillet or on a grill over high heat to caramelize the exterior. Place the reversed-seared venison roast back in the fridge to cool. A cold (or mostly cool) venison roast is easier to slice. Keep leftover liquids from the pot or sous vide bag in a bowl in the fridge to use when assembling the sandwiches.

To make the Hard Cider Kraut, cut the head of green cabbage in half and cut out the stem. Thinly slice the cabbage and add to a large pot along with the rest of the ingredients. Ideally, you want the sliced cabbage mostly covered, but do note the cabbage will cook down (so you don’t have to crack open a third hard cider if you don’t want to). Heat the pot on medium-low and stir occasionally. Turn heat to low once the cabbage is softened and covered with hard cider.

Get Cooking!

As always, good luck this fall everyone and remember to send any success pictures or stories from the field to [email protected] and you could be featured on our website or in our magazine. If this article or any of our articles have helped you become a better hunter or conservation steward, consider becoming a member of the Mule Deer Foundation for only $35 dollars a year. Click here to join: https://muledeer.org/product-category/membership/

Jack Hennessy grew up south of Chicago, started hunting at the age of 26 when attending graduate school in Spokane, Washington. Since then he has combined his love of cooking with the outdoors. He lives in south-central Kansas where he hunts whitetails and chases roosters with his Wirehaired Vizsla, Dudley.