Hunter’s Fare

Posted On October 26, 2026

Sharing Nature’s Bounty With A Wild Game Feast

I truly enjoy sharing wild game meals with family & friends, especially those who’ve never before experienced a hunter’s “field to table” meal.

I had another opportunity to do so recently while staying with my brother Ray on my annual father/son duck hunting trip with my son RJ. It was the second weekend of the 2026 duck hunting season, middle of October. I’d coordinated with my brother ahead of time to let him know I’d be bringing a bone in vension shoulder roast with all the fixin’s for what, with any luck during our hunt, would be an authentic Adirondack hunter’s fare duck/deer feast. He asked if he cold invite a few friends over to share in the meal. My answer? “Of course!”

My son & I arrived Saturday night, with plans to hunt ducks Sunday & Monday. My plan was to prep the vension shoulder roast Saturday night so that all my brother had to do was slide it into the oven Sunday afternnon while everyone was busy watching football. I brought along wild rice & dinner rolls. Ray had a couple of nice steaks & some salad greens to add to the meal. My sister in law Patty baked chocolate chip cookies. If RJ & I had success on our day’s hunt we’d add duck to the menu.

So, once our gear was unpacked I set about prepping the roast, “bone in Venison shoulder roasts” being one of my “Camp Chef” specialties. I use my own recipe that I’ve evolved through the years. Usually, I prepare my roasts as a pre-cooked foil wrapped meal for camp. This time, however, since I had the advantage of being able to serve the roast hot from the oven, I decided to add one more special touch layer. I planned to serve the roast in a big oven roasting pan on a bed of whole carrots.

I started with a few pads of real butter in the bottom of the pan, along with a few shakes of Worcestershire sauce, a little liquid smoke, a few shakes of Montreal Steak & Badia Complete Season, & a few quick black pappercorn twists. From there I cleaned & placed big whole carrots, covering the bottom of the pan. I hit everything again with butter, Worcestershire, luqid smoke & spices, then slathered everything in a layer of sliced sweet & red onions, green bell peppers, & baby Bella mushrooms, adding yet another layer of butter, liquids & spices to that.

From there, I carefully cleaned, rinsed & wiped clean the freshly defrosted bone in venison roast of any residual silver skin & excess tallow. I don’t know about other folks, but I’m not a big fan of the flavor of deer fat, so I generally remove as muchof it from my roasts as I am able. Once the big bone in roast was prepped to my satisfaction, I rubbed it with butter, fresh ground pepper liquid smoke, Worcestershire sauce & spices, kneaiding that mix into every roast nook & cranny, then I wrapped the whole roast in over half a pound of thick cut hickory smoked bacon.

Once the roast was fully bacon wrapped, I placed it in the center of the pan atop the bed of onion/pepper/mushroom covered whole carrots. Then I slathered everything with another onion/pepper/mushroom layer, another healthy dose of Worcestershire, liquid smoke, ground black papper & spices, added several more pads of butter (because everything is better with butter), & covered that roasting pan filled with venison goodness in foil for my brother to stash on his October cold screened in deck porch to rest overnight while it awaited the oven.

At that point I gave my brother Ray what I THOUGHT were a very simple & straightforward set of bacon wrapped, mushroom, onion & greenpepper slathered bone in vension shoulder roast set of cooking instructions. “Put it in the oven at 325 degrees for an hour & a half, maybe two hours. With those big carrots, it’s probably gonna be closer to two. Get a big fork. when the fork slides through the roast like butter, it’s done. RJ & I will be back sometime late afternoon/early evening. If we’re not back yet, when the roast is done, take it out of the oven to rest. There’s six packets of quick cook wild rice & two twelve packs of dinner rolls to go with it. When we get back, if we get ducks, we’ll add them to the feast.” My brother Ray nodded. “Okay. simple enough. I can do that. All we’re doing is watching football. I’m inviting my friends Ron & Cathy, TJ & Forrest (my nephews) will be here. over I’ll put the roast in about 3 o’clock. We’ll plan to eat around 5:30 or so. Everyone’s looking forward to it. This will be great!” With that task accomplished & meal coordination complete, RJ & I soon were off to bed.

RJ & I arose early Sunday morning, well ahead of the sun. We got dressed, geared up, gunned up & went hunting for ducks. We downed two mergansers early on in our hunt.

At a mid morning stop at a point where we had cell service, I called my brother :

“Ducks are on the menu.”

“Excellent.”

So after bagging two more ducks early that afternoon, RJ & I called it a hunt, got the canoe out of the water, and got back to my brother’s house at a little after 3:30 with 3 mergansers & a drake mallard to our credit. I walked into the house fully expecting to be greeted by the sizzling aroma of liquid smoke, bacon, Worcestershire & onions. To my slightly confused disappointment, there was nothing.

Now, at this point, I must stress that the next part of the tale is told in the full spirit of brotherly love & good humor. I chuckled to myself as events unfolded & I’m chuckling now as I write it. Instead of the delectible aroma of a bacon wrapped roast in the oven, there stood my brother in the kitchen:

“So, I went online to find out how I’m supposed to cook the roast.”

The hunting big brother in me looked at my non hunting brother & thought “Why’d you do that? I already told you how to cook it.”

“Online it says I’m supposed to add beef broth. Should I add some beef broth? Also, it says a roast like that should only take an hour & I should only cook it at 300 degrees. So I’m not putting it until 4. Should I add some beef broth now?”

Now, at this point in time, I’ve been my brother Ray’s big brother for nearly my whole life. Inside I was shaking my head & chuckling, but we were having a good time & I did not want a fight.

“Raymond, how many bone in vension roast have you ever cooked?” “Well, none.”

“And how many bone in venision roast do you think whatever online chatbox you consulted has ever actually cooked?” “Probably none.”

“Look. I’ve used beef broth before. That is not totally wrong. If you want to add some beef broth, go ahead & add beef broth. I don’t really care. Right now I’m going to go outside & breast out these ducks.”

*As a side note, I had chosen not to add beef broth this time becuase, in my humble opinion, with the bacon grease, butter pads, Worcestershire liquid smoke & meat juices, I was going to have more than enough moisture in the pan without beef broth & I didn’t want those whole carrots to get mushy.

But, be that as it may, I went outside to clean ducks & then get cleaned up myself.

My brother’s friends Ron & Cathy arrived about 5 o’clock. Ray had put the roast in the oven at 4 p.m. at 300 degrees, per his online chatbot chef’s instructions. When they arrived, I opened the oven door to check the roast’s progress. My brother chimed in again; “I’ve got this great meat thermometer. We can use it to check to make sure the roast is done.”

“I don’t need a meat thermometer. What I need is a big fork. Actually, I don’t even need that right now. I can see & smell for myself. There’s nothing going on in this oven. Everything in this pan is still raw. I’m not sure how your oven works (it’s a convection oven), but if we’re planning to eat today, you need to crank it up!”

So the oven went up in increments, first to 325, too little too late. Then to 350, where thing started to show signs of sizzle. Finally, about 6:30 p.m. Ray cranked it up to 375. AT 6:45, I decided to take matters into my own hands & begin cooking ducks. “We’ll eat in stages. 1st course will be ready in about 20 minutes. We’ll start with wild rice pilaf & duck.”

One of my nephews put two steaks on the grill. Ray made a big salad & prepared a big bowl of wild rice. For my part, I thin sliced six skinless merganser breasts. I a big frying pan, I added olive oil & butter, liquid smoke, soy sauce & spices (NO SALT!! the soy sauce adds all the salt needed) browned some sliced sweet & red onion, then added the meat. Once the duck was nearly cookd through, I added a stir fry mushroom blend & a handful of chopped scallions. Duck cooks pretty quickly that way. Within about fifteen minutes, our hunter’s feast first course was ready.

At this point I want to take a moment to make a quick comment about ducks. Mergansers specifically, which are much maligned as table fare, in my opinion, due to their status as a fish eating duck. I know lots of folks, including many hunters, who will not eat them. As far as I am concerned, that is due to ignorance or lack of proper preparation, because breasted out skinless & properly cleaned, fresh from the field, a pan of mergansers makes a mighty fine meal.

The reactions to this rendition of my hunter’s fare duck offering were no different. I always love the comments from folks. Especially those who’ve never before tasted freshly cooked wild duck.

“Wow! This is amazing!”

“This is one of the richest meats I’ve ever tasted!”

“Are these black ducks or regular ducks?”

“Is duck meat a super food?”

(*Technically, I don’t think it is, though I think ALL wild game classifies as “super food”. But that’ just my opinion.)

The questions were many. I explained to everyone that wild duck is nothing like the domesticated duck they may have eated in a restaurant or seen cooked on TV shows:

“There is no “crispy skin” there is no rendered in “duck fat” like the domestic duck preparations you see on TV or might eat in a restaurant. Wild ducks are generally breasted out, skinless. It’s a completely different preparation & culinary experience.”

Then, at just about the time the last of the duck was being scraped onto eager plates from the pan, I opened the oven & was met by the wafting aroma of sizzling onions,carrots, peppers, liquid smoke, spices & bacon. My borther Ray peered over my shoulder & piped up “I’ve got this really great meat thermometer, want me to check it?”

At that point I was thinking to myself “I’ve got a place you can stick that meat thermometer little brother of mine, but you ain’t much gonna like it…”

But I did not say that. Instead I held up my big fork & smiled. “All I need is this.” The fork slid through the roast like butter. Meat was literally falling off the bone. Finally, at 7:30 pm, I confidentally declared my bacon wrapped bone in vension roast done.

I pulled to roast from the oven & removed the bacon & put it aside in a bowl. “That’s not for eating”. We cut the carrots into chunks. They were done perfectly. Just as the duck course was finished, everone began filling their plates with roast venison.

The compliments were many. I think my favorit was from my nephew Forrest:

“These carrots are GAS!” (Apparently, “Gas!” is a good thing.)

Even Ray’s dog Pepper got some. She gobbled the bacon (“Who said that’s not for eating?”). Then claimed the bone. Ran off & hid with it actually. (“I’ve been waiting all afternoon for this. You can’t have it back. This bone is mine.”)

When all was said & done, there were no leftovers.

My other favorite comment came from Ray’s friend Cathy:

“Thank you Dick. That was fantastic. I’m going rave to all of my friends about this meal.”

And that’s what it’s all about.

Sharing nature’s bounty with family & friends.

A hunter’s fare feast fresh from the field.

**********

Until Our Trails Cross Again:

ADKO