Not Cat Scratch Fever, but backstrap fever.

Yesterday it dawned on me that I still have some perfectly good backstraps in the freezer, along with the tenderloins.  There is a difference between tenderloins and backstraps by the way – one is on the inside of the ribcage and the other is located along the spine apparently.  But after reading about the topic on many different sites it doesn’t seem that anyone can agree on which is which.  So for now we’re referring to all of them as backstraps.  Capiche?  Besides both of them taste incredible anyway.

Since I now have backstraps on the brain, I’m wondering when all of you enjoy your backstraps.  Do you eat them immediately as some guys and gals do?  Do you save them for a special occasion?  Or do you just eat them whenever the feeling hits ya?

And while we’re on the subject, how do you prepare them?  Last year I used a very good recipe idea that Mike had on his blog,  and it tasted dang good.  But this year I want to try a different recipe and I’m hoping all of you readers will help me out with that.

In the comments section, or if you prefer, in an email, send me your favorite backstrap/tenderloin recipe.  Also, feel free to let me know when you eat your backstraps – immediately, during a special occasion, or whenever you feel like it.

I’ll pick the recipe I think sounds the best, or most enticing, have my wife prepare the backstraps using your recipe (God knows I can’t cook), and I’ll let everyone know how it tasted here.

Mmmmmm,  I’m hungry already.

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The picture in this post brings a smile to my face.  Unfortunately, my freezer hasn’t looked like this in over a year.  But after my opening day success this year, as you can tell, it’s pretty full.

We got a call yesterday afternoon from the processor, and my wife happily picked up our future table fare early yesterday evening.  The beautiful thing about this picture is that we already have a few meals planned that we will use the venison in.  If there is venison in the freezer, you can be sure that you will find it included in bunch of our meals.  We love using the burger in goulash, potato soup, and spaghetti.  We even throw it in lasagne, tacos, and even – and I hate to admit this – an occasional Hamburger Helper meal as well.  And of course you haven’t lived until you’ve had venison roast in the crock pot.  Mmmm!

I’m glad our freezer already looks like that this early in the season, and I’m hoping I can add some more venison to the freezer as well.  Thankfully we have a chest freezer that doesn’t have much in it, because the normal freezer is looking a little full.

Hunting happiness is a full freezer.  Now I just need to start to fill the other one.

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I think Jeff feels left out when it comes to the site.

For some reason he won’t write, because, as he says, he has good thoughts, but when he writes them down they just sound stupid.  I don’t know that for sure, because I’ve never read anything he has written, but that is his story and he is sticking to it.  I always include his hunting success on the site, especially since they usually outnumber mine.  And I have even managed to keep his 0 for 2 2008 bowhunting record quiet.  Whoops, until now I guess.

So, a few weeks, well actually, I think it has been months ago, Jeff called me and wanted to do a recipe page.  I thought that was a good idea, so I posted the page up and said that we would have recipes coming soon.  And I waited.  And waited some more.  And then waited some more.  No recipes.  I told him about it over and over, kept checking the page, and still no recipes on it.  I figured with his feelings of site loneliness and all, that given this opportunity, he would have been all over it.  He talked about putting up recipes, and having pictures included of the dish…..and still we had nothing.

Then I started getting emails:  When is the recipe page going to be up?  Are you ever going to put recipes on your page?  Not wanting to mess with Jeff’s stuff, considering his feelings of SimplyOutdoors inadequacy, I just made the page private so that no one could see it anymore, but he could still start messing with it if he wanted.  And I’ve waited.  And waited again.  Still nothing.

I think Jeff needs some encouragement to get his recipe page up and running.  So, to use a phrase from Miss Congeniality, “I think Jeff is a little scared.  He might need some applause”.

With a little encouragement maybe he will actually get the recipe page off the ground-because he does make some killer venison meals.

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