Beer Cheese and Venison Smothered Tots
Grilled tots under sliced venison steak and a skillet beer cheese sauce. Car camp only.
- calories
- 780
- weight
- 11 oz
- cal / oz
- 71
- protein
- 42 g
- serves
- 6, scales
- prep
- 25 min
- cook
- 45 min
- total time
- 70 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Grill grate
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Real dishes
- Grab and go
- Needs a cooler
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Frozen tater tots | 2 lb bag | keep them frozen until they hit the heat |
|---|---|---|
| Venison steak | 2 lb | backstrap or top round, nothing tough |
| Salted butter | 3 tbsp | |
| All purpose flour | 3 tbsp | |
| Milk | 1 1/2 cups | or reconstituted whole milk powder |
| Beer | 3/4 cup | a lager or amber, nothing hoppy |
| Shredded sharp cheddar | 8 oz | |
| Worcestershire sauce | 1 tsp | |
| Garlic powder | 1/2 tsp | |
| Smoked paprika | 1/2 tsp | |
| Cayenne pepper | 1/4 tsp | |
| Salt and black pepper | to taste | |
| Jalapenos | 2 | sliced, raw or grilled |
Method
- Get a bed of coals or a grill running around 400F. Spread the tots in a grill basket or a foil pan poked full of holes and set it over indirect heat. Turn them every ten minutes.
- Salt and pepper the venison hard on both sides. Grill it over the direct coals, about four minutes a side, and pull it at medium rare. Let it rest while the tots finish.
- Melt the butter in a skillet at the edge of the fire and whisk in the flour. Cook it a minute so it stops smelling like raw flour.
- Pour in the milk a splash at a time, whisking, then the beer. Keep it just under a simmer until it thickens.
- Pull the skillet off direct heat and add the cheese in handfuls, stirring each one in before the next. Direct heat here will break the sauce.
- Stir in the Worcestershire, garlic powder, paprika, and cayenne. Salt to taste.
- Slice the rested venison thin across the grain. Pile it on the tots, pour the sauce over, scatter the jalapenos.
This is a car camp dish and it does not pretend otherwise. Frozen potatoes, cold beer, real cheese, and a cooler that has to hold for the whole trip. There is no backpacking version of it worth eating.
The sauce is a plain roux, and the only place it goes wrong is the cheese. Melt shredded cheddar into liquid that is still boiling and the fat separates out into a greasy slick. Move the skillet off the coals first and add it in handfuls. The beer thins the sauce enough to pour, which matters because the tots need to stay crisp under it rather than drown.
Packing
Tots stay in the cooler bottom under the ice. Shred the cheese and mix the flour with the three spices at home so camp is butter, whisk, pour. Open the beer at camp and drink the rest of the can.
Variations
- Ground venison browned in the skillet works if you have no steak, and the fond makes the sauce better.
- Diced green onion, cilantro, or tomato in place of jalapenos.
- No beer, or a dry camp: use the same volume of milk and an extra pinch of paprika.
https://realtree.com/timber-2-table-wild-game-recipes/beer-cheese-and-venison-smothered-grilled-tater-tots