Canned Venison and V8 Soup
Pressure-canned deer meat, tomato-vegetable juice, and dried vegetables. Heat and eat.
- calories
- 420
- weight
- 9 oz
- cal / oz
- 47
- protein
- 34 g
- serves
- 3, scales
- prep
- 2 min
- cook
- 12 min
- total time
- 14 min
- water
- 600 ml boiled
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Canister stove
- Liquid fuel
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Canoe / raft
- Winter / snow
- Gluten free
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Grab and go
- Shelf stable
- Dump and stir
Ingredients
| Home-canned venison | 1 quart jar | canned in its own juice, no fridge needed until opened |
|---|---|---|
| V8 or other vegetable juice | 46 oz can | a 32 oz bottle plus water also works |
| Dried peas, corn, and carrots | 1 1/2 cups | freeze-dried or dehydrated, not frozen |
| Instant mashed potato flakes | 1/3 cup | for body |
| Salt and black pepper | to taste |
Method
- Pour the vegetable juice into the pot and bring it to a simmer.
- Add the dried vegetables and let them rehydrate for eight minutes. Add water if the pot goes thick.
- Dump in the venison with all its jar liquid. Break the chunks apart with the spoon.
- Stir in the potato flakes a spoonful at a time until the soup coats the back of the spoon.
- Simmer two more minutes, salt and pepper it, and eat straight from the pot.
Home-canned meat is already cooked through, so the only real work is getting the vegetables soft. Everything else is warming up. That makes this a good first-night meal when you rolled into camp late and nobody wants to think.
The original called for a bag of frozen vegetables, which no cooler holds past day two. Dried peas, corn, and carrots do the same job and rehydrate in the juice while it heats. Potato flakes replace the missing starch: without them the juice stays thin and drinks more like a hot beverage than a dinner.
Packing
The jar and the juice can are the weight, so this is a car or boat meal. Dried vegetables, potato flakes, and seasoning go in one bag together. Bring a bag for the empty jar; it rides home dirty.
Variations
- Swap the venison for two foil pouches of chicken and this becomes a backpacking meal at a third of the weight.
- A handful of instant rice in place of the potato flakes stretches it to four servings.
- Chili powder and cumin push it toward a stew.
https://www.huntingpa.com/threads/cold-pack-soup.2903