Muley Caldillo
Venison, green chile, and potatoes simmered down in one dutch oven at the truck.
- calories
- 480
- weight
- 14 oz
- cal / oz
- 34
- protein
- 38 g
- serves
- 7, scales
- prep
- 25 min
- cook
- 90 min
- total time
- 115 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
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Grab and go
- Needs a cooler
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Venison roast | 3 lbs | mule deer, elk, or whitetail, cut into 1-inch cubes |
|---|---|---|
| Lard or vegetable oil | 3 tbsp | |
| Onions | 2 large | chopped |
| Garlic | 6 cloves | chopped |
| Rotel | 1 can (10 oz) | |
| Fire-roasted tomatoes | 1 can (14 oz) | |
| Roasted Hatch green chiles | 1 can (27 oz) | canned travels; frozen roasted chiles work if the cooler is cold |
| Tomato salsa | 1 cup | |
| Salsa verde | 2 cups | |
| Chicken broth | 3 cups | bouillon and water saves the weight and the cans |
| Ground cumin | 1 tbsp | |
| Salt and black pepper | to taste | |
| Red potatoes | 2 lbs | skin on, cut into 1-inch cubes |
| Frozen sweet corn | 1 bag (12 oz) | |
| Corn tortillas and limes | for serving |
Method
- Get the dutch oven hot over the fire ring or a two-burner stove and melt the lard.
- Brown the venison in batches. Crowd the pot and it steams instead of browning, and you lose the crust that flavors the whole stew.
- Pull the meat, drop the heat, and cook the onions until soft. Garlic in for the last minute.
- Return the meat. Add the Rotel, fire-roasted tomatoes, green chiles, both salsas, broth, cumin, salt, and pepper.
- Bring it up, then hold a low simmer for about an hour. Over coals, that means moving the pot off direct heat or raking coals aside.
- Add the potatoes and cook another 20 minutes, until a knife goes in clean.
- Stir in the corn and give it 5 more minutes. Serve with tortillas and a lime wedge.
Caldillo is a chile stew built around tough meat and time. Venison is very lean, so the browning step and the ninety-minute simmer are not optional — that is the only thing turning a shoulder roast into something you can chew. Two salsas and canned roasted chiles do the work a long aromatics prep would do at home, which is why this scales to a camp kitchen without much cutting board.
Everything but the meat and potatoes is shelf-stable, so the cooler only carries two items. The corn goes in at the end on purpose; boiled for an hour it turns to mush and gives up the sweetness that cuts the chile.
Packing
Cube the venison and potatoes at home and bag them separately; potatoes in cold water keep from browning. Cans, salsa jars, and spices go in one box so the whole dinner is a single trip from the truck.
Variations
- Beef chuck stands in one for one if the freezer is empty.
- Cut the potatoes and serve it over rice instead.
- A can of pinto beans in the last ten minutes stretches it to nine or ten people.
https://realtree.com/timber-2-table-wild-game-recipes/muley-caldillo-mexican-style-mule-deer-stew