Venison and Plantain Skillet Piñón
Ground venison, sweet plantain, olives, and raisins in one camp skillet. The Puerto Rican layered casserole flattened into something you can actually cook on a cook box.
- calories
- 620
- weight
- 9 oz
- cal / oz
- 69
- protein
- 34 g
- serves
- 5, scales
- prep
- 15 min
- cook
- 30 min
- total time
- 45 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
- Campfire coals
- Liquid fuel
- Canister stove
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Gluten free
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Pre-mix at home
- Needs a cooler
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Ground venison | 1 lb | frozen solid at home, thawed in the cooler by dinner |
|---|---|---|
| Ripe plantains | 3 large | yellow with black spots; they travel fine outside a cooler |
| Tomato sauce | 1 cup | a small can or a shelf-stable pouch |
| Pimiento-stuffed green olives | 1/4 cup | sliced, drained |
| Capers | 1 tbsp | drained |
| Golden raisins | 1/2 cup | |
| Adobo seasoning | 1 tbsp | |
| Dried onion and garlic | 2 tbsp total | stands in for the fresh sofrito base |
| Cooking oil | 3 tbsp | enough to brown plantains, not deep fry them |
| Kosher salt | to taste |
Method
- Slice the plantains into rounds about a half inch thick. Skins peel easier if you score them lengthwise first.
- Heat 2 tbsp oil in the skillet over medium coals or a low flame. Brown the plantain rounds in a single layer, three or four minutes a side, until the edges go dark gold. Pull them onto a plate.
- Add the last of the oil and the venison. Break it up and cook until no pink is left. Venison is lean, so it will not render much fat.
- Stir in the dried onion and garlic, adobo, capers, olives, and raisins. Cook a minute so the dried aromatics rehydrate in the meat juices.
- Pour in the tomato sauce. Simmer eight to ten minutes until it tightens and stops looking like sauce on top of meat.
- Return the plantains, fold them through, and cover for five minutes off direct heat. Salt at the end, after the olives and adobo have had their say.
The original is a layered casserole: fried plantain sheets, sofrito-cooked meat, cheese, eggs, all baked in a dish. None of that survives a campsite, so the layers get folded into one skillet instead. The plantains still get browned separately, because that step is where their sugar caramelizes and it will not happen if they go in with the sauce.
The sofrito becomes dried onion and garlic bloomed in the meat juices. It is not the same, but a food processor and a bunch of cilantro are not coming on this trip. The raisins, olives, and capers do most of the actual work here anyway — sweet, salty, and sharp all landing on lean meat that has no fat of its own to carry flavor.
Packing
Adobo, dried onion and garlic go in one small jar. Olives, capers, and tomato sauce ride in the pantry bin. Plantains sit out of the cooler in something rigid or they arrive as jam. Venison stays frozen at the bottom of the cooler and comes out the morning you cook it.
Variations
- Ground beef or bulk sausage works if the freezer has no venison.
- No plantains at the store: brown thick-cut sweet potato rounds the same way.
- A handful of shredded hard cheese melted over the top at the end gets closer to the original, but drop the dairy-free tag if you do.
https://realtree.com/timber-2-table-wild-game-recipes/venison-and-plantain-pi-n-casserole