It’s getting close to that time of the year when the men in our county start itching– itching to get into the woods to set out their deer feeders and stands, and select their next hunting spot.
I’m a country girl that grew up eating deer meat in just about any form or fashion. My dad kept me supplied with it for many years until his passing nearly 15 years ago. My dad was also an avid hunter and marked rifleman, so if the freezer got low it only took one shot for him to fill it back up.
After dad passed away, I began begging my oldest brother, Clinton Cato, to keep me furnished with deer meat. I don’t think we saw eye-to-eye on the situation because his donations kept getting smaller and smaller. It was like he didn’t think it was his job or duty to support his younger sister.
I’d sometimes leave his house with a cut of deer roast or a soup bone that I usually added to a pot of beans or chili. I have my own deer chili recipe and often make it for family functions, so when I received the free meat from Clinton along with some free garden veggies, it cost me nearly nothing to make.
One afternoon, I put on a pot of beans and realized I didn’t have any meat to add. I pulled up to Clinton’s house just in time because he was cooking something outside on his smoker. When I asked for a donation, he lifted the lid to show me four entire deer legs laid across the rack.
“Are you cooking these for your dogs?” I asked, confused. “I was needing some meat to put in my beans. Do you have any?”
“No, just what you see here. But I’ll give you one of these legs,” he said, with a smirky grin on his face that I’d seen before.
He put the smoked leg into two bread sacks so that it was completely covered and sent me on my way.
I returned home, opened the bread sacks and looked at the leg. I figured my best bet was to try and take the meat off the leg and then stir it into the beans. I soon found out that the leg wasn’t entirely cooked and actually somewhat raw. There was no tearing the meat off because it was still connected, tendons and all.
I decided it was time to improvise because the beans were almost ready. I put the deer leg on my kitchen counter and tried to bend it, but it wouldn’t budge. Since I was running out of options, I transfered the beans to my tallest pot and stuck the entire leg in, hoof up. It was still too tall to put the lid on top so I left it off, waiting for the beans to cook enough to boil the meat off.
It did boil the meat off, but just the lower half, so I flipped the leg over and let it cook the top portion. Once the pot started growing there was no room for a spoon, so I took the deer leg and stirred the beans with it, much like a witch stirring her cauldron. I was almost sad because there was no one there to witness it, but after repeating my story to my siblings, I have never “heard the end of it.”
It was one of my best pots of beans that I have cooked to this day and I have never forgotten it. So if you ever see me competing with beans or chili at a fall festival, you might think twice about sampling.
