Eating and Cooking Bison

If more people knew about my desire to raise bison they would ask questions. But since very few people know of this passion, I will ask myself these questions. I hope you enjoy.

Why should a family add bison to their diet?

As a man, my reply would simply be "for the taste". If you cooked any main dish involving meat (say lasagna) with bison, and another with beef or sausage, the bison lasagna would win the taste test every time. Even comparing cheeseburgers, bison will taste better and will have a lot more moisture when prepared correctly.

Not only does bison taste better but it is also better for your body than beef, chicken or fish. Bison has 76% less fat than Beef and 68% less fat than chicken. It also has 43% more protein than beef. According to readers digest magazine, (something I have never read) bison is in the top 5 foods women should be eating.Their reasoning is because of the iron content.

Can you cook bison in the same manner as beef?

This is my first experience with buffalo prime rib.
It was the best cut of meat I have ever eaten.

Preparing bison is similar to beef in many ways and can be substituted for beef in many recipes. However bison needs patience and low heat. Over cooked bison is just like any other meat that has been overcooked, dry and tough. The FDA recommends meat to be cooked medium. I recommend medium rare steaks and medium burgers. But remember, cook em' slower and NEVER press down on your burgers while cooking. With bison meat, there is very little shrinkage when cooking, what you see is what you get. There is almost no fat to be cooked away. Don't be afraid to use a little bit of oil when cooking steaks and roasts. I have never tried a bison roast! What is wrong with me? Just imagine a bison roast just falling apart into bite sized pieces... Yuummmmm

And with that thought, I will leave you.

The Perfect Autumn Ale

There are very few people that know how to brew there own beer. So, I decided to share an easy way to brew quality beer in the comfort of your home. 

First things first. Pour a beer from your last batch (if this is your first batch a microbrew will work). In this case my last batch was an American Amber Ale that I named the "Tuff American Amber Ale". It had a beautiful amber color, complex flavors, wonderful aromas and 6.5%abv. What more could you want? 

Now to get started Brewing our Pumpkin Ale. 

1) Make sure you have all your equipment and ingredients. You can start your home brewery by buying a kit from your local Homebrew shop. Don't forget most kits do not include a brew pot or a food grade spoon. For my beer I purchased a pumpkin ale kit from Midwest Homebrew supply in St. Louis Park. Pumpkin was purchased at a local grocery store. I doubled the amount of pumpkin to give it a more pronounce flavor. There is a total of 60oz. of 100% pumpkin in this brew.

 2) Clean your brew pot, rinse thoroughly and add 2.5-3 gallons of water into your brew pot. Turn burner to high and watch the temperatures. Your goal is to reach and not exceed 150 degrees.

 3) Clean and sanitize the rest of your equipment. I cannot stress this enough. If you have unsanitary equipment you will taste it your final product. Once sanitized it can only be placed on a sanitary surface. Paper towels work just fine.

 4) You need to get all your crushed grains into your grain bag. I have mine crushed at the store because I don't have a grain mill at home. You only want to crack open the shell of the grain. Do not crush to a powder. You just want to get the flavors and colors out of the specialty grain leaving very little grain behind.

 5) Put your liquid malt extract in hot water (make sure its completely sealed). This makes it easer to pour.

 6) Now that your water is at 150 degrees you want to insert your grain sock into your brew pot and let it steep for 20-30 minutes.

Starting to infuse color

 7) Once your timer goes off take the grains out. You should have a nice color wort (pronounced wert) and a great foundation of a wonderful beer.

 Discard your grain bag any way you chose. I open the bag and scatter all my spent grains in the lawn to give the grass some carbons. 

 8) Remove your wort form the heat and pour in your malt extract. Make sure you are constantly stiring the wort so you don't scorch your malt extract. Its not fun to clean later.

 Add the brown sugar. Place back on burner and crank the heat to high. Get a good boil going. 

Pellet Hops 

9) Once you get your wort boiling, add your first package of hops.

 This will boil for  55 Minutes

 10) Prepare you pumpkin for easy handling and get your yeast soaking in a 1/4 cup of water. This will help your yeast start working quicker than just putting it in wort dry. We will come back to the yeast.

 11) Now that your timer has gone off its time to add the 60oz. of pumpkin...

 the cinnamon and nut meg and your last package of hops. Let this boil for another 5 minutes.

 12) When your last timer goes off you need to cool your wort as quickly as possible. The best way is with a wort chiller. But since I don't have one yet, I found an ice bath is the next best thing. Once the ice water gets warm, drain it and refill the sink with cold water.

 13) Once the wort reaches 100 degrees you can put it in your food grade pail.

 Top off your pail with cold water to bring the total liquid level to 5.25 gallons. This should bring your wort temp to 70degrees.  

 14) Take your original gravity reading. This  number tells you how much fermentable sugar are in your wort. It will also give you an indication of when your beer is done fermenting. You will also need this to measure your final alcohol reading when you bottle later.

15) Now you will pitch your yeast that has been sitting. Yeast will eat the sugars in your beer and convert them to alcohol.

16) Get your wort into your primary fermentation vessel. For my primary fermenter I chose a 6 gallon carboy.

 17) Put your air lock on or your blow off tube. A blow off tube is great in high gravity beers. Without it, you have a big mess all over your baby room... I mean... fermentation cellar.

 18) Place your fermenter in a cool dark place. Light and heat are enemies of fermentation. My fermentation cellar is the hall closet.

The beer on the left is a dunkelweizen. Going into bottles tomorrow.

If homebrewing is something you are going to try I wish you the best beer you have ever tasted. The most valuable books I have found are Homebrewing for dummies and The Complete Joy of Homebrewing. Both books are great resources for all experience levels.

Raising Bison

Lately I have been giving a lot of thought to raising Bison as a main enterprise. There are farmers that advise not to raise exotic breeds as a main income source, and with the advice from the old is usually the advice of the wise. So my pursuit of bison farming is definitely in the "lets think about it stage".

So, what am I thinking about?

I want to know how my animals are going to manage the cold Minnesota winters. With wind chills dipping down into the -50's to -100's I need to make sure cold weather will not be a problem. Before commercial hunting in the 19th century, Buffalo roamed from Canada's Great Bear Lake (in the Upper Northwest Territories) down to the center of Mexico. So the freezing cold winters and the sweltering hot and humid conditions we are currently experiencing will not slow the growth or production of this great animal. I also want to raise an animal that attracts attention from the public. I want to educate people about bison and how to responsibly steward God's beautiful creation in ways our ancestors never did.

The sad history of the bison. At one time there were bison herds as large as some of americas largest cities. They roamed across the land in such great number it literally made the ground shake. In the 19th century bison ware hunted commercially and endorsed by the US Army in order to force the indians onto reservations by depleting there food supply. Indians were hunting bison as they have for thousands of years. The indians alone were killing about 250,000 per year. Most indians would utilize the entire animal. Commercial hunters would strip the bison of there hides and leave the carcass in the field until all that remained were the bones.

Currently in america there are about 225,000 bison. Most are being raised by farmers that are trying to steward these animals well. This is considered an inspiring comeback from just a couple thousand in 1874 when President Ulysses S. Grant pocket vetoed and bill protecting the bison.

Bison are powerful, graceful, efficient, fast, beautiful and delicious. Far more nutritious than beef, the taste alone is truly amazing and will bring delight to any meal including breakfast.

On a later blog I will explore the special requirements for raising Bison as opposed to beef and how it will all fit together with my pigs, chickens and other enterprises.