Boarritos is what I could have made. Instead, I made enchiladas. Well, an enchilada casserole, to be precise. I didn't have any big wheat tortillas for burritos. Walt had to go out in the morning for a doctor's appointment and to do some shopping at two or three stores: Gamm'Vert, a garden center; Facile, a housewares and odds-and-ends store; and BricoMarché, a hardware and garden center. I stayed home and spent the morning cooking. Outdoors, a rain front was moving in. As far as the weather goes, we're finally back to normal. It's raining again this morning and is supposed to rain on and off all day. And it's chilly, with temperatures in the mid- to high forties F now. It's time for food that sticks to your ribs.
I had some of the seasoned, pulled boar meat in the freezer and a ziploc bag holding about half a cup of dried black-eyed peas. There was no shortage of rice or spices chez nous. And I made a batch of enchilada sauce, a mole based on a roux made with flour, oil, and spices including chili powder and cumin. It looked like chocolate pudding.
I also had some cans of corn and two pieces of cheese — mozzarella and peccorino — that I thought would be good melted in an enchilada casserole/gratin. Some of the brown mole went into the bottom of the casserole dish, and some went into the filling mixture of meat, peas, corn, and rice. As a side dish, I made some fresh green beans with tomato, onion, garlic and Mexican spices Those turned out to be very good.
As for the effiloché de sanglier (pulled boar), I'm still surprised how mild the meat is in taste. I didn't know what to expect when I cooked it, but you can't look a gift pig in the snout. The 2007 edition of the Larousse Gastronomique says: Les jeunes sangliers ont une chair délicate, dont le goût s'affirme de plus en plus avec l'âge, jusqu'à être très fort chez l'adulte. The 1967 edition says of the wild boar: sa chair, qui a un goût de sauvage très prononcé, n'est agréable que chez les animaux jeunes (marcassins) ; celle des animaux adultes est coriace et ne devient comestible qu'à la suite d'une longue marinade. It goes on to say that only the head of the adult boar is worth cooking and eating. Coriace means tough, and comestible means edible.
When I told our neighbor from Blois, a woman in her 60s whose father and husband were both hunters when they were younger, that I had been afraid the boar meat would be too tough and gamy for our taste, she said no, it's not strong-tasting at all. It's delicious. And it was. I wonder how old the boar was. I also have read that boars these days are raised in enclosures, so maybe this one wasn't all that wild after all. I'm glad it's good because I still have five pounds of boar meat in the freezer.
Food doesn't seem to stick to my ribs - it seems to stick a bit further down.
ReplyDelete:) :)
DeleteBettyAnn
Your enchilada gratin looks delicious. I wonder if boar would be on a menu in Paris.
ReplyDeleteBettyAnn
Figaro article listing restaurants serving game meats
DeleteGlad your are enjoying the boar's meat, especially since you have a good supply of it. There once was a Blue Boar Cafeteria in Louisville that I loved as a child.
ReplyDeleteI guess you had enough space for that quantity of boar's meat in your refrigerator. I wouldn't have had it on such short notice. Love your idea for making enchiladas. Mexican food is my comfort food and even though I don't prepare it frequently I certainly would never turn it down!
ReplyDeleteMaybe you cut it up and froze it in parcels upon rereading your post.
ReplyDeleteWe had enough freezer space for the big 5 lb. half of leg of boar along with three 1 lb. containers of pulled, seasoned meat. Yesterday read a recipe for slow cooked boar's leg with a champagne sauce that I'm going to make this winter.
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