Submitted by Founder of Rocky Mountain Sportswomen,
Elena Reynolds
Last fall, my mountain man, Jesse harvested a nice bull elk during Colorado’s muzzleloader season. We have been happily eating it throughout the winter, including our 3 year old, who loves it as well. During this time of the coronavirus pandemic, we have been so grateful to have meat in the freezer to get us through these times. We tend to get stuck doing the same things with the elk meat, so when making this roast we kind of decided to switch it up a bit. Now, we are definitely not professional cooks, and rarely follow recipes ourselves, so feel free to switch this recipe to tailor to your taste and style. This was a great dinner to come home to after a long day of fishing on the ice!
Ingredients:
Elk Front Shank
Red Onion
3 tsp cumin
3 tsp oregano
3 tsp salt
1 tsp ground black pepper
⅛ tsp cinnamon
2 garlic cloves
2 bay leaves
2 limes
Corn Tortillas
White Rice
Directions:
1. We decided that before we through the shank into the crockpot, that maybe we should try giving it a good searing in the cast iron with the sliced up red onion and bacon grease. We seared each side for about 2 minutes per side while the onions sauteed for a bit.
2. After a good searing, I drizzled a little bit of avocado oil in the bottom of the crockpot and threw the shank and onions in.
3. Dump the cumin, oregano, salt, pepper, cinnamon, and garlic into the crockpot along with the bay leaves and one of the limes freshly juiced.
4. Fill the crockpot with water until there’s about two inches standing. Stir in the spices, and let it cook on low for 6-8 hours.
5. After about 6 hours of cooking, open the lid and shred and cut the meat up in the crockpot. Let it cook on low with the shredded meat for about 2 more hours.
6. Cook up your rice on the stove top and start preparing your taco toppings, including lime wedges, cheese, sour cream, or whatever else you enjoy on your tacos.
7. When ready, fry up your street style corn tortillas in a pan with some butter. I recommend double layering your tortillas for each taco, because they can be soft and fall apart easily.
8. Add rice to your tortillas and top it off with this tasty meat and onions, along with your choice of taco toppings!
I hope you enjoy this dinner as much as we did. The next day, I just made a rice bowl with the leftovers, and the flavors had really sunken in the meat overnight. Please let us know how this recipe worked out for you in the comments below!
If you have a wild game recipe you would like to share with us to be posted on our website, feel free to contact us! Provide us with the ingredients list, instructions, and if you would like, a quick story about the harvest and/or the recipe.