Pickled Deer Tongue

So this year when the boys got back from deer hunting I thought I would try something different.  I had been reading Martin Picard's Au Pied De Cochon cookbook and trying as many of his recipes as I can and kept flipping past the page of pickled deer tongue.  Not that I am opposed to the idea just that deer tongue isn't exactly something you can get at the grocery store.  So when the boys brought five deer home I thought, what better opportunity to give them a try.  When I started cutting them out of the deer everybody was looking at me like I was out of mind.  Whether or not that's true is yet to be determined.

Just in case anyone is wondering how to remove the deer tongue, I found that making a cut from the chin to the throat and then wrestling it out from the bottom to be the easiest method.  After you remove the tongues I would suggest letting them lit in a cold water bath for a day or so changing the water three or four times.

After you tongues have soaked all you have to do is simmer them for a couple hours let them cool and peel the skin off your tongues.  Once they are cooked it is just a matter of soaking them in a pickling solution.  After they are soaked in the pickling solution they are ready to eat.  In Picard's book he suggest browning them with a little but and serving them with some crusty bread and some spicy brown mustard. I can tell you that this a perfectly suitable way to eat them.  I enjoyed it tremendously, however, I have five of these tongues and wanted to try something different.  

A while back my wife and I were at Piccolo a restaurant in minneapolis that is home of the best thing I have ever eaten.  Scrambled brown eggs with pickled pigs feet, truffle butter and parmigiano,  I know it sounds odd but so far in my life I have not eaten anything that could top it.  So I thought why not try something similar with the pickled deer tongues.  Now, I am no Doug Flicker but my scrambled eggs with pickled deer tongue, asiago and truffle oil wasn't the worse the thing I have ever had.  I think I over cooked the deer tongue when I chopped it up and browned it in butter.  The flavor was all there but I remember the pigs feet being as soft as the eggs and them blending together better.   My tongue was a little crisp and not as subtle.  Not bad, just not as good as the original.  

The good news is I still have some more tongues to experiment with and I am looking forward to finding something else I can do with them.  I am not sure what to do next with them but what ever it is I am sure it will end up on here.