Smoked some Bear

One of the great things about getting known for your smoking prowess is that you get people asking you if you want to smoke something for them. In this neck of the woods that can mean quite a bit of wild game. Now, I know that you could be thinking that this would mean a lot of work and possible expense with no pay off for me and, that would be true, if I did it totally for free that is. :twisted: Honestly though, I'm not in the butcher business or even in the curing meat for cash business but, a man needs to eat. More importantly, my family needs to eat so, I have a standing rule, I take a cut off the top of whatever I smoke, literally. Okay, sometimes it's a cut off the side but, you get the idea. The other added benefit of people bringing me different things to smoke, I get to smoke new stuff I've never smoked before.
When a friend of mine mentioned that he had a couple of bear roasts he wanted me to smoke up, I jumped at the chance. Hadn't smoke bear before and always wanted to. I trimmed up both of the roasts he gave me. Bear fat is notorious for giving off flavors so, I made sure to get every scrap of it off of the outside. One of the roasts didn't require much trimming at all but, the other was a different story. When I was done with that one, I ended up with three fist size chunks of meat. Boy was that meat ruby red!


The color reminded me of beef so I hit it with some Cow Pow and there was a sweet smell to it so I hit it with some Pig Pollen as well.

From there it went onto the OTG to catch an indirect smoke. Sorry, no temperatures were taken, I have a bad tendency of doing this. It's like cooking by feel and intuition.


Now, for a commercial break. While the bear was continuing its slow cook, I through some squash and chicken thighs on for dinner.




And now back to the Bear!
It took about 5 hours until it hit 205. I wrapped it when it hit 160 because I was worried about a major loss of moisture. After it came off the OTG I let it rest for 2 hours wrapped in towels on the counter before even slicing into it. Here is how Yogi looked when he was ready to slice up.


Time for the slicing!


Yogi was really tasty. The flavor was similar to beef but, a hair sweeter. The tenderness was perfect and it pulled apart like choice brisket. There was a good amount of shrinking during the cook process so, I didn't take much of the end product. I did end up with enough for a couple of delicious sandwiches.
I have word that the same buddy who brought me the bear is out salmon fishing. Considering he was ecstatic over how the bear turned out, I'm looking forward to possible salmon being on the menu. :thumb:
Thanks for looking!

Dauvis said:

So... he was tastier than the average bear? :twisted:

Click to expand...

I cooked him so, yes. :biggrin1:

landarc said:

Nice cooking Tom, good to see you post again.

That bear looks a lot like brisket, amazingly so. Great cook, I have had bear, but, the fat was left on.

Click to expand...

Yeah, the fat issue is huge when it comes to wild game, that and hang time. I'm not a fan of either. I know that "gaminess" is a desirable taste to some but, not me.

superlazy said:

Does it have a sweet taste like my friends keep telling me?

Click to expand...

Yes it does but, like a light fruit sweetness. It definitely is subtle.

martyleach said:

Tom, so how does it smell when cooking? To me, that is a key if I'm gonna like it. I hate wild boar because it stinks like crazy cooking it. Smells like friggin' B.O. and I am not going to eat that stuff.

Click to expand...

lets put it this way, my wife even commented on how good it smelled while cooking. If I were to draw a comparison it would be like beef smells when it has a nice strap of fat on it. Which is odd considering I trimmed all the fat off but, that was the smell.