Hawaiian venison sausage with local mushroom ragout

You’ll recall that, with the help of my dad, I put together some Hawaiian venison sausage with pork and guanciale.

The day after I made those, I cooked with them.

My intent was to braise the sausage with some local mushrooms in red wine and beef stock.

Easy enough.

At the Troy Farmers Market, I found some crimini and shitake mushrooms. I cleaned and quartered these.

I heated a pan with a couple of tablespoons of olive oil and toasted some fresh garlic and rosemary in the oil.

When I thought the fragrance was in the oil, I added my sausage and browned it on all sides.

I added the mushrooms into the oil to get those working; I forgot about the saltiness, and I added salt at this stage; Whoops! I cooked this for a few minutes.

I added about a cup of red wine and cooked it down for a few minutes (until half of the volume remained).

When the wine reduced, I added about a cup and a half of beef broth and cooked for about 15 minutes until the liquid coated the back of a spoon.

When it was finished, I served it over some whole wheat gnocchi in a light brown butter sauce.

Ok, let’s get it out of the way. It was salty. I made mistakes. Next time, no salt when I cook with the sausages. Luckily, I undersalted the gnocchi, so at least there was somewhat of a balance in each bite.

They were very good, though. Texturally, the venison meat is much more gritty than pork, so it was good that the pork was there to add some softness to the sausage. The guanciale acted like medium to slowly release the flavor of the sausage into the braising liquid. I was really great to taste the depth of the sauce in all of its fatty glory.

This recipe is going in the “frequently used” pile.