Smoked Mountain Lion Shoulder

[Matt Dworak]

Any Pit Masters on here? Or, just some solid weekend warriors?

We have a big game feed at our place every year and this year I'm excited to cook up some Lion. Since this isn't something I dabble with everyday I want to get it right. I'd like to serve the kitty in a couple different dishes, one pretty basic so folks who haven't tried it can learn what it tastes like and a second dish with a little more culinary creativity. I pretty much preserved all my larger cuts (fronts and rear quarters) as slabs since I knew I wanted to smoke them whole. I have a pellet grill and I'm thinking of smoking at 180 for a couple hours to get a good base then finishing in the oven at 250-300ish until I hit an IT of 160 just to be safe with Trichinosis. Thinking a basic rub and spritzing with a mix of apple juice/Worcestershire while smoking. I'm up for any advise/pointers anyone may have. We normally have 60-70 folks and people bring some amazing dishes so I want to make sure I'm bringing my "A" game. Thanks all.

 

[mmazour]

Eagerly awaiting other replies to this one as well. My lion meat has tasted awesome - backstraps were as good as any pork loin. And front shoulders went into sausage. I have the two rears 1/4s frozen whole and am planning something similar. My thought was to brine first, then standard pork butt treatment - mustard and rub overnight, followed by at least a 3 hour smoke at 225, and then move to the oven wrapped in foil and some liquid and push that temp up. I just think that without the fat in there, you will want to contain some of that moisture and get braise/steam effect to get the meat to break down a bit. While my backstraps tasted good, they are tough, so there I marinated, and then grilled backstrap chunk whole to 160 and then sliced and served in 1/8 to 1/16" thick slices on a plate and everyone gobbled it. Like I said, the above smoke is my plan - I know it will taste good, but wanting the best way to break it down a bit and not have 20lbs of good, but really dry and chewy white meat. Please let us know how it goes. Attached pic is grilled and sliced backstrap with a homemade teriyaki glaze.

 

[Matt Dworak]

Dang @mmazour, sorry I just saw your post. I was coming back on here to answer my own question in case anyone else was searching in the future.

I ended up doing something very similar to what you're considering and it turned out fantastic. I used a front shoulder, approx. 9lbs - bone-in (no brine because I wanted folks to get to taste the meat unadulterated). I rubbed it down with some olive oil and a basic seasoning rub (while I didn't want to change the flavor profile too much I also wanted it to taste great). Smoked at 220 for about 4-hours, spritzing intermittently. Then wrapped and added a little apple juice, to help with the drying out you mentioned. Smoked another four hours at 180, mainly because I had already hit an internal temp of 165 and our party didn't start for another for hours.

It turned out fantastic! And a lot of folks agreed, it ended up crushing the "most exotic" category at our feed.

 

[JLS]

Damn that sounds good!

 

[noharleyyet]

Have heard pork taste comparisons...fair appraisal Matt?

 

[brockel]

Have heard pork taste comparisons...fair appraisal Matt?

Have always wanted to keep the back straps off a bobcat but never think about it when I’m skinning one

 

[Matt Dworak]

@noharleyyet You know that's a funny question, I would say so, that it is similar to pork. It's definitely fattier the deer/elk, which I find a little odd since they make up a large portion of their diet. The only thing i can attribute the fat to is a high percentage of porcupines in their diet (mine had many quills his forearms). But I'm purely speculating here...

I mentioned that I thought it tasted like pork to one of the party goers and another guy who has eaten cat said "it tastes nothing like pork"... So i guess i don't have the most refined palette, either way it's damn tasty!