Mooseloaf!

Given all the beef recalls we Canadians are currently subject to, I thought I’d play it safe last night. I whipped up a loaf made from the ground carcass of an entirely different animal.


As a child, meatloaf was the only food I ate with ketchup. As a rule I didn’t like either, but I forced them down together hoping that these two culinary wrongs would somehow make a right. They didn’t.

Nevertheless, now I’m older, wiser and cheaper, and I’ve had this free ground moosemeat sitting in my fridge for the last couple of months. I figure serving meat in a loaf is possibly the best way to appreciate all its carcinogenic goodness, so read on and enjoy!


I found a recipe the way anybody finds anything nowadays—through Google. One turned up on a Norwegian blog, as follows:


500 g ground moose meat
50 ml oats
100 ml cream
½ tablespoon potato starch
1 egg, beaten
1 tsp salt
½ tsp black pepper
1 ½ tsp ground cumin
1 garlic clove, pressed
2 Tbsp parsley, finely chopped


I replaced the cream with soy milk and the potato starch with nothing, seeing as I’ve never heard of it. I’m also not exactly sure how much meat I used—I held the meat in one hand and a 500 g bag of asparagus in the other, with roughly equal muscle strain in both arms, so there you go. The metric-to-imperial conversions were also approximate, but if you prefer a more scientific method you can do your own calculations here.

Now – it’s time to make some moose!


Here's what you'll need.

Step 1. In a large bowl, lightly beat the egg. Add everything except for the ground meat.


Step 2. Set aside for 5 minutes, then add ground meat and mix well.

Mmmmm.

Step 3. Shape into a "loaf" shape.


Step 4. Bake on parchment paper [I used foil] lined baking sheet at 225°C [440°F] for about 30 - 40 minutes, or until juices run clear. [I’m paranoid about raw meat and I still took it out of the oven at 30 minutes].

Full of loafy goodness.

I decided to serve this with a spinach salad and a potato-broccoli-cheese concoction. Unfortunately, Google was much less helpful in recommending a wine to go with my exotic dish. Apparently nobody with internet access eats mooseloaf except the Palins. And I imagine they just wash it down with a Big Bear.

In the end I consulted my wine wheel, which recommended Barolo, Barbaresco or Rhone reds for “hoofed animals.” So I went with this, based solely on availability at Liquor Barn:

I like how they haven't redesigned their label since woodcuts were the latest technology. So classic.

Finally, tasting time!

It was like the majesty of nature ground up and shaped into a loaf. It wasn’t too gamey thanks to the cumin which “tames the wild flavour,” according to the recipe source.

The verdict: at the risk of sounding barbaric, everyone ought to snare a moose, grind up the carcass and season it with some cumin. Delicious!

So if you needed a reason to take up killing for sport, here it is. No recalls, no e coli, all gamey goodness.