An unusual dish I enjoyed in Yucatán Mexico was Tzic de Venado, which is also written as Tsi’ik de Venado. Venado is Spanish for venison, and Tzic means something like pulled meat. So this is pulled venison. What makes it unusual, is that the pulled venison is served cold as a salad with onion, cilantro, Seville orange juice, cucumber, and and Mexican radishes. The venison is cooked with a spice mix called recado blanco, a ‘white’ spice mix from Yucatán. Spice mixes are called recado there, and there is also recado rojo (used for Cochinita Pibil) and recado negro (used for Relleno Negro). Tzic de Venado is served with crispy corn tortillas (tostados), and a soupy version of refried beans. The traditional way of is to prepare it wrapped in banana leaves, and then cooked in a hole in the ground with a fire of local hardwood. Sous vide is a great modern alternative for that. This dish is very suitable to prepare a batch of multiple portions at once, and then freeze them to be enjoyed later.

In Yucatán venison of the local white-tailed deer is used, which is not available here in the Netherlands. So I’ve used the leg of local deer or roe deer instead. As I wasn’t sure about the right time and temperature to cook that sous vide to end up with a ‘pullable’ texture, I decided to try some small pieces first at 68C/155F and 74C/165F for both 8 and 24 hours.

After 8 hours at 74C/165F the meat was nicely ‘pullable’, but at 68C/155F the meat was too tough.

Even after 24 hours at 68C/155F it was still too tough. After 24 hours at 74C/165F the meat was even easier to pull than after 8 hours at that temperature, but also a bit more dry. So I decided that 8 hours at 74C/165F was the way to go.

Ingredients

For the recado blanco (per kilo (2.2 lbs) of meat)

• 2 grams (2 tsp) dried Mexican oregano (or regular oregano)
• 0.25 gram (1/8 tsp) garlic powder
• 3 grams (1 tsp) black peppercorns
• 0,05 grams (1 piece) cloves
• 2 grams (1 tsp) cumin seed
• 1 gram (1/2 tsp) Mexican cinnamon (or regular cinnamon)
• 2 grams (1 tsp) coriander seed
• 10 grams (1/2 Tbsp) table salt
• 7 ml (1/2 Tbsp) Seville orange juice, or regular orange juice

For 2 servings

• 300 grams (.66 lb) venison
• 10 grams fresh cilantro (leaves only)
• 50 grams (1/2 cup) minced white or red onion
• 100 grams seeded and diced cucumber (1 cup) or 50 grams cucumber and 50 grams sliced radishes
• 200 ml (1/2 + 1/3 cup) Seville orange juice (or 80 ml (1/3 cup) orange juice and 120 ml (1/2 cup) lime juice)
• 1/3 of the recado blanco as described above for 1 kilo/2.2 lbs of meat
• 2 banana leaves (optional)

Instructions

For the recado blanco, grind the cumin seed, coriander seed, black peppercorns, cloves, and dried oregano in a spice grinder…

…to obtain a fine powder. You can also use a mortar and pestle for this.

After grinding add salt, cinnamon, and garlic powder.

Cut the venison into cubes and add the recado blanco together with a bit of orange juice.

Mix well.

Wrap the meat in banana leaves. This is optional, because it doesn’t do much for the flavor.

Vacuum seal the meat.

Cook sous vide for 8 hours at 74C/165F.

Take the meat out of the bag, and reserve the juices. Pull the meat with two forks. You can then mix the pulled meat with (a part of) the reserved juices. The meat should be moist, but not soupy. Allow the meat to cool.

Add the Seville orange juice, or mixture of orange juice and lime juice, and allow to marinate for at least 1 hour.

Then add the cucumber, cilantro, onion, and radishes (if using).

Serve the Tzic cold with refried beans (in Mexico it was served with a refried beans soup (frijol negro colado) in a bowl, but I didn’t like that as much), tostados (corn tortillas toasted for 10 minutes in an oven with fan at 180C/350F), and habanero salsa for spiciness.

Wine pairing

At wine pairing dinners I organized at home for friends and family, we tried this dish with the following wines:

• Torraccia del Piantavigna Vigna Pelizzane Ghemme DOCG 2011 (90% Nebbiolo, 10% Vespolina, Italy, Alto Piemonte)
• Valdeorra DO Mencia Carballo 2014 (100% Mencia, Spain, Galicia)
• Pommard AOC 2015 Vincent Latour Vieilles Vignes (100% Pinot Noir, France, Bourgogne)
• Goldenits Neusiedlersee DAC 2020 (100% Zweigelt, Austria)
• Giuseppe Cortese Barbaresco DOCG Rabaja 2011 (100% Nebbiolo, Italy, Piemonte)

All of these are elegant red wines with modest acidity and soft tannins. The best pairing was with the Ghemme. This is a magnificent beautifullly aged wine with velvety tannins and complex aromas. The combination with the meat softens the tannins even further. This made me expect that the other aged Nebbiolo in the lineup, i.e. the Barbaresco, would also be a great pairing, but the tannins in the Barbaresco were too hefty and made this my least favorite pairing. The Pommard was also an excellent pairing, but as a wine not as magnificent as the Ghemme and a little bit over its peak in terms of ageing. The Mencia and Zweigelt were also good pairings, and a more affordable alternative for the Ghemme or Pommard.