(As read and prepared by Alex Tuller and Dean Temple for the May 11, 2006 podcast)
Fire up your arms and shoot some deer! Then go out and pick your asparagus and fire up the grill.
For the asparagus, get a couple of pounds and trim off the bottom. I just snap the ends off. Smash a couple of garlic cloves in the mortar and add salt to make a paste. Add about 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil and stir to combine. Pour over the asparagus, add a good amount of pepper. Using your hands coat the asparagus. Then when the grill is ready, grill them for a few minutes each side, they should have nice marks on them. I toss a couple of lemon halves onto the grill as well and serve everything on a platter, letting people help themselves.
If you have no charcoal for your grill, but are desperate to have asparagus, you can also put your cast iron griddle under the broiler for 10 minutes to heat up and broil the asparagus. This is really good too.
For Dean’s cutlet portion of the menu, you will want very thin venison cutlets (we made four for two people), a half cup flour, salt, pepper, quarter cup breadcrumbs, and cayenne to taste, an egg, a table spoon of cream, and a high-temperature tolerant vegetable oil to thickly coat the bottom of your skillet.
Mix the egg and cream in a small bowl. Dip your cutlets and wipe down the excess with your fingers. In a second, wider bowl, mix the flower, breadcrumbs, salt, pepper and cayenne. Dip the cutlets into the mix to coat, and allow to dry.
Bring the skillet and oil up to an extremely high heat. I flipped the meat several times to achieve a nice golden brown without any negative result. Allow to rest briefly on paper towels to absorb remaining oil. These were served with lemon wedges and Tabasco.