Buffalo?

[Triple H]

Long story short, over the years we've had exchange students and various people live with us. Currently we have a gal from South Dakota in our home and her mother sent us, for Christmas, a certificate from a local (in Seattle) meat distributor to buy some Buffalo meat.

We're having a dinner party next weekend and thought this would be a good chance to do something a little different.

Sooooo, any ideas on buffalo meat preparation and a good match for the wine?

[Thomas]

I recently had buffalo steaks at a restaurant. Much drier meat so you should marinade or at least do a rub. The restaurant used garlic, olive oil, lemon and hot pepper rub. Cooked it a little too much for my taste, though. Should have been rare.

I prepare buffalo burgers--a lot less fat than beef. I use some soy sauce, beradcrumbs, crushed pepper and garlic, knead it and then cook it rare with some onion and mushrooms.

The meat is less fatty so it can take a wider range of red wines than beef steak usually does.

[hotwine]

I've used my M1A1 universal dry rub on buff burgers & steaks and that worked well (equal parts black pepper, white pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika and Lawry's Seasoned Salt). But heed Foodie's advice.... they cook very fast and become over-cooked very easily. Once over-cooked, they're dry as a bone.

When grilling beef, I watch the upper surface of the meat to tell me when to turn it: when it domes slightly and begins to show blood on top, turn it and cook for half the time it took to reach that point. That gives a nice medium rare. But following that plan with buff will turn it into boot-leather. With buff, I watch the edges of the meat for the first sign of shrinking, and turn it at that point. Then cook for no more than 10 seconds for medium rare.

It's tricky..... very tricky.

[Triple H]

Thanks both for the advice, this is very very good. It's also making me a bit hungry!

So for wine then, if we go with some sort of rub or marinade, I'm thinking maybe a Syrah, or Bordeaux blend.

[hotwine]

Those choices should work just fine, 3H. I like the idea of the Syrah.