Game on!
Delia Online editor Jo Hill enjoyed (yes, enjoyed!) deerstalking at dawn on a recent visit to Sussex with Game-to-Eat - and wonders why we neglect to eat this wonderful home-grown wild food.
‘Meet at 5.15am in Reception!’ Normally this wouldn’t phase me but after copious amounts of excellent Rioja in the fantastic Duke of Cumberland pub the night before, where recently named Pub Chef of the Year Simon Goodman prepared a wonderful seven-course game tasting menu, even this early bird found it hard to motivate herself on a dark, frosty autumn morning in the Sussex countryside.
After a short drive in his pickup with our gamekeeper, Jack Smallman (below, on the left with the deer), my fellow stalker and I had to keep close to him as we tramped, as soundlessly as possible, across a field in the dark. He then gestured towards our high seat (left): a wooden contraption about 12 feet high near a couple of trees, which would offer a crow’s eye view of any deer that approached, as well as vistas of dawn breaking over the South Downs. It would also, more crucially, keep us out of sight and smell of the deer.
Sadly, your intrepid reporter was too chicken to climb up it, so instead I ended up plonked at the bottom of a tree on the ground, barely daring to move a muscle in case I scuppered Jack’s plan to shoot a deer (I had been hugely relieved to discover that I wasn’t actually expected to pull any triggers myself). Suddenly a tinnitus-inducing crack rang out (and I nearly jumped out of my skin) as Jack managed to shoot a pricket - a young male deer aged between one and two years old, from 200 
yards away. At this time of year, hunters steer clear of does which are in season, and stags which are rutting, so prickits are the best target. As we waited for deer to appear, the only sounds were eerie grunting noises from the stags (which sounded alarmingly near), owls hooting and the leaves rustling. Eventually, dawn broke and our early morning foray had to come to an end as the deer retreated into woodland... time for coffee and Jack’s venison sausages.
The other gamekeepers had been less lucky so Jack’s deer was our only trophy. As we stamped our feet to keep warm he gralloched the deer – a process that involves carefully cutting into its abdomen and skilfully removing the deer’s stomach and intestines, as well as the lungs, heart and liver. It was a surprisingly bloodless exercise and neatly done. The deer is then hung up from a tree to allow the innards to drop cleanly out of it before the animal is hung, skin on, by its feet, for 10-14 days (feathered game are hung by the head). This hanging process tenderises the meat as well as allowing flavour to develop. Game birds are hung for 1-7 days (3-4 is ideal); deer for 7-14 days (12 is ideal).
We were there at the invitation of Game-to-Eat - www.gametoeat.co.uk - a national initiative that is trying to persuade us all to eat more game. It makes sense: when watchwords such as traceability, sourcing, organic, wild, healthy, low-fat and free-range carry such weight as they do then game really fits the bill. Whenever a deer is shot, the person who kills it has to tag it with details of when and where it was shot. This info is fed through to the Deer Trust which monitors the numbers. There is a ceiling of 500,000 deer that can be culled in Britain, yet we currently shoot only 350,000. 
So it’s wrong to suggest that herds are threatened: quite the opposite in fact. Left to their own devices with no control or culling, wild deer herds would starve through lack of food, or wander on to busy roads, endangering both their lives and the lives of the public, as well as trampling crops and damaging wild flower populations.
Game of all types is traditional fare in Britain, yet somehow we seem to have lost sight of it – perhaps it’s to do with our continuing lack of association between our food and the countryside, ie where it actually comes from. Deer – like pheasant, grouse, partridge and wood pigeon – are reared for shooting and are shot to be eaten. While the pheasant shoot we went on was obviously also a social gathering, the prime aim was to shoot pheasants as the beaters flushed them out of woodland...birds that would end up in the pot, not rotting on the ground.
The Duke of Cumberland is a wonderful 15th-century inn offering excellent food, much of it locally sourced. Chef Simon Goodman has been named Pub Chef of the Year and he certainly did us proud with a range of superb game dishes in our tasting menu: these included warm salad of pigeon, pear and black pudding; loin of South Downs venison, braised red cabbage, celeriac puree and juniper jus and pheasant wrapped in pancetta with carrot puree and wild mushrooms. Visit the Duke of Cumberland here
Why not order some gorgeous venison from Fletchers of Auchtermuchty, one of the country's top suppliers?
Find out about Britain’s game and how to cook it...
Enjoy Delia’s game recipes
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