Cracked Pepper-Crusted Musk Ox Tenderloin

If you're ever lucky enough to successfully hunt these creatures - or receive the rare gift of a muskox tenderloin - here’s a great way to make it. Pepper-crusted musk ox loin, with pepper sauce.

8-12 oz cut of loin
1 Tbsp. Tellicherry peppercorns, freshly cracked
Maldon sea salt
olive oil
butter
foraged lobster mushroom, sliced
4 oz Cognac or light red wine
6 oz warmed cream

Remove loin from fridge about 30 minutes before cooking.

Crack the peppercorns: I have a pepper grinder, but for this recipe I didn't want coarse pepper, I wanted the Tellicherry peppercorns cracked. I used a cloth to cover them and an old ball-peen hammer to lightly crack them. Why Tellicherry? Because they're larger. Bigger peppercorns lose some heat compared to their smaller relatives, but with size they gain fragrance, aroma, and complexity perfect for this meat.

Dry off the loin with paper towels and douse generously with cracked peppercorns and Maldon sea salt.

Heat the steel, or cast iron pan, add about a Tbsp. of olive oil, and then add about a Tbsp. of butter. If you use only butter it will scorch at high temperatures, so I always use some olive oil, too, since it has a higher smoke point.

Lay in the muskox and sear the first side. Because of the intense marbling and lower melting point of the fat in the tissues, this is going to go fast. Maybe three minutes for rare, 3.5-4 for medium rare.

Flip the meat and cook for three minutes on the other side. As you can see, the fat in the tissues has already melted, causing the tissue to pull up and start to curl a bit. Remove to a warmed plate and tent with aluminum foil while you prepare the pepper sauce reduction.

Turn down the heat and allow pan to cool off some, or else the cream will curdle. Once cooled to a medium/medium high temperature, add wine or Cognac to deglaze the pan.

Toss in a few mushrooms if you like and swirl around. Add the warmed cream slowly and whisk into the deglazed juices. Stir until thickened to desired consistency.

Slice the meat, arrange on the plate and spoon on some pepper sauce. Serve with some oven-roasted vegetables. Suchas; carrots, Brussel sprouts, zucchini, beets, and potatoes.