Veal Sweetbreads Grilled on the Camp Fire

skewers of sweetbreads grilling over hot camp fire coals

On a beautiful clear-sky summer evening in the Laurentians, my son was building a fire in preparation for a camp fire dinner. Earlier that day, I had made a baking-powder based bread dough that we pinned on metal bbq forks to bake right next to the flaming firewood. The fire was hot, the flames high. Some of the buns proved to be to close to the fire, and burned. But the ones that did not, turned out great, with a crusty outside and soft (and warm) inside. It was time to try out the next thing: grilling sweetbreads. As the logs quieted down to glowing hot coals, we placed a metal rack over the hot coals for the skewered sweetbreads.

They turned out great. There was a savory crisp of meat grilled over hot coals, and a very subtle touch of smokiness. I had used smoked wild boar bacon* in between the pieces of sweetbreads, which lend the tender sweetbreads a delicious heartiness.

As for the skewered sweetbreads: season with (coarse) salt, ground black pepper, and toss with a little lemon juice and olive oil. Skewer with little strips of (wild boar*) bacon in between (optional).

* Wild Boar Bacon

I go to Quebec once a year for the summer. The (relative) short time I am there, I try and make the most of the gourmet foods available. One such food is wild boar bacon. The meat itself is leaner, heartier. Its fat soft and melts away easily. For the sweetbread skewers, any bacon will do. As a matter of fact, while the tiny bacon strips do add a hearty flavor to the lean sweetbread morsels, you can easily do without!