Okay, so you’ve taken down that big whitetail buck or packed the truck-bed full of wild hog. Now what? Well, turn it into food, of course!

With Germans and Czechs to the west of us and Cajuns to the east, Houstonians are in the middle of one of the world’s great sausage pans. Everywhere you look there is art in casing, places where you’ll actually want to see how the sausage is made.

Take the proudly German Bellville Meat Market, home of the regionally famous Poffenberger sausage. Bring in a field-dressed deer and leave with custom-made jalapeño, green onion, sage, or original garlic sausages, or opt for their award-winning sweet chipotle variety. The Bellville scoffs at Baskin Robbins’s 31 flavors: since you can use any combination of seasonings and pork mixtures, there are no fewer than 80,000 possibilities here.

In the Piney Woods north of town, the two locations of Fleming’s Wild Game Processing will make Tex-Cajun venison boudin, marinate venison strips for fajitas, and whip up deer tamales. Italian, bratwurst, or Polish sausages can also be made from both wild hogs and deer—it’s like a United Nations of Texas game.  

Many in the Sugar Land area and environs swear by Prasek’s Hillje Smokehouse on Highway 59 in El Campo; imagine a Buc-ee’s with butchery. Here, you can transform your game into sausage, steaks, stews, chops, and tamales—and not only that, you can pick up a bottle of wine, a scoop of ice cream, a box of kolaches, even barbecue pits, grills, and sturdy iron deer blinds. 

And once your meat’s safely chilling in the freezer, consider transforming what’s left of your quarry into a souvenir at one of Houstonia’s many taxidermy shops. Our pick for the best of the best? Allen Palermo Taxidermy in Bryan.