Civet de Senglar de la Conca de Barberà

Civet de senglar is Catalan mountain cooking, and in the Conca de Barberà it means wild boar marinated in red wine, braised slowly with chestnuts and forest mushrooms, then finished with blood. That last addition is what makes it a civet rather than an ordinary estofat, or stew. The sauce comes out dark, glossy, and deep enough to stand up to meat that has spent its life running through the hills.

The boar needs a full night in wine, then a patient braise until a fork turns easily in it. But the method that decides the dish comes at the end. Whisk the acidulated blood with hot sauce little by little before it enters the pot, then keep it between 75 and 80°C without boiling. Gentle heat cooks and thickens it; a hard boil makes it grainy. Raw blood is not a place for improvisation.

No wild boar where you live? Farmed wild boar is perfectly good. Venison shoulder is the closest widely available substitute, lean and properly gamey, though the result becomes civet de cérvol rather than de senglar. Food-grade pig’s blood from a licensed butcher binds the sauce just as reliably as boar blood, with a slightly gentler mineral taste. If you cannot buy inspected food-grade blood, finish the pot with the picada alone. You will have a fine estofat de senglar, but not a civet.

Use preserved tomato rather than a pale winter one, firm mushrooms if rovellons are beyond reach, and cooked peeled chestnuts that hold their shape. The Margin beside this recipe says only la sang al final, the blood at the end. Keep that rule and the rest is patience. Siempre sale, si lo sigues.