Chef Orlando Ramos has worked at Clydz, the New Brunswick restaurant known for serving exotic meats, for 18 years. The restaurant opened in 1997, and Ramos started as a line cook just three years later. He became sous chef in 2006 and head chef in 2013, and in that time he’s handled a greater variety of proteins than most chefs touch in a professional lifetime. That doesn’t mean just bison or octopus, though he cooks those too. Every night, Ramos is preparing nontraditional proteins like python meat, alligator, kangaroo and wild boar.
Clydz is a restaurant of certain contradictions. Its unassuming facade is half-sunk into the Paterson Street sidewalk, but inside there’s a coupling of cocktail-fueled nightlife (the restaurant closes at 2 AM, daily) with a menu of classically prepared, mostly exotic game meats. Ramos seems to take it in stride. “The four most popular [dishes] that come to mind are the Bison Ribeye, the Kangaroo Loin, the Alligator in a Blanket and the Python Ravioli,” he says.
It’s illegal to sell wild game meat in the U.S. without state or federal inspection, so everything on Clydz’s menu is farm-raised game, which it sources from D’Artagnan, North American Meats and Broken Arrow Ranch, and for more exotic game like python and rattlesnake, Fossil Farms in Boonton.
With such exotic meats on the menu at Clydz, Ramos has to consider ways to avoid becoming a culinary checkpoint of sorts, as well as tackle the challenge of cooking proteins with variations in protein and fat content, anatomy and appropriate complimentary flavors. (Python veers toward poultry or, some say, fish. Bison and kangaroo are closer to beef. Antelope is described as meaty but clean.)
“It’s been an adjustment working with the game meats, since their cooking time is different,” says Ramos, who got his start as a butcher but, prior to Clydz, only worked with venison. “Meats like bison, wild boar, and elk are very low in fat, so the cooking time is much quicker,” says Ramos, who pan-sears and grills frequently, locking in moisture with fast high heat.
“Depending on the cut, some meats can be slow-cooked over a long period of time,” braised like the poultry-proximate python in the ravioli. Alligator in a Blanket comes pre-seasoned as andouille sausage (a spicy ancestor of ‘nduja), wrapped in that familiar buttery crust. “Customers are surprised to find the game meats mimic flavors they are familiar with,” chef Ramos says.
The market-priced (in the $40 range) Game Plate du Jour is where Ramos features game meats most prominently, and does most of his seasonal maneuvering as a chef. The idea is unfussy, with precise presentation of beefier meats like elk, wild boar, antelope or kangaroo. “We try to change up the [Tasting du Jour] every week or two, depending on what’s available,” says Ramos.
Game meat is becoming more popular, less wild, so to speak. You can now find venison at Arby’s and bison at Bareburger. That might be why Clydz doesn’t discourage bald curiosity. New customers, says Ramos, “find the flavors are very palate-friendly, and not much different from what they’ve experienced with the usual fare of beef or poultry.” But the restaurant does plenty of repeat business. “We have many regular customers who started their game adventure at Clydz.”
Clydz, 55 Paterson Street, New Brunswick; 732-846-6521. Open daily.