gfron1

What yeti said and thin with its own puree if necessary

It may be a thing of beauty but it won't work for the menu I have planned. And I've thought about the overcook. I'm going to lower my temp and time because the pcs are so small.

I'll tell you when I eat it. I skinned it last night, but left it on for the confit. I can tell you that it was more delicate than anything I've plucked to date - ripped a couple of guys in my haste.

Martin - what did you do with the meat besides the breast? Seems like not much there.

This morning I headed down to the store and started plucking. I perfected my technique as the process went along. Pull the wings back and cross them over each other behind the bird's back. This completely reveals the breast. The base of your thumb and the tip of your middle hold the wings back while the pinky pulls the feet down toward the tail. The breast is ready for plucking. Then start pulling against the grain and the feathers come out very easily - much easier than chicken and infinitely easier than duck. This is one bird's worth of feathers...you should have seen the pile after 55. My goal was the breast. I was sending the carcasses to a game rehab center for feed for its carnivores. I did clean one completely just for the heck of it. My plan is to use this bounty at a guest chef dinner this coming Friday in ABQ. I am preparing the breast confit with a freshly made 5-Spice powder salt mix. So, there you go.

WARNING: GRAPHIC PHOTOS And down comes the hatchet His buddies were unphased. We met just before dusk because they were easier to catch And on to the ground to flop a bit before I put them in the cooler. We kept track of where we were in the process (and the final cost) by counting heads Many of you know that I'm not just out slaughtering animals. Over the years I developed a deep relationship with both the animals that I use as food and the wilderness that I forage for my restaurant. I often spend a little bit of time being present with whatever will become my food, sometimes in meditation, sometimes in prayer, sometimes in conversation. My first chicken slaughter was really sad to me. Pigeons, not so much. They showed no response. In fact, they seemed very calm. So pigeons were not an emotional experience so much as a job. With chickens we used the slaughter cones which keep them from flopping around. Here, Bob would just toss them on the ground to flop. Unlike chickens, however, the pigeons don't have the mass to damage the meat in their flopping. The cooler filled with each chop and so did the head count The cooler became very full That was last night. My new found butcher friend said I could let the pigeons sit in my walk-in overnight before processing. So I did, but first I cooked the hoisin pigeon breasts for my dinner - still warm from the carcass.

So this was the set up when I arrived. Here's the backstory. A couple came in for dinner a few weeks ago. I had never seen them before but apparently they come to lunch regularly. They told me that they had some pigeons that they wanted to get rid of. They were going to raise them for meat, but it just became too much work on top of their chickens and other animals. I learned long ago to never turn down an offer for local plants or meats. Once your reputations is established then the goodies just roll in. Last year I got a javelina, ducks, plenty of vegetables, a large bushel of quince and on and on.Many times I don't really want the items, but I take them and make sure they get used. Pigeons I was sort of ambivalent about. I didn't want the extra work right before a big chocolate show, but affordable meats are a good thing. When we negotiated prices, they started at free and I started at $5 each. We finally settled in at $2 per bird, but he would have to kill them and I would do the dressing. Which brings me back to the pigeons. Bob and Verna had yet to kill any of their birds and didn't know what to do, and so we both spent some time with YouTube. What did we do before YT? In the process I met a British butcher who coached me last night on what I needed to do. Bob's insistence on there being 20-30 birds turned out to be 57, so lots of chopping happened. WARNING: THE GRAPHIC PICTURES BEGIN NOW. My Facebook friends know that I am not shy about posting pictures of food in all of its stages. Each year I post the massive slaughter that follows our county fair, and each year I lose a few more friends. But, I am completely committed to people not eating shit anymore, and learning what goes into that plate of food. And for meat eaters, that involves dead animals. Verna popped into the coop, grabbing the birds 2 by 2. Bob lounged leisurely waiting for each delivery. Verna would hold the body, while Bob stretched the neck out and up rose the hatchet.

I've been chatting with a Brit butcher and he assured me that they were fine to hold off til this morning, so I only did the two I ate last night. The thought was alluded to - these weren't shot so there was no internal damage. I'm heading down in a bit to process, then I'll post pics. And I agree about the giving back to nature and have already been thinking of the best place to discard the carcasses - probably my javalina hunting area where I saw no javalina but plenty of coyote and bobcat tracks.

Dinner tonight - Hoisin pigeon breast, pulled warm off the body.

Not sure if its the same thing, but...just last week after months/years of on and off success, I decided to double check my infrared's accuracy. It was reading 2-3ºC high. I adjusted and since then every batch has been perfect. So my advice - check the temp with a probe device.

I'm harvesting a bunch of pigeons tonight. Anyone know how long I can delay dressing pigeons after I kill them. I want to harvest tonight, but dress tomorrow. Is that OK? And should I just store in my cooler or would my wine cellar be better? I'll document the process as the week goes on for you all.

So I dumped as much as I easily could, added more melted chocolate and re-filled. The bottoms weren't perfectly pretty but they did seal and look pretty good. Tops are perfect. I can't imagine a shelf-life issue since we're talking oil not water, and I'll be selling in 2 weeks so the oil won't go rancid. I lost maybe 10% of the cavities to shells falling out when I dumped. Overall, a good save.

I thought I would share a recipe I just added to the book. This is unedited. So many of the recipes are from previous years - I tend to not dwell too long, but this one is from last month. Hope you enjoy it. Quinoa Gratin I love farmer ingenuity. I love when a farmer is willing to commit valuable acreage to crops that may or may not make it, and has questionable sellability. When I lived in Alamosa, Colorado there were farmers trying to raise quinoa because of its success in the Andes of South America and the geographic similarities to the region. At that point few knew what quinoa was and hardly a farmer knew that the crop could replace traditional crops such as potatoes. Nearly 20 years later the quinoa has been firmly established and has provided nutrition and livelihoods to many residents of that remote community. Quinoa Cakes 15 g Neutral cooking oil 1 Tbsp 40 g Shallot, minced ¼ C 128 g Quinoa 1 C 5 g Salt 1 tsp 32 g Flour ¼ C 1 Egg Heat oil in a medium saucepan and add the shallots. Sauté the shallots until the turn translucent. Add the quinoa and toss to coat. Fill the pan with water and bring to a boil. Boil for 10 minutes. Drain the quinoa very well and transfer to a mixing bowl. Add the flour and egg and mix everything together. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Using a 3” ring mold, press ½” of quinoa into a firm, flattened disk. Remove the mold and continue until all of the quinoa mixture is used. Store in the refrigerator to help the quinoa cakes set up. Salt-Baked Leeks 900 g Kosher salt 2 lbs 2 Leeks Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Pour ½”of salt on the bottom of a loaf pan. Make two cuts on each leek. The first is to remove the bottom roots–cut ½”inch off the root bottom. The second is to remove the top–cut where the white transitions to green on the outer layers. The tops can be used in stock or turned into a tasty ash (p. ##). Do not remove the outer layers as they will protect the tender insides during cooking. Lay the two trimmed leeks on the salt bed and cover with the remaining salt making sure that none of the leek shows through. Ideally the leek is covered at all spots by ½” of salt to insulate it from the heat. Bake for 1 hour. Remove the pan from the oven, but leave the leeks buried to continue baking and infusing flavor until service. Garlic Soup 28 g Butter 2 Tbsp 160 g Onion, chopped 1 C 160 g Garlic, peeled 1 C 1000 g Rabbit stock (p ##) 1 qt 120 g Day old bread, torn into chunks 2 C 1 Bay leaf Salt 123 g ½ and ½ ½ C Black pepper Melt the butter in a stockpot. Add the onion and garlic and cook over a medium-low heat until the onions start to brown–don’t cook them to caramelized. Add the stock, bread, bay leaf and salt, and bring to a simmer over a medium-high heat. Cook for 15 minutes. Remove the bay leaf and salt to taste. Puree with a stick blender and return to the heat. Add the ½ and ½ and black pepper, and adjust the seasoning one last time. Amaranth porridge 14 g Butter 1 Tbsp 75 g Amaranth seed 1 C 15 g Brown sugar 1 Tbsp 5 g Salt 1 tsp 250 g Rabbit stock (p ##) 1 C 30 g Cream 2 Tbsp Melt butter in a medium saucepan. Add the amaranth seed and stir until a nutty brown aroma hits your nose. Add the sugar, salt and stock. Bring to a simmer and continue cooking until most of the liquid has been cooked off. Add the cream and hold, covered, until service. 4 Provolone slices 80 g Granny Smith apple, peeled, fine diced ½ C Fennel leaves Preheat your oven’s broiler. To serve, heat a large skillet with a heavy coating of neutral cooking oil over medium-high heat. Carefully add the quinoa cakes making sure not to crowd the skillet. Cook for about 3 minutes, and turn to cook the other side. The cakes should have a deep brown color now. Spoon a quarter of the garlic soup in the center of a large bowl. Place the fried quinoa cake in the center. Top with a quarter of the porridge. Remove the leeks from their salt bed and peel off the outer layer until all you see is white flesh. Cut into ½” rings and place a few in the porridge. Cover with a slice of provolone and set the bowl under the broiler until the cheese begins to melt. Top with the apples and fennel and dig in.

In a related note - I asked AUI about their praline and they were out of the 50/50 hazelnut variety, but at the unsweetened. How would I use that? Would I make a caramel, warm the praline and then combine them? Has anyone bought the unsweetened praline?

Haste makes waste. I'm in the middle of trying to knock out 5k bonbons for an upcoming event, and balancing that with maintaining a relationship with my spouse who doesn't like how my 14 hour days stretch to 16 hour days. So in my impatience when I was making a hazelnut praline from scratch, I added a bit of hazelnut oil to help it loosen. It loosened and I continued adding my chocolate and cocoa butter; piped it and let it set overnight. Next morning it was runny and still completely liquid - well hell! - wasted time and ingredients. But I didn't want to give up, so I did a heavy spray of cocoa butter on top to create a sort of seal. This morning I went in and there definitely was a seal but when I touched it it was still liquidy to the touch, but it felt firm enough that I should be able to get a cap on the shells. Has anyone had success with this? If the first of the 10 trays doesn't work, I'll stop and dump the filling out, add more chocolate and try again.

I bought Sepia based on your comment and really like it both for content and design. So, thanks!

The cities are mostly places where I have family or friends that can fill a venue without me doing any marketing - 24 seats. I'm hoping to link up enough places to take a month off and do a morning foraging workshop with an evening dinner.

Typical sequence: Bring cream/glucose to simmer, very short rest (:30), pour over chocolate, short rest (:60), mix - like said above, I use either my food processor or a stick blender. I never stir by hand. Try it again and see if you never truly got the emulsion.

We did. In January I did a 6 city dinner tour, which definitely showed I'm up for it. I've also got requests for dinners in Atlanta, Dallas, NYC, StL, Indy and KC, so I've got the roots of a good tour already.

You're messing with my head being from the UK but using ounces! A very basic ganache like that is often just equal parts cream and chocolate...there are countless recipes however that are more or less of both. But 2:1 chocolate to cream seems like it should not only set up, but set up firm. I ran to Paul Young's book to see his basic and its 250g:250g and 150g muscovado. I've used that one before and its a firm ganache...almost firm enough to slab for dipping. Another common base for me is 500g chocolate, 250g cream, 150g butter. So...are you waiting long enough for it to set up? Is your room too warm for it to set up? Throw a spoonful in the fridge and see what happens. And I don't think it would make a difference but tell us about your process...maybe there's a clue in that.

Interesting article about the comparison titles of a proposal. This was another section discussed in the webinar yesterday that was really useful.

I participated to this webinar (above) and it was useful. Would have been more useful months ago, but still... Two key take aways relevant to me: 1. Think about the question, "What shelf would this book land on in a bookstore?" Make sure you've made that clear in the proposal. For example, my book is food, foraging/outdoor life, southwest, regional, plant identification...lots going on. So where would it be shelved? 2. People always have good ideas in their marketing section but have they demonstrated in the author bio that they can pull it off. You say you're going to do a book tour - have you ever done any type of tour? Do you do cooking classes? Have you been on the media before? If not...how does the publisher know you can do it if they invest in printing your book.

and to be specific - the bowl would be fine if the spout wasn't right in the middle of it. You lose a third of your bowl in the process.

I appreciate it Kerry, but maybe I'll send a box of chocolates for the social that doesn't include elk's blood

So, good questions...this is not for a friend. This is not for a charity. I'll be doing riffs on some of my existing dishes. They were going to put me up in their lodge (very nice accommodations), but then sold the rooms, so now they want to put me up in a local hotel. I'm doing this for my own promotion, and to feed my customers in ABQ (5 hours away) because I love feeding fans, but I've got lots on my plate as it is, and don't want to be taken advantage of. So my question is really about industry standards. I guess I should have titled this Guest Chef Compensation because that's what I want to know. Is it my rate, the host chef's rate, a percentage of the take, a flat fee... I certainly don't want to go with my rate because I own my own restaurant - I get paid virtually nothing. This should have been hammered out months ago, but I keep not getting answers and now we're a few weeks away, they've been selling tickets, but I'm willing to walk away if that can't offer a professional response.