Pheasant

[helenas]

Impulsively i bought d'artagnan's pheasant today.

As i had no idea what should be done with it, i turned first to cookbooks, and then to internet.

The recipe in "Joy of cooking", where a bird is braised with gin and juniper berries sounds good.

And also the one from BBC:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/db/4/G/g...sant_2859.shtml which has walnuts to the liking of A Balic (see other game thread).

Patiently waiting for your ideas and suggestions...

[yvonne johnson]

The Clarissa Dickson recipe sounds good.

My husband cooked pheasant a few years ago, and made confit with the legs. Not as a means to preserve them for months--we ate them right away!

[Fat Guy]

You'll find juniper a near-universal ingredient in pheasant recipes. But it's better suited to gamy, wild pheasants than to the milder version I assume you got from D'Artagnan. If you use juniper, go light on it.

My suggestion is that you just roast it and serve it with a sausage dressing (perhaps with some grapes in there). While roasting, you can baste with a mixture of red wine and butter. Rub with plenty of coarse salt, inside and out, before cooking. Make a simple gravy from the pan drippings.

[NewYorkTexan]

As a result of a bi-annual hunting trip, there are often a few pheasants sitting in my freezer.  I gravitate towards rustic, simple recipes.

It may not be what you had in mind, but pheasant and white bean chili is excellent.  It is my favorite chili.  

A slow roast is probably your best bet.  You can wrap the breasts in bacon and roast them, or grill them weather permitting.

[Wilfrid]

About the only thing that can go wrong with pheasant when you roast it is drying out the bird, especially the breast, so let me just give you an alternative.  Brown the bird nicely in a pan.  Put some roughly chopped veg - carrots, root vegetable, chunks of onion - in the bottom of a dutch kettle/stovetop casserole.  Pour in red wine up to the top of the vegetables, and throw in some herbs (or some aromatic juniper berries if you like).  Sit the pheasant on top and cover it.  Let the liquid simmer (don't let it boil away), and check the breast and thighs of the bird with a sharp knife or skewer occasionally to see if it's done.  Probably about forty minutes.

Roasting in the oven is a classic, but my alternative, which is halfway between pot roasting and steaming, should guarantee you moist, tender meat.  I used to cook every kind of game bird this way in the days when I lived in a garret with only a couple of electric plates to cook on.

[NeroW]

I made a new friend in Chicago.

He has 5 wild pheasant in his freezer. He killed them in October.

What, if anything, to do with these birds?

[Richard Kilgore]

I have not cooked pheasant, but I can point you to a few reliable cookbooks, if that would help.

[Lesley C]

This is just off the top of my head by memory...

Remove the legs and braise them.

Sear the breast on the bone, then roast at high temperature for about 15 minutes.

I think that's right. Can anyone confirm this?

[guru]

That should do it but you can also make some CONFIT with the legs.

[snowangel]

This is just off the top of my head by memory...

Remove the legs and braise them.

Sear the breast on the bone, then roast at high temperature for about 15 minutes.

I think that's right.  Can anyone confirm this?

Leslie, this is how I do it (I include thighs in the braise). If I'm feeling lazy, I will butterfly and braise entire birds, "wrapping" breasts with fat pork stuff. Shallots are a welcome addition; I don't usually add raw garlic. DH and I go pheasant hunting every fall in S. MN, on a farm in the cornfields. Said farm has been in the family for 150 years.

And, they need to get out of the freezer and into tummies mui pronto. The freezer is not a safety deposit box...

Our pheasants never even make it to the freezer.

Along the same lines, how, Leslie, do you do grouse? I have typically done it similar to pheasant, or braised the entire birds, preferably in something light colored so one can find the shot easier. Shot can equal a dental crown. Makes for a pricy bird.

Edited May 1, 2003 by snowangel (log)

[jackal10]

October should be fairly young.

Did you hang them before plucking and freezing? If not too late now. They are, however much better eaten in season.

If they are young treat them in a traditional fashion: Roast fairly plainly

Treat like a small chicken (especially if you did not hang them). . Put bacon over the breast to stop it drying out.

Traditional accompaniments are bread sauce, redcurrant jelly, game chips, gravy.

You'll need roast potatoes and some member of the cabage family as well.

Old birds braise, casserole or make a game pie. Long low wet cooking. The flesh stuffed into the middle of a cabbage makes a good dish.

[Robin Meredith]

A different but utterly delicious idea - braise them with some aromatics, white wine, herbs, and tomatoes to create a ragu - utterly delicious with fresh pasta. Cook until falling off the bone, shred the meat, and combine it with the sauce. Marcella Hazan has a recipe for a quail ragu in one of her books ("Marcella's Italian Kitchen", I think) that makes a good blueprint for this sort of thing, and I think there's a rabbit ragu recipe in the second Union Square Cafe book that is also a good model. I've done this with guinea hen and duck in addition to quail and rabbit, and they've all been delicious.

Edited May 1, 2003 by Robin Meredith (log)

[bigbear]

I can't believe that you are all so calmly discussing cooking and eating the peasants. I tell you, if I were one, I'd be very angry. Have you no..... oh..... pheasants..... never mind..... confit their little legs till kingdom come.

[Chef/Writer Spencer]

I made a new friend in Chicago.

He has 5 wild pheasant in his freezer.  He killed them in October.

What, if anything, to do with these birds?

Make stock...make enchiladas. Buy peeeelenty of toothpicks.

[Schneier]

I have just been handed four fresh-shot wild pheasant breasts, legs attached. (They're vacuum packed at the moment, so I don't have any more information.)

I'm looking for recipe suggestions.

There are some ideas here.

Bruce

[Susan in FL]

Here is a recipe from Mario Batali which I've made, different and very good.

[Richard Kilgore]

There are very few pheasant experts, because pheasants are experts at very few things.

[curlywurlyfi]

friend of mine recently gave me Green Thai Pheasant Curry (based on her freezer glut) which was absolutely knockout. Though if you don't have pheasant on a regular basis you might want to go with a slightly more classic treatment, perhaps.

Fi

[Schneier]

Here is a recipe from Mario Batali which I've made, different and very good.

That looks like it could work. Thanks.

[budrichard]

A recipe is not the important factor in cooking wild pheasant. What is important is realizing that the bird has little or no fat. Contrary to chicken even though there are physical similarities, if you pan fry or oven roast, the important thing is to cook until the breast still has some pink in it. If you have a very old rooster as evidenced by the spurs or want a long cooking time, braising for at least 3 hours in some medium is the only way to go and yield a somewhat tender bird. In any event it won't be chicken but if properly handled and either of the above methods are used, it will be good. -Dick

[LOS]

A recipe is not the important factor in cooking wild pheasant. What is important is realizing that the bird has little or no fat. Contrary to chicken even though there are physical similarities, if you pan fry or oven roast, the important thing is to cook until the breast still has some pink in it. If you have a very old rooster as evidenced by the spurs or want a long cooking time, braising for at least 3 hours in some medium is the only way to go and yield a somewhat tender bird. In any event it won't be chicken but if properly handled and either of the above methods are used, it will be good. -Dick

Will brining help with this? Is there a reason not to?

[budrichard]

In my opinion, brining will not do anything except make the pheseant salty. The reason not to brine is health related. For roasting, one can rub with olive oil or butter or wrap in bacon but I really believe that is more cosmetic. I have been hunting/eating phesaent for 40 years and if cooked by one of the two mentioned methods, you should have good results. If a wild bird and improperly cleaned and chilled, nothing will help the bird. Remember, it's not going to be chicken, so an attempt to make it taste like chicken is a waste of time. Appreciate it as a different fowl. -Dick

[Schneier]

Thanks everyone.

Last night I cooked two wild pheasants using this recipe.

The bird came out perfect: tender and tasty.

I have two more in the freezer.

Bruce

[Susan in FL]

Glad you had a pleasant pheasant experience.

That recipe looks great. I saved it and will use it next time we do pheasant. Thanks!

[Schneier]

Once you've got the basic recipe down, there are endless variations. I would try a little fruiter sauce next time.

Bruce