On Oct 8, 4:34 pm, Jan wrote:
Hi All, My husband went pheasant hunting today and got 2 birds. The
guide dressed them and I have 2 beautiful breasts. (Hush Sheldon). I
have them marinating in an Italian dressing. Question is, how do I
cook them? I was thinking on the grill, but for how long and how will
I know when they are cooked through? Or do I roast them in the oven?
Thanks for any advice. Jan

My ex made pheasant for our first date. He is a pheasant hunter. He
used only the breasts of the pheasant and browned them in butter,
first a little flour, s&p dusting. Removed the breasts, added sliced
white onions and a lot of mushrooms and little more butter to the pan,
and white wine, reduced the wine, added the pheasant back and cooked
until everything got happy and the sauce made a gravy. Served this
over mashed potatoes.

Two breasts isn't very much. He usually used more than that.

Also be careful for the little pellets that are sometimes hard to see
from the shotgun.

Karen

On Oct 9, 6:44 am, "MJB" wrote:
I agree about braising pheasant, provided I have the whole bird and not just
the breast. The tough thighs and legs benefit from the long, slow cooking a
couple of hours of brasing provide - breasts, not so much which will
over-cook pretty quickly IMO. The one thing I don't recommend is using any
sauce that is tomato-based with wild fowl. I've never had good results
making a fricasse or anything similar.

The parts of the pheasant that aren't the breast are good for making
the sauce, even if you're planning on just eating the breasts.

Karen

On Oct 9, 9:53 am, Karen wrote:
My ex made pheasant for our first date. He is a pheasant hunter. He
used only the breasts of the pheasant and browned them in butter,
first a little flour, s&p dusting. Removed the breasts, added sliced
white onions and a lot of mushrooms and little more butter to the pan,
and white wine, reduced the wine, added the pheasant back and cooked
until everything got happy and the sauce made a gravy. Served this
over mashed potatoes.

Forgot to add that he put cream in the sauce towards the end, if I
remember right. It's been a long time.

However, the pheasant dinners we had were some of the best memories of
those times!

Karen

"Jan" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
oups.com...
Hi All, My husband went pheasant hunting today and got 2 birds. The
guide dressed them and I have 2 beautiful breasts. (Hush Sheldon). I
have them marinating in an Italian dressing. Question is, how do I
cook them? I was thinking on the grill, but for how long and how will
I know when they are cooked through? Or do I roast them in the oven?
Thanks for any advice. Jan

2 slices of bacon
50 grams butter
10 grams wheat flour
Cognac
pineapple juice
2 slices of pineapple


Bind bacon over breast so that it's covered (the pheasant's, not yours).
Heat butter in pan, fry breasts (see above) in butter.
Remove bacon and brown the breasts (see above) a little.
Remove breasts (see above) and keep them warm.
Stir in flour and roast shortly.
Douse with Cognac, add pineapple juice and let it simmer until
the gravy is right for you.
Strain gravy through a sieve and pour it over the breasts (see above).
Fry pineapple slices in butter and put them on top of the breasts
(see above).

Cheers,

Michael Kuettner

"Michael Kuettner" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...

"Jan" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
oups.com...
Hi All, My husband went pheasant hunting today and got 2 birds. The
guide dressed them and I have 2 beautiful breasts. (Hush Sheldon). I
have them marinating in an Italian dressing. Question is, how do I
cook them? I was thinking on the grill, but for how long and how will
I know when they are cooked through? Or do I roast them in the oven?
Thanks for any advice. Jan

2 slices of bacon
50 grams butter
10 grams wheat flour
Cognac
pineapple juice
2 slices of pineapple

I forgot :
salt, pepper


Salt and pepper breasts (the pheasant's, not yours).
Bind bacon over breasts (see above) so that they're covered .
Heat butter in pan, fry breasts (see above) in butter.
Remove bacon and brown the breasts (see above) a little.
Remove breasts (see above) and keep them warm.
Stir in flour and roast shortly.
Douse with Cognac, add pineapple juice and let it simmer until
the gravy is right for you.
Add salt and pepper to taste.
Strain gravy through a sieve and pour it over the breasts (see above).
Fry pineapple slices in butter and put them on top of the breasts
(see above).

Cheers,

Michael Kuettner

"Vilco" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...
JoeSpareBedroom wrote:

Why marinate them? Do they have a strong taste you need to disguise?

Usually they taste strong, some people dislikes them for theyr
"kind-of-liver-ish" taste, which is a little less intense than in pigeons.
They are usually a bit sour.
For breasts I'd tend to a ragout, ideally to serve on pappardelle.

If you dislike the gamey taste, marinade them over night in buttermilk
with pimentum corns, juniper berries and pepper corns.
Take out of marinade, wash them, dry them and process them.
Works for all game.

Cheers,

Michael Kuettner

"Janet Baraclough" wrote in message
...
The message
from "JoeSpareBedroom" contains these words:


Tell me again how I find your house, please. :-)

North to Labrador, turn right, and keep swimming.

I'll bring my
not-yet-famous cardamom cake.

Just in case it gets wet, or eaten by sharks, could you post a copy
of the recipe here please?

Janet


I don't sprinkle the cake with powdered sugar, unless I'm bringing the cake
to an event where I know the host or hostess is easily amused by powdered
sugar. The cake doesn't need it.

Enjoy!

Cardamom Cake

½ to ¾ cup crumbs made from vanilla wafer cookies
2 tbs butter (to grease pan)
2 cups all-purpose flour
1-1/4 cups sugar
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp powdered cardamom
½ tsp salt
3 eggs, at room temperature
1-1/2 cups heavy cream

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Place 8-10 vanilla wafers between sheets of waxed paper and, using a rolling
pin, grind into moderately coarse crumbs. Butter a 9” kugelhopf mold or
Bundt pan. Pour in cookie crumbs and rotate pan to coat sides. The finer
crumbs will stick, leaving the coarser crumbs in the bottom. Distribute
these evenly – they’ll become the topping on the cake. There should be
about ¼” of the coarse crumbs.

In large bowl of electric mixer, combine flour, sugar, baking powder,
cardamom and salt. On low speed, blend in the eggs and heavy cream until
thoroughly combined. Increase speed to medium and mix until the batter has
the consistency of softly whipped cream, approximately 5 minutes. Pour into
prepared pan. Bake until toothpick comes out clean, about 55 minutes. Turn
out onto rack immediately and cool before serving.

If desired, dust lightly with confectioner’s sugar just before serving. If
cake is to be stored more than a couple of days, wrap tightly and
refrigerate.

Tips:
- Stick with name brand vanilla wafers, such as Nabisco. The store brands
don’t seem to have much vanilla flavor.
- The original recipe called for only 1 tsp of cardamom. If you find the
flavor too strong, go ahead and reduce it to this amount.

On Oct 9, 9:59 am, "MJB" wrote:
"Ophelia" wrote in message

...



I agree about braising pheasant, provided I have the whole bird and
not just the breast. The tough thighs and legs benefit from the
long, slow cooking a couple of hours of brasing provide - breasts,
not so much which will over-cook pretty quickly IMO. The one thing I
don't recommend is using any sauce that is tomato-based with wild
fowl. I've never had good results making a fricasse or anything
similar.

What would you use?

Wild meat is so strong-tasting that you either like it's 'gamey' flavor or
you don't. Growing-up in Montana, I always ate much more elk, deer and
antelope than I ever did beef , so acquired the taste for wild meat at a
very early age. I think a strongly-flavored tomato-based sauce serves only
to disguise the wild taste, but only partially and never successfully IMO.
I much prefer a chicken or even veal stock as my braising liquid, with the
sliced pheasant/grouse/goose meat served with either a milk / cream gravy
(mushrooms optional) strongly flavored with sage and black pepper

I'd second what you wrote. I'm saving this, and am going to exactly
that with the next wild bird (usually they're ducks).

MJB

--Bryan

MJB wrote:

I agree about braising pheasant, provided I have the whole bird and not just
the breast. The tough thighs and legs benefit from the long, slow cooking a
couple of hours of brasing provide - breasts, not so much which will
over-cook pretty quickly IMO. The one thing I don't recommend is using any
sauce that is tomato-based with wild fowl. I've never had good results
making a fricasse or anything similar.

I goofed and meant a basic brown sauce instead of a classic espagnole w/
tomatoes. Easier to adjust and does not overwhelm the bird, as many
hunters in places other than the Mid-West hunt released raised birds
that are not so gamey.

nb

On Oct 9, 8:38 pm, notbob wrote:
I goofed and meant a basic brown sauce instead of a classic espagnole w/
tomatoes. Easier to adjust and does not overwhelm the bird, as many
hunters in places other than the Mid-West hunt released raised birds
that are not so gamey.

The pheasant I've had wasn't gamey at all. And, like you said, were
raised for hunting pheasant, near Stockton, Calif.

Karen

"Karen" wrote in message
ups.com...
On Oct 9, 8:38 pm, notbob wrote:
I goofed and meant a basic brown sauce instead of a classic espagnole w/
tomatoes. Easier to adjust and does not overwhelm the bird, as many
hunters in places other than the Mid-West hunt released raised birds
that are not so gamey.

The pheasant I've had wasn't gamey at all. And, like you said, were
raised for hunting pheasant, near Stockton, Calif.


Ah - I've only eaten truely wild ringneck pheasant. So perhaps my
experience with 'gamey-ness' is unique to non-raised birds.

shrug

MJB

MJB wrote:
I've only eaten truely wild ringneck pheasant. So perhaps my
experience with 'gamey-ness' is unique to non-raised birds.

All good points, mjb. I've hunted both. Raised birds have a lot of fat
around the breast while wild birds have little, if any. Either way, a
good braise in a mushroom sauce will never do you wrong. A touch of
wine, in and out of the sauce, won't either.

nb

Karen wrote:


My ex made pheasant for our first date. He is a pheasant hunter. He
used only the breasts of the pheasant and browned them in butter,
first a little flour, s&p dusting. Removed the breasts, added sliced
white onions and a lot of mushrooms and little more butter to the pan,
and white wine, reduced the wine, added the pheasant back and cooked
until everything got happy and the sauce made a gravy. Served this
over mashed potatoes.

No wonder you married him. We won't go in the the other end of it.

nb

Oh pshaw, on Wed 10 Oct 2007 07:16:24p, notbob meant to say...

MJB wrote:
I've only eaten truely wild ringneck pheasant. So perhaps my
experience with 'gamey-ness' is unique to non-raised birds.

All good points, mjb. I've hunted both. Raised birds have a lot of fat
around the breast while wild birds have little, if any. Either way, a
good braise in a mushroom sauce will never do you wrong. A touch of
wine, in and out of the sauce, won't either.

nb


For some reason, I keep reading this heading as "cooking peasant breasts".


--
Wayne Boatwright
__________________________________________________

The Rule of Fives states that all things happen in
fives, or are divisible by or are multiples of
five, or are somehow directly or indirectly
related to a five.