More Pheasant and Another Recipe

As I said in my last post, our friend Rich brought home 3 pheasants on his second day hunting. We used 1½ birds in a wonderful Pheasant Mushroom Stew, and it was finally time to do something with the remaining 1½ birds. Back on Monday when we worked with the birds, I set this second half of them into a marinating container with some red wine, olive oil, smashed garlic and fresh herbs, and there they stayed until yesterday evening. This was the wine marinade recipe:

Wine Marinade for Pheasant

Enough for 1 to 1½ pheasants

1½ cups dry red wine
½ cup olive oil
2 teaspoons juniper berries
4 cloves garlic, smashed
1 large sprig fresh thyme
1 sprig fresh rosemary
2 sprigs fresh sage (about 20 leaves)

Set the pheasant quarters into a container. Add in the juniper berries, garlic and fresh herbs, then pour in the wine and olive oil. Marinate, turning twice daily for up to 3 days.

Dinner of Pheasant Alfredo, egg noodles and Fall Fruit Compote

My original intent with these wine marinated birds was to make a wine-based sauce, and add in a lot of dried fruit - somehow. Somehow, the recipe was just not coming together in my mind. The concepts I wanted to bring together just weren't coalescing into a usable recipe. And then - and this is where I love having Rich around - he said he really wanted to use a cream based sauce, maybe an Alfredo Sauce for these birds. I said I had really hoped to use a lot of dried fruits in the recipe, and it seemed they would just muddy an Alfredo sauce. Rich said, "Why not use the fruits in a side dish?" To which I had to smack myself on the forehead and say, "Well, DUH!" 

Okay, so now I had a workable plan. First off, being me, I prefer to make my own Alfredo Sauce, so I had to create a recipe, since I never really had. I asked Rich what he would put in an Alfredo sauce? He said cream and cheese. Well, okay. I was a bit concerned that the meat, having soaked in wine for 3 days, would also muddy up the white Alfredo Sauce. Rich said he didn't care if the sauce was pink or purple. I embellished on his Alfredo "recipe" a bit, but in essence, used that concept. I will say, try to use the best quality butter, cream cheese, Parmesan and Romano cheeses that you can afford for this sauce. It makes a world of difference. As for the dried fruits, I decided to make a compote-like side dish that would serve like cranberries do with turkey or chicken. Wine seemed to be a theme in this menu, so I wanted to cook the fruits in a wine reduction sauce. My other true desire was to use fresh quinces as a part of this fruit melange. 

Creamy Pheasant Alfredo and noodles with a splash of color from the Fruit Compote

I think it is truly not necessary to first marinate the pheasant in the wine sauce before making it into this Alfredo recipe. The main reason we went the wine marinade route was just to keep the birds in a suspended state until we could get one batch eaten and get around to the second batch. Rich was averse to freezing the remainder, if we were going to be using them soonish. However you choose to go about this recipe, I will say that the meat did not leach color into the white Alfredo Sauce, so that was wonderful. The meat was tender, albeit still dry, despite not really overcooking. For anyone who has not cleaned, cooked or eaten pheasant, the meat has almost no fat whatsoever. It is almost impossible to have a fat-free meat that is also juicy and tender. We even went the route of a very low 250 degree oven this time, and the meat was still dry. Luckily, I like dry fowl just fine.

The birds tasted very good last evening, in the recipe we thought up. Nothing truly new under the sun, of course. Pheasant Alfredo recipes seem to abound, as I soon noted when I Googled that concept. My Alfredo was terribly rich, but I think that sort of comes with the territory. Still, the addition of herbs and garlic seemed to take the sauce to new levels. It was absolutely delightful. The fruit compote was the perfect accompaniment. The wine was great, the company convivial and all was perfect in my world.

Pheasant Alfredo, straight from the oven

Pheasant Alfredo

Serves 4 to 6

1½ pheasants, in quarters (marinated or not)
1 stick unsalted butter
4 cloves garlic, minced finely
10 sage leaves
1 tablespoon flour
1 cup milk
1 cup heavy cream
1 (8-ounce) block cream cheese
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (3-ounces)
1 cup freshly grated Romano cheese (3-ounces)
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
1 large or 2 smaller sprigs fresh thyme
2 sprigs fresh sage (or about 20 leaves)

At least ½ hour before making the Alfredo Sauce, melt the stick of butter over very low heat and add in the minced garlic and 10-ish sage leaves. Leave the pan on the lowest heat possible, so it does not even come to a simmer. This might require leaving the pan slightly off the burner. The goal is to "steep" the garlic and sage flavors into the butter, cooking the garlic very gently so there is no raw flavor left. (I left my pot over a "warming burner" for over an hour).

When ready to make the sauce, remove the spent sage leaves and add the flour to the butter and garlic in the pan and stir in. Add in the milk and cream and bring to a low boil. Add the cream cheese, in cubes, stirring until it is melted into the cream. Add in the Parmesan and Romano cheeses, stirring until they are melted.

Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Spray a 9 x 13 casserole with cooking spray. Set the fresh herbs over the bottom of the casserole. Lay the pheasant quarters over the herbs, skin side down (whether it has skin left on or not). Pour the Alfredo Sauce over the meat. Cover the casserole tightly with foil and bake for 1½ hours.
This pheasant Alfredo dish was just perfect served with wide egg noodles as an accompaniment. The Fall Fruit Compote (recipe coming in my next blog) was just the right amount of bright flavor to cut through all the cheese and cream in the sauce. 

My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

It's Pheasant Hunting Season Again

Once again, it is time for avid hunters to test their shooting skills against pheasants. I have nothing against hunting, if it is done so one can eat or otherwise live. Our friend Rich arrived last Friday evening, so as to get out as soon as possible on Saturday. Sadly, no one was available to hunt with him on Saturday, and he didn't manage to get any birds. On Sunday however, he went out with someone and he came home with 3 birds. 

Stewed Pheasant, Dressing with Stewed Mushroom Gravy and Delicata Squash, a hearty meal

Once home, he and I cleaned them and put them to brine overnight in a mixture of:

Large mushroom chunks in the gravy

Marinade for Three Pheasants

8 quarts of water
½ cup Kosher salt
1 teaspoon whole peppercorns
4 bay leaves
1 tablespoon juniper berries

Bring all ingredients to boil and then cool before pouring over cleaned pheasants. If using a zip-top bag to hold the birds, you might be able to halve this recipe for the marinade.

NOTES: The use of juniper berries is not absolutely essential, but if you can find them, they make game meats taste wonderful. 

The next morning I drained off the brine, as leaving them too long would make the birds too salty. Then Rich and I sat down to try and figure out what we wanted to do with them for dinner. We must have gone back and forth with ideas for more than 2 hours before finally agreeing, first, to use them for two separate meals, second to make the first batch into a stew with mushrooms and to have a stuffing/dressing made on the side to accompany, and third, to make the second 1 1/2 pheasants in a few days. Meanwhile we put that second batch to marinate in red wine, thyme, sage, olive oil, garlic. We had so many leftovers in the fridge that last night and tonight are pot luck nights here. Tomorrow I plan to work with the wine marinated pheasant.

Delicata Squash, baked

What I did for the stew recipe with the first 1 1/2 pheasants was to set dried mushrooms to soak in boiling water and start assembling the rest of the ingredients, which I was mostly making up as I went along. All I can say is the result was a rich and gloriously savory stew gravy. I had to hold dinner, as Rich got a last-minute call that his hunting partner could head out for a brief while, and he wouldn't be back till about 7 PM. We normally eat between 5 and 5:30 in our house, so this was a late dinner indeed, and the stew sat in the oven on "Hold" for at least 2 hours. Let's just say that the meat was literally falling off the bones by the time we ate dinner. We had decided to have some Delicata squash with the meal.

A note on the fats used in this recipe: It is difficult to exactly pinpoint the amount of fat to use, as much will depend on how meaty or fatty the bacon is. The bacon I used was extremely meaty and rendered so little fat that I had to add in oil and butter to accommodate frying the onions, garlic and then the pheasant. No matter how much extra fat or oil you add, it will make little difference to the moisture of the bird. Pheasant is naturally very lean. If it was to be roasted, wrapping the pieces in strips of bacon might help a bit in the overall moistness of the meat, but when the meat is in a stew, that has no real effect. The fat that floated on the surface of the stew attests to the fact that it was not absorbed by the meat!

Pheasant and Mushroom Stew

Dinner of Pheasant, dressing,
gravy and Delicata squash

Serves 3 - 4 

1 ounce dried shiitake mushrooms (8 - 12, depending on size)
½ ounce dried chanterelle mushrooms
4 cups boiling water
6 slices thick-sliced bacon, in 1/4-inch slices
1 large onion, chopped
4 large cloves garlic, rough chopped
1 - 2 tablespoons oil or butter, as needed for frying
1½ pheasants, cleaned and cut into quarters
½ cup flour
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
6 juniper berries
1 large sprig fresh thyme
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 - 3 tablespoons Worcestershire for Chicken (or regular Worcestershire)
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon salt

Pour the boiling water over the dried mushrooms, cover and set aside for 20 or 30 minutes, while preparing the other ingredients.

Dry the pheasant pieces thoroughly with paper toweling. Combine the flour, 1/2 teaspoon of salt and the first teaspoon of paprika in a large plate. Dredge the pheasant pieces in this flour mixture and set aside, reserving the flour.

Have ready a large stew pot. In a large skillet, over medium heat, brown the bacon. Once browned, remove with a slotted spoon to the stew pot. Add the onions to the grease in the pan, and add more oil or butter if needed. Once softened, add the garlic for 2 - 3 minutes, until fragrant. Remove the onion and garlic to the stew pot. Use 2 - 3 tablespoons of the reserved dredging flour and sprinkle it over the bacon, onions and garlic. Stir in well until it disappears.

Stew gravy with mushrooms
 - no sour cream!

Brown the pheasant pieces on both sides, in batches, without crowding the pan, and removing them to the stew pot when browned. Add in the juniper berries, thyme, tomato paste, Worcestershire, additional smoked paprika (regular paprika can be used instead) and the remaining teaspoon salt. A few grinds of fresh pepper would be nice also. Remove any tough stems or other parts of the soaked mushrooms. Chop the mushrooms and add them to the pot. Strain the mushroom liquid through a coffee filter or paper towel to remove any grit or dirt that may have accumulated. Measure the remaining liquid and add enough water or stock to make about 4½ cups. Pour this liquid into the pot and stir carefully. Set the pot over a burner and bring to a boil, while simultaneously preheating the oven to 275 degrees. Once the pot comes to a near boil, stir carefully, then cover the pot and place in the oven for 1½ to 2 hours, or until the pheasant is tender.
Sour cream may be added to the stew gravy if desired. I meant to do this but completely forgot in my hurry to get the food on the table for such a late dinner. No one missed the sour cream. The stew was absolutely perfect. The stew could be served over rice, or noodles. I made a dressing with the precise intent to use with this dish. Another alternative is to add potatoes to the stew to cook.

My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Another Weekend, Another Pheasant and Another Pheasant Recipe

4:30 PM Sunday

Saffron

Our friend Rich went out hunting again and came back with another pheasant. This time he wanted to make soup. The pheasant itself had a lot of very visible fat on its body; Rich commented he'd never seen one with so much fat on it. Still, it is a wild bird, so it was expected to be a bit on the lean and dry side. He cleaned the bird and I started in on the vegetables. Unfortunately, it took about 3 hours to get the bird to the point I could take the meat from the bones, so we had leftovers for dinner last evening. I let the soup cool and saved it for today. Rich wanted to serve the soup with egg noodles. All this made me reminisce a bit about going to my Grandma's house when I was young, smelling her soup cooking away on the stove, the scent of saffron in the air. Saffron comes from the Crocus sativa flower; the 3 tiny stigma of each flower are removed to dry and the flower is discarded. Saffron gives beautiful golden color to soups and pastries and a most wonderful flavor. Cooking with saffron is something I grew up around, so of course, I added saffron to the soup! 

Rich is also a big fan of pumpkin pies. Since I have had frozen portions of pureed pumpkin and squash in the freezer, along with portions of pie dough, it is a pretty simple matter to get a pie together in no time. I like freezing pie dough. I really do not like making it with all the mess it entails, but my Never Fail Pie Crust recipe makes enough for four 9-inch single crust pies or two 9-inch double crust pies. This means I can freeze portions for later, allowing them to thaw on the counter for an hour or so when needed. I made my Pumpkin Pie recipe last year for Thanksgiving, so I used that recipe last week when making a pie. As I tasted it, I felt it needed more spices than it had, even though I followed my own recipe. Rich was of the same mind about it, so I amended the recipe and we will be testing out the flavors after dinner this evening. 

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Rich and my husband had been out and about for a while today and when they got back, the pie was fresh out of the oven. Rich came in and said we just couldn't ask for a better Fall meal than Pheasant and Wild Rice Vegetable Noodle Soup and Spicier Pumpkin Pie!  

My Traditional Pumpkin Pie

Spicier Pumpkin Pie

Spicier Pumpkin Pie

Makes one 9½ - 10-inch pie

1 single-crust 10-inch unbaked pie shell
2 cups pumpkin or squash puree
2 cups whipping cream (can substitute evaporated milk)
1 cup white sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
3 teaspoons ground cassia cinnamon  
3 teaspoons ground ginger
½ teaspoon ground cloves
½ teaspoon allspice
4 eggs, slightly beaten
2 tablespoons Brandy or Cognac, optional


Preheat oven to 350 degrees (325 if using convection). With a whisk, hand held mixer or stand mixer, mix together all the ingredients until combined. Pour into prepared pie shell and bake for about 1 hour and 5 to 10 minutes, or until a knife inserted halfway between center and edge comes out clean.

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After making the Spicier Pumpkin Pie, I thought maybe I should just mix up my own Pumpkin Pie Spice. It can be used in either of my pie versions. Here is that recipe:

Pumpkin Pie Spice

Pumpkin Pie Spice

Makes about ¾ cup

6 tablespoons good quality ground cassia cinnamon
6 tablespoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Stir all the spices together thoroughly and store in a tightly sealed glass jar in a cool, dark place.

To use in pies: For a regular pie, such as Chris's Pumpkin Pie or one using a label on canned pumpkin, substitute any spices called for with 1 to 1½ teaspoons of this mixture. To make my Spicier Pumpkin Pie above, use half the total amount of this mixture, or 7 teaspoons.

8:30 PM Sunday

Pheasant and Wild Rice Vegetable Soup

Dinner was just delightful. The Pheasant and Wild Rice Vegetable Soup was full of earthy flavors and wonderful textures. We served it over wide egg noodles. I had made my Multi Grain and Seed Bread earlier in the day and I served that alongside for another great texture to add to the mix. The Pumpkin Pie was revised from what I have posted on my website and I will be amending that a bit later. I nearly doubled the spice quantities. Keep in mind, the pie was made in a 9½ inch deep pie plate and the filling is ample. It tasted much better this time around, so that is my new go to recipe. Meanwhile, here is my Pheasant Soup recipe, which will serve a lot of people or be a meal for days: 

Pheasant and Wild Rice Vegetable Soup

Pheasant and Wild Rice Vegetable Soup

1 pheasant, cleaned and drawn
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 onions, coarsely chopped
3 carrots, sliced in rounds
3 stalks celery, coarsely chopped
6 cloves garlic, minced
1 green pepper, chopped
1 large potato, cut in small cubes
2 bay leaves
2 - 4 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves, minced
½ cup fresh parsley, chopped finely
3 - 4 teaspoons salt (start with the smaller amount)
few grinds pepper
pinch of saffron, crumbled
1 teaspoon smoked paprika (Pimenton de la Vera)
¼ ounce dried porcini mushrooms
¾ ounce dried shiitake mushrooms
3 cups boiling water
9 cups water
1 cup wild rice
cooked egg noodles, for serving

Set the dried mushrooms into the boiled water, cover and set aside to soak. In a large soup pot or Dutch oven, heat the olive oil. Add in the onions, stirring occasionally while prepping the other vegetables. Add in the carrots, celery and garlic and continue to stir occasionally. Add in the whole bird, allowing to brown on each side. Add in the green pepper and potato, the bay leaves, thyme, parsley, salt, pepper saffron and smoked paprika. Add in the 9 cups of water, stir and bring to a simmer.

Remove the mushrooms from their soaking water, reserving the water. Cut stems from the shiitakes and slice. Check the porcinis for any that are too hard and woody, shopping any larger pieces. Add both kinds of mushrooms to the pot. Check the mushroom soaking water for dirt or grit in the bottom. If there is any dirt, strain the liquid through a coffee filter or paper toweling and add to the pot. Cover the pot and allow to simmer for about 3 hours, or until the pheasant is ready to freely come off the carcass. Remove the pheasant from the soup and allow to cool enough to handle. Meanwhile add the wild rice to the pot and bring to a medium simmer for at least 45 minutes. Once the pheasant is cool enough to handle, remove all the meat and discard the bones. Return the meat to the pot. Once the wild rice is completely tender the soup is ready to serve. This soup is wonderful served over egg noodles.



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

It's Pheasant Hunting Season; time for delightful recipes

Our friend Rich came to visit for the opening of pheasant hunting season. His first day out was unsuccessful, but on day two he did get one young bird. I have had the experience of killing and cleaning both chickens and turkeys in my life, but never a pheasant. I was informed that one does not need to pluck feathers from a pheasant as the skin is so easy to just rip off with the feathers still attached. I came outside to watch Rich skin and clean the bird and then came the time to think what to do with it.

Dried Shiitake Mushrooms

Rich and I collaborate well on food matters. We both have wonderful ideas, but vastly different ones, so it is especially fun to bounce ideas back and forth. His first idea was that he wanted to brine the bird. I have only brined once - a turkey. I was unimpressed. I did understand the reasoning behind brining a wild bird such as this, so we agreed on that, for both better flavor and tenderizing. He also wanted to subsequently soak it in buttermilk as an added insurance against too gamy a flavor. Once the bird was cleaned we set it to soak overnight in brine. Next morning (yesterday) he removed it from the brine, cleaned out the container and set the pheasant pieces back into the container with 2 cups of buttermilk. We left that to soak for a few hours.

Assembled casserole, before baking

Meantime, we started to work out the flavors we wanted. I had only eaten pheasant once in my life, at a restaurant over 20 years ago. I recall loving the dish, but was unsure if that was an accurate representation of the flavor of a wild bird. I told Rich that I knew juniper berries were supposed to be good with wild game, so we agreed to use a little of those. We both love the flavors of fresh thyme, so we decided to use that. Rich wanted rice with the casserole, and particularly to have wild rice be a part of it. 

What we ended up doing is cooking wild rice in one pot, brown rice in another and white rice in a third. I made ¾ cup (dry) of each variety of rice, with a teaspoon of olive oil, 1¼ teaspoon of salt and 1½ cups of water, cooking the brown and the wild rice for 50 minutes, and the white rice for 15. The wild rice did not soak up most of the water it cooked in, and I drained and saved that water to use for the sauce later. Rich dislikes the use of flour to thicken things and suggested using bread crumbs instead. We were looking for a creamy mushroom base for the sauce, but without using a canned mushroom soup (we are both purists on that score). I had some artisan style homemade bread on hand so I cut two thick slices and put into the food processor to make crumbs. We wanted mushrooms to be a part of it, so since my husband and I love dried shiitakes, we used those, which are delightfully chewy when reconstituted. I used 10 of them, soaked in boiling water for about 20 minutes. I saved the about 3 cups of water from the mushroom soaking to use as part of the liquid for the sauce. Rich also wanted to add chicken to the whole dish, as chicken is more fatty than pheasant and would lend some of the fattiness to the dish.

Rich, serving his pheasant creation

Okay, so now we had a working idea and had started prepping. Rich chopped an onion, a carrot and 2 stalks of celery, along with about 6 or 8 large cloves of garlic. I sautéed that mixture in a frying pan in olive oil until they were wilted, then removed that to a large roaster pan, spread over the bottom of the pan. Meanwhile, Rich blotted all the pheasant and chicken pieces dry with paper toweling, then sprinkled with salt and pepper and I followed with browning all the pheasant and chicken pieces, which were then removed to the roaster pan, in one layer. We removed the stems from the soaked mushrooms and sliced them, strewing them over the meats. I sprinkled in about a teaspoon of juniper berries, and then the bread crumbs. Over top of this I evenly sprinkled the wild rice, then the white rice and then the brown rice. Rich was interested in a smoky flavor element, so I sprinkled on 1 1/2 teaspoons of smoked paprika (Pimenton de la Vera).

Pheasant Chicken Casserole with Three Rices

Back in the frying pan, I added about 1½ tablespoons of fresh thyme leaves and a cup of dry white wine, cooking quickly over high heat, stirring up all the browned bits in the bottom, to reduce to less than a half cup, total. We added in the mushroom cooking water and the wild rice cooking water and cooked briskly to reduce to about 2 or 2½ cups of total liquid. To this we added 2 cups of heavy cream, off the heat. After tasting, we added another teaspoon of salt to the sauce. I poured this sauce over the whole casserole, covered the pot and baked it for 1½ hours at 325 degrees.

It may have taken a while to assemble, but I have only one word for the outcome. YUM! The casserole was unctuous from the cream and perfectly flavored. The smoked paprika was just enough to give that hint of smokiness without overwhelming. The pheasant was absolutely not gamy though it retained the flavor of a wild bird, and it was very tender. Both the pheasant and the chicken were juicy and perfect. It may have taken a while to assemble, but oh great heavens, it was good. 



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.