Juniper and Wood Smoked Potted Pheasant

The shooting season came to an end last week, but instead of mourning its passing I had to get on with plucking the two pheasant, two duck and seven woodcock that landed on my doorstep courtesy of WTH (Woody The Hunter) and Mr. Hedworth. I have been inundated with birds all season from the shoot my dad attends, so as a thank you I potted up some pheasant for the proprietor and the keepers. He tells them stories of everything I cook and I get the impression he forces them, and others, to look at my blog, so I thought it only right that I show my gratitude in the form of food...

 

Pheasant is the main thing that comes home from the shoot, sometimes duck, then more rarely a partridge, a grouse and very rarely a woodcock. So with lots of pheasant filling up the freezer I have been trying to find inventive ways of serving it. Roast pheasant often dries out when cooked, and just doesn’t do the bird justice really. It is better in a casserole or pie I think. I've made a Pheasant Salmis in the past, a lovely French dish with a rich truffle sauce. I have also, a few times, attempted a St. John Pheasant and Trotter Pie, although delicious it takes hours, hours and hours, and each time I have become so frustrated and annoyed by making it I have vowed never to go there again. I was going to write about it on here some time, but I am yet to find a point in time where I'm ready to relive the experience via the written word...

Pheasant is probably one of the milder game birds, the wallflower of the game world; I prefer partridge and woodcock who really up the gamey-ness levels. That was until I thought of potting it, or to be more precise, smoking it, confit-ing it and then potting it, so now I'm a pheasant convert.

 

 

I smoke the pheasant in Mr. Smokerson for 2 hours, the whole bird, with a mix of hickory and apple wood and some juniper berries. You are meant to add a small handful of woodchips, but TLI has taken to packing the whole box full with the intention of 'smoking the f**k out of them'... It works... If you don't have a smoker you can just roast them for 15 minutes instead of this stage.

To confit, put the jointed pheasant in a pot that it fits in snugly and pour over 350g of warm duck or goose fat, a standard size jar per bird. You want the fat to cover the pheasant as much as possible. Add a bay leaf and a bunch of thyme, then cook in the oven for 1 to 1 1/2 hours, until the meat is soft.

 

 

When it is done take it out of the fat and leave to cool, you can keep the fat in a jar in the fridge and use again, reserve a bit to pour over the top of the finished pheasant. Then shred the pheasant meat into tiny pieces; this is best done by hand so you can discard any bits of bone, skin or fat, and you get a nice irregular course texture rather than a pâté texture if you blitz it. Add a little of the melted fat now and again to keep in from drying out and add quite a few fresh thyme leaves and some pepper. Then melt 25g of butter per bird and the juice of half a lemon and add this all to the meat.

 

Finally pack the meat into a jar or small pots and pour over a thin layer of the melted fat, just enough to cover, this will keep for a few months in the fridge. I find that one bird makes two regular jars of potted pheasant. You can use this method with a range of other meats, I have made Potted Duck previously, you can also try pork in the same way, which is known as pork rillettes. I have also read about potted goose and rabbit, which I'm keen to try too.

The best way to eat this potted pheasant is either slightly warmed through, or at room temperature, on hot toast with butter and a scatter of capers. I also like a little bit of Bread and Butter Pickle on the side. It's so delicious, the meat is soft and tender and smoky, the thyme and butter really add to the flavours. It's changed my view of pheasant no end...

 

Salmis of pheasant with truffle

I think my neighbours and postman might think I'm slightly strange over autumn when the porch is often decorated with hanging duck, pheasant, partridge and on one occasion a brace of woodcock. I am lucky enough to be given occasional game over the shooting season. It needs to hang for a week or so depending on the temperature, and also needs plucking, which I am getting better at. It is time consuming and messy, but it is lovely to have interesting, local food that you definitely couldn’t pick up in the supermarket.

This was the last pheasant in the freezer and so it deserved a fitting end I felt. The Little Idiot gave me a book called 'The French Menu' for Christmas. It was written in 1970 by Richard Olney from his little house in the hills of Provence. It is divided into menus according to the seasons, menus that have eight courses in some instances, and are really interesting. This is from the section called 'Two Formal Autumn Dinners'. It is not Autumn nor a formal dinner, but never mind that there was still a pheasant to eat...

It is a pretty serious recipe, serious cooking... but I like a challenge and so decided to give it a go. A Salmis, by definition, is a French dish most often game, roasted, sliced then reheated in sauce. For interest if I had cooked the whole menu that Olney advises we would have been having Sorrel Soup, followed by Fritto Misto, then the Salmis of Pheasant, a Wild Mushroom a la Bordelaise, a Rocket Salad with Nasturtium Flowers, Cheeses and finally Orange Jelly. I honestly think that would take about three days of solid cooking, but it sounds amazing...

Start with the veloute, a traditional French sauce. Melt 1 tbsp of salted butter in a heavy saucepan. Be warned at this stage you will use every pan in the house for this, and more... Add 1 tbsp of plain flour to the melted butter and cook it gently, stirring regularly. Take it off the heat and start to add 480ml of stock very slowly. I used the stock I'd poached the chicken in for the Chicken, bacon and caper pie, which is quite organised for me, it was even labelled in the freezer...

Stir the whole time as you slowly add the stock, to stop it from lumping. Then simmer it over a low heat for about half an hour. Skim the top of it now and again if it starts to form an oily top. At the same time boil 240ml of dry white wine with a tablespoon of chopped shallots and five crushed white peppercorns. Boil it down on a high heat until there are only a few spoonfuls of liquid left.

At this point you need a truffle. They are generally expensive and difficult to get in your average supermarket. I had brought one home for TLI as a present from a holiday in Mallorca. It didn't cost a lot and I got it in the airport. I should have perhaps put two and two together at that point... We have been looking forward to it since then but hadn’t had a recipe worthy of it until now.

Open the truffle and add its preserving juice to the veloute. It was at this point that I realised that our truffle tasted of absolutely nothing... I'm not sure if it was left for too long or if it never tasted of anything in the first place, or if it indeed was actually a truffle? Nothing to do but carry on however. I improvised by slicing up the non truffle and dousing it in truffle oil until it was needed...

Sprinkle the pheasant with salt inside and out, wrap it in streaky bacon and tie it up with string to keep it all together. Roast it in a very hot oven for 25 minutes in a pan that is a snug fit. When you take it out keep all the juices in the pan for the next stage. Cut away the bacon and discard, you will see that it has kept the pheasant nice and juicy inside.

Next you need to joint the pheasant into pieces. Cut off each of the legs with a sharp knife, remove any skin and keep it separately, also keep any scraps of meat or bone. Cut the body of the pheasant into two pieces down the middle of the breast bone. Take the breast bone out, and cut each half into two length ways, remove all skin. Tidy up all of the pheasant pieces and put them into a serving dish that can go into a low oven to keep warm. Before you put them in slice the truffle over the top and grind some black pepper over. Also sprinkle over a tablespoon of cognac that you have set on fire to get rid of the alcohol. Cover this all with foil and put it into the warm oven.

Next you need to finish the sauce. Pour the fat off the top of the juices from the roasted pheasant dish. Put what is left on a high heat and add a couple of tablespoons of white white, stir it and scrape up all the bits from the pan. Chop up all the skin and scraps from the jointed pheasant and pound any bits of bone in a pestle and mortar. Add this and the roasting juices to the veloute and boil everything for 8 to 10 minutes. Pass it all through a sieve, pressing the meat and bone firmly to get all the juices through. Bring the sieved sauce back to a boil and simmer for another ten minutes with the heat on one side of the saucepan, it needs to reduce by about one third. This is much more serious cooking than I usually take on, I found the sauce quite daunting.

Finally pass through a fine sieve again, reheat, check for seasoning and swirl in 2 tbsp of unsalted butter cut into small pieces. Pour the sauce over the warm pheasant and serve straight away.

I served it with some black pudding, made by Stewart and co. in Jesmond, that was cooked in a frying pan for 5 minutes, removed and some spring cabbage wilted in the same pan. Add the black pudding back in and pour over a whisked dressing of Dijon mustard, white wine vinegar, olive oil, crème fraiche and parsley...

It is quite time consuming and a bit exhausting but extremely tasty. I'd love to try it with a real truffle one day but will probably have to wait until next autumn and when I win the lottery...