16ga.com ~ View topic - recipe series

A lot of folks here prefer chuckars as their #1 table fare - please share your recipes for preparation of these little birds - I hope this expands into a series or recipes for many of the game birds we all hunt for and eat.

Whole bird and/or parts - just post your methods - suggestions for side foods like beer and veg are welcomed too

Chukar breast. Butter, garlic, white wine. With white rice. Put some butter, garlic and white wine into the rice while its cooking. Serve with a Santa Margerita Pinot Grigio. Santa Margerita is the king of Pinot's.

Chukar Poppers.----- take strips of breast meat, apple wedge, a chunk of Jalapino cheese , and wrap it in bacon. Place on a cookie sheet and bake in oven 350 degrees for 20-30 min(depending on oven). Serve with ICE cold beer during Superbowl game. Or enjoy them the night before and go hunting during the game.

Great idea Sprocket!

Dove; Marinate the breasts in a dry red wine, one that you like to drink, for an hour or two, then salt & pepper, wrap with a strip of bacon and put on a charcoal grill until bacon crisps. Serve with cou-cous cooked with currants and pine nuts. Drink the rest of the wine!

If this theme catches on, I have plenty more where this comes from.

How about a seperate listing for 16 ga. recipes.

Good Evening
The last Chukar we cooked was skinned, or as they may say in other Areas skin't. The bird is scrubbed up( feathers and other assorted debris in getting the bird from field to pot). Take the rinsed bird and place in the ever faithful crock pot, we usually cook two as they are just the right size for one hungry person to get around. Okay the birds are in the crock pot, then take a can of Campbell's Southwest PepperJack Soup and smear the birds with it. Probably best to dry the birds a tad to get some adhesion from the soup. Pour in about one cup of water, set the crock pot on low, start the rice about 5 hrs. later, when the rice is done, serve over rice. Magnifiquissimo. Perhaps a Fria Cuervesa, supremo. Things are looking up only five months til the shooting preserve opens again.
Have a Good Evening.
Chet

I would bet that we could put together one heck of a cook book for game birds with a little work...

Member Joined: 24 Dec 2005 Posts: 134 Location: Idaho

Here is another recipe. I pick the birds and then then with poultry shears cut the bird into two pieces. Each piece is one half of the breast and a leg/ thigh combo. Melt butter and honey in equal parts and then put on the rack in the oven, broiler part. After brushing on the melted honey and butter, cook 5-7 minutes on each side. Then eat and of course drink your favorite wine with the birds. An elegant dinner. Larry Very Happy

Member Joined: 20 Mar 2005 Posts: 1522 Location: NH

I do these guys like I do pheasants.

Skin and breast out. Place the breast in flour and then fry lightly in warm olive oil. Remove.

Then melt a couple sticks of butter, put some sliced garlic in the butter along with basil or oregano and a cup of a sweet white wine (white Zinfadel works great), and a couple of shakes of crushed red pepper.

Place the breast in the sauce for about 2-3 minutes stirring everything together.

Serve over white rice or couz couz.

Chuckar Scampi at it's finest. Very Happy

Member Joined: 02 Feb 2007 Posts: 371 Location: mpls mn

Bird Prep
I skin out the chukar/grouse or quail cut off the feet wings and head spilt it up the entire back with scissors or shears off some type, pull out all the guts wash them rewash them clean them out ( cut off the neck or outer unsightly parts)

With large birds I like to cut them in half length wise and flatten the bird out on the cutting board.

The other method is to just split the bird up the back with shears an clip the wish bone this allows you to flatten out the whole bird. I think culinary people call this butter flying. what do I know Im a shop teacher. I like to push 2 skewers thru the bird right before grilling( bamboo ar metal). With the bird spread flat on the cutting board I push one skewer thru the breast parallel to the cutting board and one thru the thighs again parallel to the cutting board. This serves no purpose than to keep the bird flat in relationship to the fire, it also keeps the legs from flailing around or falling off .

I always brine my birds for 24 hours in a salt /sugar brine nothing special. I think it draws out the blood and adds moisture to the meat I may be wasting my time with this step but I still do it.

Marinade/ basting sauce:
2 sticks of butter
1/2 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup Dijon mustard
Head of roasted garlic
2 lemons juiced
1 Table spoon thyme or you can use oregano
Dash of red pepper
Salt and pepper to taste

Combine all ingredients in sauce pan and simmer for a 1/2 hour. Let cool
pat dry birds pour sauce/ marinade to cover birds let marinate for 8 hours+

Grilling Birds:
Remove birds from marinade
skewer if desired
Re heat sauce to melt butter
Place on grill brush on sauce
Grill 4-6 minutes each side I start with bone side down
remove from fire

I had some time on my hands on Sunday, and felt like cooking a bit. Wasn't sure where I was heading, but started with four "jumbo" store bought quail. They are actually smaller than most the pen raised birds I get, and little darker meat too.

So, I get out the stock pot, and put half an onion or so, stalk of celery, and some mushroom stems in after bringing to simmer. Drop Quail in whole, and light boil for 25 min, probably would have been fine for 15-20. Retreived quail, and let sit on cutting board for a couple of minutes. I then picked the meat off and set aside in fridge, while I returned skin/bones/etc back to stock pot. Let simmer for two-three hours. I strained the broth when it started to darken, as I wanted a lighter base...

For the next stage I got out:

Ricotta Cheese
Quail Meat
Four Mushrooms
1/4 yellow onion
white pepper
salt
savory
marjorm
walnuts (freshly toasted)
Pasta dough

I roasted the walnuts, then threw the onion and finely diced mushroom in the toaster oven for a couple of minutes to burn off some of the water in them. Mixed all ingedients together, and lightly spiced. I then Added a couple of drops of walnut oil t get a little fat content, as the ricotta was skim and the quail are so lean. This came to the consistancy of a thick filler, which I used to stuff ravioli made from the pasta dough. For future reference, I will probably use wonton wrapers, as the pasta was a bit on the heavy side.

Next I cooked the suffed pasta pockets in the broth, and set aside to dry slightly. Heated a skillet to med, and added a bit of walnut oil, and browned the stuffed pasta. Use non-stick if you got it.

sliced the Leek/green onion thin and one more mushroom, added to the broth base a boiled a couple of min. placed quail stuffed pasta in warmed bowls four at a time, and half covered with the quail broth, using green oinon and mushroom slices as a garnish. Served with a un-oak chardanay...

I still had about half my filling mix left after making twelve shells. Wife used that in the bottom of a quiche last night...

Member Joined: 01 Dec 2006 Posts: 524

Ya know........I've bveen hunting Chukars since I was 14 yeasr old, I'm now 48 years old. Over the years, I have become quite a foody and master of the culinary arts. Oh yeah, you name it, port wine and berry reductions to classic french butter and wine drenchings with presentations worthy of the finest. Mirapoix to bechamel and all points in between, I've tried it all. One theme I've found no matter how hard I've tried to buck it, is that with game birds, less is more. Be it chukar, pheasant or quail my dear old dad had it right the first time with his old double dipped fried bird as follows:

Season up some flour with salt and pepper.
Break a couple eggs in a bowl and add just a lttle half and half or butter milk. Dredge the birds pieces in the egg wash and then roll them in the flour. Then, resip the floured bird pieces back in the egg wash again and re- flour them. In the meantime, you shouldve been heating some crisco or other vegetable oil in a well seasoned cast iron pan over medium heat.
Plaace the bird pieces in the hot oil and cover for about 15 minutes. Take the lid off, turn the bird pieces over and reduce heat to low until the bird pieces have turned golden brown on the new side. Place pieces on a paper towel covered plate to drain. Pour the oil off the pan, throww in a tablespoon of butter over medium heat and sprinkle in some flour -don't worry about any fragments of bird or anything left in the pan. Stir the butter -flour in the pan until its light brown (you just made a roux). Then add some milk and stir virgorously until thickened into a nice white gravy to serve over the mash potatoes you also made. You just can't beat the moist heat and crispy outside of southern frying gamebirds - thats my contention, are you in good hands?

Member Joined: 04 May 2005 Posts: 123 Location: Oregon

Jig, I'm gonna give your recipe a try. When you turn the birds over and turn the heat down to low do you put the lid back on or not?

Thanks,

Larry

Member Joined: 04 May 2005 Posts: 123 Location: Oregon

Jig, your dad really knew his stuff! Thanks so much for the chukar recipe. I tried a very large late season wild chukar and it was tender and tasty right down to the drumstick! The gravy was excellent too.

Thanks again,

Larry