pheasant

I picked up a couple of pheasants from the farmers market on Saturday and had a dig around the web for a good recipe. This recipe for pheasant casserole (pot roated pheasant, really) looked just right as I didn’t want to mask too much of the game flavour. Some people seem to think that you need to heavily marinate and sauce this bird because of it strong flavour, but my family and I disagree. Pheasant has a wonderfully rich taste.

The recipe turned out fantastic, I only tweaked it a little bit:

  • Add 3 cloves of whole garlic along with the shallots.
  • I left out the redcurrant jelly because I didn’t have any.
  • I toasted the roux, as I am prone to do, and added rosemary, thyme and bay leaves along with some cracked black pepper to the roux instead of the bouquet garni. Toasting the herbs like this, especially the rosemary, makes them nice and nutty and allows them to dissolve into the sauce.
  • About half way through remove the cover and if the sauce left in the pan is not thick enough reduce it.

This made very rich and savoury sauce for spooning over the pheasant at the table. I served it with a black/long grain/wild Canadian rice and some steamed broccoli.

If you’re not one for game, you might try Pot roasted pheasant with cider and calvados, I haven’t, but it looks plenty good.