Pigeon Breasts

[welsh wizard]

Simple question

I am the proud owner of a large quantity of the aforementioned and I want to cold smoke them.

Do I have to brine them first? and if so what brine (simple please) should I use and for how long should I brine?

Thanks WW

[jpj]

yes
100g (of salt) a litre
(plus 100g sugar and any other flavourings of choice0
15-20 minutes'ish
smoke as far as possible from the heat source as they can dry out quite a bit.

[welsh wizard]

thanks jpj helpful as always

OOI if I were to hot smoke some of them as well, would I have to put them into a similar brine?

Chers WW

[jpj]

i would
try some wrapped in streaky

[welsh wizard]

interesting thought - thanks

Cheers WW

[Fallow Buck]

Wiz,

How were the smoked pigeon breasts? How long would you smoke them for?

I'm out pigeon shooting on saturday so thisd could be interesting.

Rgds,
FB

[welsh wizard]

Hi FB

The PB's were very good indeed but a little dry as JPJ said they may be, but fine for me and I will certainly be doing them again.

Got two brace of frenchies this Saturday so looking forward to those later this week!

I havent been pidgeon shooting for a while now as my time seems to evaparate too quickly, but for my money it is the best shooting you can get and the end result is one of the most delicious foods ever.

Try breasting out the bird - melt a little butter and olive oil in a pan with two cloves of split garlic and fry for 3 mins on each side. Rest for 10 mins in a warm oven and in the meantime add two glasses of port or sloe gin to the pan juices with three table spoons of double cream S&P and simmer genlly. take out the pidgeon, fan the breasts and pour over the sauce - fantastic!

Heres to a good season, cheers WW

[Fallow Buck]

Hi Wiz,

How long did you cold smoke them for? did you then just eat them as they were or did you cook them? I'm gonna give this a go hopefully.

I'll post a pic of the days resuts. I spoke to the guide today and he said things are a bit slow but we'll give it a go.

Here's something I like to do with them which you might want to try.

Like you I fry offf in butter and olive oil and put to one side. then I finely dice some onion a couple of tomatooes and a couple of mushrooms. fry off in the same pan and flambe with some brandy and reduce. I then slice up the breasts and put them back in the pan for a few seconds to coat and pour onto toast. You can do the same thing with a little cream with rabbit livers after lamping and it makes an awesome starter!!

Rgds,
FB

[welsh wizard]

Hi FB

I cold smoked them for three different periods of time. 1 hour, 1.5 and 2 hours in a Bradley (side of salmon 2.5 hours).

I then cooked them off and ate them cold in a salad and hot as in my previous recipe. I then froze the rest.

For me the 1.5 hour oak smoke was the best, the others were too weak / strong.

Thanks for the recipe I will give that a go. Rabbit livers sound very good indeed. I have just made a few rabbit and smoked bacon pies and I have a few livers that I was going to freeze ready to make a game pate but I think I will give your recipe a go tomorrow instead.

Good luck for the coming season. Im picking up Partridge on Saturday so should get a few in leiu of wages - �3.50 a brace here at the moment! Well it is the start of the season I suppose.

Cheers WW

PS I didnt keep the skin on the pidgeon breasts.

[Fallow Buck]

Wiz,

Thanks for the info. I'll give those a go. I bought Partridges last week at the shoot for �2/brace in the feather. I'll have a dry plucker in a couple of weeks so things will get a lot easier for the preparation side of things.

I made some pate last week out of the liver from a fallow pricket.

1 Liver
Breadcrumbs from 2 baegles
30cl Sloe Gin
650G cooking bacom
half a block of butter
2 Onions
2 cloves of garlic.


I cooked the bacon and garlic/onions then blitzed, and then blitzedeverything else up too and mixed before puttinginto ramekins and baking in a bain marie for an hour.

Rgds,
FB

[scotty]

Lots of smoking recipes here. Not a commercial site.


http://www.deejayssmokepit.net/

[welsh wizard]

A dry plucker FB - thers posh, really wish I had one though, it would save a lot of tired fingers..........Yep I agree ref partridge they are �2 a brace off the shoot (�4.99 plucked and dressed)


Cheers Scotty - nice site


WW

[georgebaker]

Hi
�2.20 each dressed last week from memory
George

[welsh wizard]

hi George - thats a good price.

Cheers WW

[georgebaker]

Hi
I had a year old Guinea Fowl for �7 instead. Needed braising 'cos it was not tender but good flavour

George