How to cook a partridge? Recipes for cooking tasty ptarmigan dishes

Since hunting has ceased to be the main means of obtaining food, and people have learned to breed poultry and livestock, game has begun to be valued much higher than the result of labor of cattle breeders. Nutritionists claim that the meat of wild birds and animals is more useful, because it is less fat. And they did not use artificial fodder, supplements and hormones.

However, even in times of greater prevalence of hunting, partridges were valued for tender, juicy meat and were considered a worthy product even for royal (royal) table.

National preferences

Ptarmigan is an international bird. It lives, perhaps, everywhere, except for absolutely tropical places and Antarctica. And in every country there are ideas about how to cook a partridge. The Germans extinguish it, and necessarily in the vegetable stew. In Russia it is common to fry a bird. Americans bake it in the oven or in the form of a barbecue. The French, in general, do not eat whole ptarmigans: broths and soups are cooked from the carcass, and meat is consumed as pates and soufflé.

But this is just a tradition, which does not necessarily follow. Any way of how to cook a partridge gives invariably delicious results. So you can choose any, but you can try everything.

Selection of birds

Hunters, of course, and themselves are well versed in the quality of the mined. But ordinary citizens have gone far from nature and can appreciate unless a piece of chopped pork or "stati" chicken. And there is a serious enough risk that such an illiterate person will buy absolutely not what he would like.

So, before you cook a partridge, you must first buy it. When choosing a bird, you need to look at her armpit. The skin under the wings should be thin, plastic and soft. If it is rough or hard, there is an "old lady" in front of you, from which nothing good can come of it.

In the same secret place, there should be no spots. They are? Partridge, to put it mildly, stale. If the bird is not plucked, you need to take a closer look at the feathers: piled, as if wet, also say that the carcass rests on the counter far from the first day.

Cutting the carcass

In shops and supermarkets, game is usually sold frozen and already cut. But if you are lucky to find a fresh bird, before you cook it, you need to gut it. How to cook a ptarmigan for shipment to the fire?

Suppose you can pluck a bird without outside advice. Guts are also removed without special subtleties. And further on, attention! Partridge must necessarily be harvested goiter. Since the bird is small, the head is usually not cut off, only the eyes are removed, and then the head is hidden under the wing. Claws must be cut off, and paws bend back. Now your bird is ready for further processing.

Partridge and oven

In our opinion, this wild bird is too small to be fried. Therefore, people who know how delicious to cook a partridge, prefer to use an oven. Naturally, because of the small size of a bird, the calculation of products always goes to several carcasses - because of one and the stove should not be lit. Usually, four birds are prepared right away (if you do not have a very large family).

Most recipes offer before cooking a partridge in the oven, marinate it. First, so she will lose less weight, and secondly, the meat will become softer and more fragrant. So first we prepare the sauce. We heat together lean and butter (in the ratio 1: 1). In this mixture, quickly roast the partridges (about five minutes). Add a laurel, thyme, shallots. You can pour broth from the chicken. On a small fire the saucepan must be poured for an hour. Then the carcasses are deposited, the broth is decanted, it is added with juice or jelly of red currant (1 tbsp.), Black berries and grated beets (50 g each). Everything boils for 3-4 minutes and is removed.

Butter, rubbed with the same charlotte, salt and thyme, is rubbed into partridges, which are then wrapped in thin bacon plates. Then prepared birds for an hour put in the cold. This recipe for cooking ptarmigan offers a very gentle pickling.

On the baking sheet lay pieces of bread with a thin layer of oil, on them - partridges. We put in a hot oven. In a quarter of an hour, when the bread is toasted, it is cleaned, and the game is left in the oven. When it becomes rosy, it is again put on bread, watered with sauce and asked everyone to the table.

Hunting secret

The miners advise how to cook a partridge in the oven without such culinary complexities. Tasty, quick and simple: to stick a carcass with a test (the simplest, dumplings or lean shops will do) and into the oven. To make the dough not dry and served as an addition to the game, a cup of water is placed in the oven under the grate. If baking is done on a baking sheet, place a stand under the carcases (for example, wooden bars).

"Sleeve" option

Still there is a good idea on how to cook partridge in the sleeve. Gutted and peeled birds are rubbed with salt. They will be salted for about ten minutes. During this time, mustard, pepper and mayonnaise are mixed. The proportions of the ingredients are according to your taste. Carcasses are rubbed together and marinated for about half an hour. Ready seasonings do not take - the taste is not the same, most of them contain some stabilizers.

Garlic cloves should be cleaned and washed, large cut along. Sweet and sour apples cut into small slices. In each marinated partridge put on a clove of garlic and a pair of pieces of apples. Toothpicks fasten sections on carcasses, and birds are put in the food sleeve. The remains of apples can be placed there too.

The severed end is tied. The sleeve is seated upward on the baking tray, and at 180 degrees partridge is baked for half an hour. Minutes for 5-10 until the end you need to open the seam - otherwise the bird will turn out, rather, boiled or braised. The result is amazing!

The multivar does not disappoint!

No less tasty it turns out, if you know how to cook a partridge in a multivariate correctly. A great variety of products will not be required, the main thing is not to break the technology.

Partridge will have to take more than other recipes - six or eight pieces. Their total weight should approach one and a half kilograms. Still need garlic, honey (2 tbsp.), Red pepper, soy sauce (50 ml) and shallow onions.

Before you cook a partridge in the multivark, it will have to boil slightly. Then each carcass rubbed with pepper. In the multivarka, lean oil is poured, and partridges are laid out in it. Lukovki artistically arranged among the carcasses. So that they do not fall apart when cooking, "ass" is better not to cut off. Add honey, garlic (or whole denticles, or large chopped) and soy sauce (it is usually salty, so try "for salt" before the end of cooking).

Water in the bowl should be poured so that the birds under it disappear completely. The extinguishing mode is switched on and the hour is set. Partridge is very small, so 60 minutes is usually enough. But if the meat is not soft, you can increase the time.

American Recipe

This recipe for cooking ptarmigan is good because it allows you to cook a bird on vacation and get a completely unusual taste in comparison with other options.

The carcasses are washed and cut into the stomach, like "chicken tobacco". By the same principle, they fight off, only very carefully and on massive parts. On both sides the birds are peppered and salted, folded into a saucepan and poured with marinade from wine and white vinegar (the latter must be a little, 10 times less than wine). You can add to the composition and herbs - mint, oregano, basil. Marinate partridges should be at least an hour. It is possible and more - it does not hurt.

Then the birds are dried and smeared on all sides with melted butter (this will require 1 tbsp.). Partridge-barbecue fry only on the grate and only under the load. Although the proposed recipe - marching, romantic, you can cook on it at home, on an electromangal. Each side will require 6 minutes of roasting. It is better not to move the carcasses while they are above the fire - the tender skin will be ripped off, and there will be a different taste and appearance.

Very suitable for barbecue from partridges sauce from garlic, pepper, wine (a couple of tablespoons), vinegar (it is enough and one teaspoonful) and vegetable oil (one large spoon).

Greetings from Spain

The partridge with oranges is unusual and interesting in cooking. It is prepared quite quickly, since it does not require preliminary pickling. Carcasses are cut in half and quickly fried in 20 g of creamy (this is important!) Oils. Ruddy halves fold into a deep vessel. With two oranges, peel is removed. In the original recipe, it must be very thinly cut, and then cut into strips. However, it has been established by experience that it does not get any worse if it is just gently wiped off with a grater.

Peeled oranges are sorted into slices and discarded. Grapes from one bunch and orange slices are laid out in a pot around the partridges. The contents are filled with juice, which is separated from the carcasses during their frying, sprinkled with orange peel, the pan is covered with a lid and placed in a hot oven, where it will be from five to seven minutes. The taste of the resulting dish can not be compared to anything!

It's clear, this is not all that can be cooked from the partridge. She goes to salads, fricassees and pates are made from her ... However, you can start acquaintance with this game with the proposed recipes.