Home › The World's Kitchen › English Pheasant, Mcclellan
English Pheasant, Mcclellan
Carefully singe, cut head and feet off a nice, tender English pheasant, split open through back without separating, draw, neatly wipe and carefully remove spinal bone, envelop in a towel, gently flatten with a cleaver, lightly prickle both sides with point of a larding needle and lay bird on a flat dish. Crack, remove meat from fibres of twelve good-sized, sound, unpeeled pecan nuts, place in a mortar with eight shelled, peeled and roasted almonds, a small, sound, peeled and very finely chopped shallot, then pound these articles to a fine paste. Add a half ounce fresh butter, light teaspoon each French mustard and salt, two saltspoons paprika, a saltspoon curry powder, half teaspoon finely chopped fresh parsley, strained juice of quarter of a sound lemon, and pound whole well together for two minutes. Remove force, carefully rub pheasant all over with it and let infuse for forty-five minutes, taking care to rub frequently meanwhile. Place bird on double broiler and set to broil on a brisk fire for eight minutes on each side. Cut from a fresh, sound pineapple six two-third-inch slices, scoop out eyes, hard part in centre, lay in a lightly buttered baking dish one beside another, and arrange pheasant on top of pineapple. Lay six very thin slices raw, lean bacon over bird, evenly spread remaining butter in dish over pheasant and set in oven to roast for eighteen minutes, being careful to baste frequently meanwhiler. Remove and immediately send to table in same dish.
A spatchcocked pheasant under a pounded nut butter, grilled and then finished over pineapple. The dish works, but the bird is the whole problem: pheasant is lean and unforgiving, and the original's two-stage cooking will overshoot unless you watch a thermometer.
- The hinge: cook to temperature, not to the clockEight minutes a side over a brisk fire plus eighteen minutes in the oven is 34 minutes, which will dry out a pheasant; the bird is lean and unforgiving either way. Pull it at 165F in the thickest part of the thigh and let it rest; the total time will likely be shorter than the recipe's 34 minutes.
- "English pheasant"The common ring-necked pheasant, Phasianus colchicus, sold farmed and oven-ready at good butchers and by mail order. A dressed bird runs 2-2.5 lb and feeds two. Ask for it drawn and the head and feet removed and you skip the first two lines of the recipe entirely.
- SpatchcockingSplit through the back without cutting the bird in two, remove the backbone, then flatten under a towel with the flat of a cleaver or a heavy pan. The pricking with a larding needle is to let the paste penetrate; a fork does the same job.
- Saltspoon and other measuresA saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon, so two saltspoons of paprika is half a teaspoon and the curry powder is a quarter. Half an ounce of butter is one tablespoon. The "twelve good-sized, sound, unpeeled pecan nuts" means twelve nuts in the shell, which shell out to roughly a third to a half cup of halves.
- "Remaining butter"The recipe never sets aside any butter to remain, having called for only half an ounce in the paste. Plan on an extra 2 tablespoons, softened, to dot over the bird before it goes into the oven.
- Oven heatNo temperature is given. A hot oven, around 425F, is a reasonable modern choice for eighteen minutes of roasting with frequent basting; the bird has already taken colour under the broiler.
- The double broilerA hinged wire grill basket that clamps the flattened bird between two grids and lets you turn it in one motion over coals. A grill pan or an overhead broiler with the rack about four inches from the element gives the same sear.
- Fresh pineapple onlyCanned pineapple is already cooked and softens further under a basting bird; fresh rings hold their shape better.
- YieldOne bird on six pineapple slices serves two generously, three at a stretch. Serve in the baking dish as directed; the pineapple juices and butter make the only sauce.
This comes from Alexander Filippini's The International Cook Book (1906). Filippini spent decades in the Delmonico's kitchens in New York, and the book's habit of hanging a patron's or a friend's name on a dish is a restaurant convention carried onto the page rather than any claim of authorship. The dish itself is thoroughly of its moment: the ring-necked pheasant, introduced to North America by several routes — the celebrated 1880s Oregon stockings came directly from China, while earlier eighteenth-century attempts used English birds — was by 1900 established enough to be a market bird, and the seasoning here, curry powder and paprika worked into a nut paste, then pineapple underneath, is the Edwardian dining room's taste for a controlled touch of the exotic on a fundamentally European roast. Pounding nuts to a paste in a mortar to carry spice and butter is much older, and would have been familiar to any cook trained in the French tradition as a beurre composé; Filippini's term "force," like "forcemeat," traces back to the French farcir.