Until we deem the world can take that, here's something I cooked yesterday to use up the last two partridges from the freezer. Partridge Buried in Mushrooms. Doesn't sound right does it? Ok, lets call it perdrix sous les champignons. Sounds more like a £30 quid a plate job, right?
After defrosting the birds, this simple stew started out as most do, with onion, celery and carrot chopped up and sizzling in a pan.
Why do stews always start this way? You're softening up the cell membranes in the vegetables and releasing flavours to react with each other (pyrolysis of the sugars and all sorts of other things going on). But this holy trinity of stock vegetables turns a relatively bland idea into something fit for a king. If you want to save time, start them off with a little water and cook as hot as you dare until thats mostly driven off, and then add your oil for frying - you'll find you start getting caramelisation much faster that way.
While thats going on season the partridges with salt and pepper and dredge some flour over them. Just a little to brown and add colour. Just above the partridges there you'll also see a bouquet garni - or in other words a bunch of herbs tied together with string. I used parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme and bay. And then on to the mushrooms... This dish is absolutely divine if you use blewits, especially wood blewits, but you can hurl in whatever you have. I used a mix of wood blewits, field blewits, parasols, field mushrooms and I think there was a single yellow cracking bolete in there.
If you have to buy mushrooms then you have my condolences. Chestnut or button mushrooms will do fine, but make sure you have enough to pretty much bury the partridges when they're in the pan. Chop them to a size that they're about eatable, and put them aside.
Now brown the partridges - scoop the veg out of the pan and put them aside, and heat the pan to smoking hot. Expect the partridges to leave some colour in the bottom of the pan - YOU WANT THIS TO HAPPEN, IT IS NOT BURNING. Brown them top and bottom, and see whether you've a stray glasses of wine or cider to de-glaze the pan with.
Whats that, it looks like I burned the bottom of the pan? Yes, it does. That stuff is called flavour there - the browning there colours the sauce and gives you a rich flavour when you get it off in deglaze.
Now turn it down, put your stock veg back in and keep putting mushrooms in the pan until you can't see the partridges. Yes, really. And then add in enough stock to maybe go less than half way up the sides of the mushrooms, to not cover the partridges entirely. Yes, again, really. You're cooking the partridges in the mushroom juice in this dish, which gives them an amazing flavour and produces a sauce so rich and flavoursome you'll be amazed by it.
This goes in the oven until its good and done. Cover it with a well fitting lid, give it half an hour at 180C, open it up and make sure that there's enough juice starting to flow. Turn the birds over, and then put it back in the oven for another half an hour at 180C. Then turn it down to 160C and forget about it. The meat is on the bone so it won't disintegrate, it'll just keep getting better and better. If you leave it in there an hour more it'll still be fine, but don't let it dry out. You should end up with the birds around half covered by the sauce.
You've got a hot oven on when you're cooking this so use it all - I put baked spuds and roast pumpkin on at the same time to go with it, and also cooked another pan full of mushrooms at the same time for tomorrow. If you're heating that whole space, you might as well use it.
To serve, well, you can't go far wrong with a crisp, steamed brassica and whatever other vegetables you've baked or roasted. Put a generous scoop of mushroomy gravy on the plate alongside everything else.
This is an absolutely top dish to serve as an autumn-warmer or even for game loving dinner guests. If you find yourself with a few pigeons to eat, they're good cooked this way, as is rabbit, or even pheasants. If doing pheasant you might be well served to half them before cooking this way, and of course you'll want to joint your bunny. You can even cook chicken this way - its great with chicken legs. The important thing here is to cook the meat on the bone - you're giving it a long, slow cook, and you're not trying to make soup.
If you want to vary this dish a bit, garlic works. With pigeons adding a few crushed juniper berries is delicious. But don't feel restrained by any stew recipe - everything here is interchangeable. Just know your ingredients and cook what seems right.
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