I have just got a bunch of pheasants

[johnyd]

Just got a number of birds (10) and thought mmmmm! maybe pheasant salami? or at least pheasant sausage anyone got any ideas / done this before?

 

[BGKYSmoker]

Just got a number of birds (10) and thought mmmmm! maybe pheasant salami? or at least pheasant sausage anyone got any ideas / done this before?

Yup

Mix with a cut in of fat like 73/27 GB, brisket trip or pork fat. Season the way you like and make salami, bologna, sausage fresh or smoked. It endless.
 

 

[SmokinAl]

Let us know what you decide.

 

[johnyd]

Boned out the birds today, and have them soaking to draw the blood and to give me another day to make up my mind what to do.

I have it seperated into thigh meat ( deboned) and breast meat with the tenderloin removed.

I think I will cure the tenderloins and smoke them slow and cold.

The thigh meat I will mince and make into a cold then hot smoked sausage with a mix of beef and pork, I'll hang these to dry a few days ......maybe a week as we have 60 % RH here at the moment and temps in the day time are around 65F.

The reason I chose a sausage rather than a Salami size is that this will be a trial run and I havent done a full on salami type yet, so a sausage size will dry off sooner and I hope if its a successfull flavour I will get a whole bunch of birds (from paid driven shoots english style) before the season closes and make good bunch of Salami before winter ends.

Still weighing up what to do with the breast meat, may even just crumb and shallow fry conventionally or put it in with the tenderloins.

The sausage will be done to a summer sausage / thuringer style, 10% beef, 20% pork, 70%pheasant

 

[johnyd]

Ok I have made a start on this. 

I made fresh sausage with some and the rest is going into a summer style sausage.

I used a turkey with dried tart cherries recipe from a charcuterie book for the fresh sausage, I substituted apricot and raisins for the cheries and mulled wine and bourbon for the white wine.

They turned out ok but not a rave product, next time i wouldnt bother with the booze it seems to take away from the experience rather than enhance it.

I'm curing the breast meat and tenderloins  in two different ways, and in the next day or so plan to do a smoke on the summer saus and breasted meats.

 

[johnyd]

Just to up date the thread ( its nearly all eaten now)

Heres the Pheasant sausage / breast / tenderloins ready for cold smoke

And this is about 2 hrs in to the hot smoke section at about 120F

Here is the breast meat and tenderloins at rest. The breast meat was cured and the tenderloin done like a jerky

I decided to string the tenderloins, to hang up to dry

I hung the string around the heat shield of my  wood fire's chimney i guess the temp would have been around the 100F mark maybe even 120 

It stayed there  around 8 hrs

And last but least ( its nearly all gone too) is the salami / sausage after about 2 weeks hanging in the garage.

Its dried off about a 3rd and is just awesome, used fermento on it so it has a little sourness to it. The yellow blob at the right is a lump of pheasant fat .... it melts at a low temp and is best not eaten in the scheme of things but it peels off easy!

 

[africanmeat]

Look good and yummy