Transcript for On The Wing Podcast Ep. 342: A Holiday Recipe Featuring Quail in Red Wine and Mushroom Sauce
Speaker 1 (00:50)
Welcome to On the Wing podcast presented by Parina Pro Plan. We're back for a second snackable hunter's table episode as we hit the intersection of hunting season, wild game feasts, and yes, holiday shopping. Joining me once again for this conversation is Quail Forever journal editor, Ryan Sparks, in one of his recipes.
paired with a Passalacqua wine with a Quail Forever collab wine. Today's dish, the second version of our hunter's table round of two, will be quail in red wine and mushroom sauce, featuring the Passalacqua and Quail Forever Pinot Noir. Before we get rolling, I want to thank once again Purina Pro Plan, the national dog food sponsor of Pheasants Forever and Quail Forever, and the presenting sponsor of On the Wing podcast. All of my pups eat Purina Pro Plan, not just because Purina supports the wildlife habitat mission of our organization, which is incredibly important to me and should be important to you as a bird hunter as well. But the most important thing is that Purina Pro Plan was created by a team of the world's best scientists and nutritionists at Built Pro Plan specifically for the working dog like yours and like mine. You can learn more at Pro PlanSport.com. All right, Ryan, thanks for bearing with me as I stumble through a few words. I was thinking about it. You've contributed quite a few recipes in this is, you're in year two now, right?
Speaker 2 (02:52)
Yeah, next month it'll be the start of my second year, I think.
Where's your food background come from? Did you ever take any classes or are you from the school of hard knocks?
yeah, I guess the, the ladder, I've just always been interested in food, but you know, I like to eat food. but I like to cook like cooking to me and food in general is like a cool intersection of a lot of things that I'm interested in, like hunting, history, culture, geography. so, you know, just to learn of different cuisines and like where things come from and similarities and differences and technique and.
Um, I did work, uh, in a butcher shop, uh, in Iowa city for a couple of years while my wife was finishing up her graduate degree there. Um, so that, that was, uh, I learned a lot at that job. was, it was a fun job that I enjoyed. And yeah, and I also just think cooking is, you know, if you're a hunter, the other, the other side of that is when you, know, when you get your, your birds or whatever you've, wherever you got that day home, um, you know, that's a whole new skill set. And in my opinion, it's just as important as.
Any type of woodsman ship or knowing where to look for birds in the uplands and things like that
Speaker 1 (04:07)
I feel pretty competent as a cook, at least in my own home, when it comes to breaking down butchering animals. know you kind of follow the muscle tissue and it's not... After you've broken down a few animals, it becomes relatively straightforward how different cuts are made. And I also feel competent cooking. Grilling, getting meat to the right temperature, where I feel sorely inadequate is in sauce making.
The dark art of sauce making.
Well, kinda. It's like sauce pulls different pieces of a meal, or at least a dish together. And I've struggled to successfully make my own sauce. you know, the last episode, we talked about your apple cream sauce and have you taken a class on sauce making or is a trial and error? What advice do you give me as a sauce challenged?
Speaker 2 (05:22)
So, I mean, is it like the flavor of the sauce or like the body of the sauce? I mean, I don't know. Generally the sauces are, you know, you sort of deglaze a pan with something, stock, wine, beer, water, whatever, and add some aromatics and, you know, either reduce it to kind of intensify the flavor.
Speaker 2 (05:49)
And you know, add in some cream, add in some butter, you know, to kind of give it a glossiness. But I think like, and this is a perfect example is this recipe is like an absolute game changer for sauces, is making your own stock. Cause most sauces have some kind of stock or broth that goes into them. And I think people will be like surprised to learn that sounds like, boy.
It's a complicated process and you have to know what you're doing and it takes a long time. it's, mean, we'll go through it, but it's literally like throw a bunch of stuff in a crock pot and leave and come back and strain it. And guess what? That's, mean, that's where stock comes from. It's just, the, it's the leftover cooking water that has, you know, got all the amazing juices from the stuff that you throw in it. So.
Stock is a much better word than the leftover cooking water. Yeah.
Yeah, broth stock, whatever. Yeah, it's good.
Well, we'll get into that. Like we did in the first episode of this series, you told the story of the pheasant and where it came from, your family's ranch lands in South Dakota. I believe this is a Bobwhite quail recipe. Where'd the Bobwhite or the Bobwhitecome from for this particular recipe?
Speaker 2 (07:09)
Yeah. And actually didn't even think about it until, you know, you brought it up on the, on the last podcast and I started, I started thinking about it for this one. And I was kind of in like recipe mode when I was getting the quail out. And then after the fact, I realized, there's eight quail in there and, six of them were the collected quail, the last Bobwhite that I shot with my dog, Tippett in Nebraska. the other two.
were my new dog Winnie's, the first two quail that I shot over her. So I didn't intend it to be that way, but it was cool to kind of combine those two. And there's a little bit of a arc storyline in the recipe. So that was cool for me. And they all came from our farm in Nebraska.
Yeah, it's amazing how sentimental you can feel pulling out a piece of frozen meat and remembering back to those special moments and special people and the special dogs that made it happen. That's terrific story.
Yeah, it was a special meal when we sat down to it.
All right, we'll get talking about this dish. One more shout out thanks to OnX, a proud partner of On the Wing podcast and a proud partner, national sponsor of Pheasants Forever and Quail Forever. They're also a partner in our PATH program, Public Access to Habitat program, which has now opened up more than 100,000 acres of high quality habitat on private lands.
Speaker 1 (08:53)
to public land hunting. Those acres are available in South Dakota and Nebraska, and new this year, the program is getting rolling in North Dakota, Oklahoma, and in Michigan. OnX is helping to make real boots on the ground impact for you and for me. If you want the best tool in your game vest and you want to support our Wildlife Habitat mission, go to the OnX link in the show notes.
and use the code PFQF for your renewal or your membership in OnX. You'll get 20 % off and OnX will make a donation back to our Wildlife Habitat mission. All right, today's dish, quail in red wine and mushroom sauce. Get us rolling, Ryan. What did you do here?
Two reasons I really like this recipe is one, quail or a small bird. it's, have to use all the meat off of them. And this recipe does a great job of that. And then also this is a great way for people to learn how simple it is to make stock. you can get a lot fancier than this, but this is a completely passable stock and it's way better than anything you're going to buy at the grocery store. So to get started, I started with eight whole birds and, I took the breasts off of all the birds and then,
I put them in a little bowl and threw them in the fridge to hang out.
So as I look at the photo, it looks like you plucked.
Speaker 2 (10:21)
Yeah, so some of the birds that were pluckable, that weren't too shot up, I plucked them. I like to just have the skin on for that option. Sometimes, you know, they're too shot up or the dog gets a little excited and you know, they're just going to skin them. For this recipe, it is nice to have the skin on the breast, but it's not a, you know, it's definitely not a requirement. So then you've got those breasts in the fridge hanging out and then you can separate the legs and thighs from the rest of the body cavity or not.
And then just make sure the body cavity is washed out really well. Make sure all the goodies that are inside there, it's nice and clean. And then you're just going to put the body cavity, the legs and thighs in the crock pot and top them off with cold water, just enough to cover them. And then you're going to throw some other stuff in there. it's a couple of carrots chopped up, just rough, an onion. I threw some black peppercorns in there, whole black peppercorns, a bay leaf.
I put some dried thyme in there and then we had like some stubs, stems of parsley in the fridge and I threw them in there too. And the nice thing about stock is like it's a great way to use up those other things in the fridge that would otherwise go to waste. And if you don't have a bay leaf, it's not like, I can't make stock. just, you know, use whatever you have. That's the great thing about stock. It's like the great equalizer. Just throw out the pot. And so I put that crock pot on high and I think mine went for about three and a half hours. I tested them.
That's another nice thing about this recipe is at the end result looks really fancy, but the actual active cooking time is probably like 25, 30 minutes, something like that. So they'll go for three and a half hours. And then I take them out. I let them cool down a little bit. Once they're tender. mean, when I say tender, mean, just you grab them with a fork and the meat's falling off the bone. So then I'll let them cool down a little bit on a cutting board. And then just using my hands, I flake the meat off the thighs, the legs. You'll even be able to find some little bits of meat um, on the body cavity. And I just put that in a separate container off to the side. It's also, it's a great way when you're doing that to find little pieces of shot that you missed and stuff, because they'll just, you'll hear that clink fall against the counter. And then you're really, then you're ready to go. So I'll take those, breasts out, um, you know, lightly salt them. And then in a skillet with olive oil, you could use butter. I just brown them really good on both sides.
Speaker 1 (12:42)
So if the ones that have the skin still on, that's where it crisps up. Because when you pull it out of the crock pot, it's going to be soft and not...
The breasts aren't going in the pan. The breasts have just been hanging out raw in the fridge. So you breasted them out and then you throw everything but the breast into the crock.
Okay, I gotcha.
So, but those ones that do have the skin on, you know, it's kind of like a 90 10 rule and quail breasts cook really quickly too, cause they're, they're small, but I'll, I'll do like 90 % of the cooking on the skin side down to get it really nice and crispy. You'll just start to see those little like red, you know, juices come out of the top, flip it, you know, maybe 30 seconds and it's done. Take those breasts out, put them in a plate. You could tent them with foil or you could throw them in a warm oven just to keep them warm.
So just so I'm following clearly here, what goes in the crock pot is everything from the quail minus the breasts. Exactly. The legs, the carcass, everything. Okay. And then you're saving the breast till the end and that's where they're going into the frying pan.
Speaker 2 (13:50)
Exactly. Okay. And you bring up also made me realize I did miss a very important part. When you pull those legs and thighs and carcasses out of your crock pot, that cooking juice, as we talked about before, you need to strain that. And then that is essentially your stock that you're going to use later in this recipe to build your sauce. You'll have a lot leftover, which you can just throw, I just throw it in a Mason jar and freeze it, label it. If you want to really intensify the flavor, you can strain it, throw that liquid back into a pot and just boil it for, you know, 15, 20 minutes to just reduce it even more. You know, some people at that point will, will put, you know, a little bit of like Worcestershire, like a couple of drops of that, maybe a couple of drops of soy sauce in there. You can kind of play around with it and make up your own recipes, realize, you know, what you like. And then it's like your ace in the hole for sauces to make a soup out of this. You could take the leftover.
Broth and make like a quail noodle soup. That'd be fantastic, So I think we had just taken the breasts the brown breasts out of the pan They're just hanging out staying warm somewhere and then you're gonna make your sauce So I'm gonna add a little bit more oil if it's looking dry and then I'm throwing in my sliced mushrooms and a sliced up shallot or a diced up shallot I should say and again, you can use a small onion. You could use a little bit of a red onion I just happen to like shallot. It seems to be the right amount of you know an onion type thing and it's also i just really like the the flavor of a shallot in there as well any
Any kind of mushrooms you favor?
Speaker 2 (15:27)
For this, I just used cremini. You could use a mix if you're lucky enough to have some wild mushrooms or something. That would take it to the next level. That would be really good.
Yeah, morels would go great in here. Chanterelles.
I can't think of a mushroom that maybe wouldn't throw like a puff ball or something other than that. Yeah. Yeah, that would be, that would be amazing to have some wild mushrooms that you have as well. and then once those mushrooms and shallots are browned, I'm going to, I'm going to season that a little bit with salt and pepper. And then in comes that Passalacqua Pinot noir. And I'm going to use that to deglaze the bottom of the pan. And when I say deglaze the pan, I just mean
I take a wooden spatula and I just scrape all that brown, you know, I think the technical term for it is fond, off the bottom. And that's really going to infuse a lot of that flavor into the stock as well. Then I'm going to put the heat on high and just, and just put it to it until it's reduced by about half the wine. And then, then you're going to take your coil stock, add that in along with that meat that you de-boned from the carcasses and the legs and the thighs.
So essentially what we're creating is a quail cutlet with a quail meat sauce on top of it with mushrooms and wine. it's great. It's just, quail is a very subtle flavor. And I feel like this one, just compounds those, those quail flavors again and again and again. And it's a, it's a, it's a fancy recipe. or it comes off as fancy. I'm going to let that stock with the deboned meat reduce for, you know, five to 10 minutes. take it off the heat, throw in a little butter.
Speaker 2 (17:06)
splash of cream, it's optional, but I highly recommend the cream. little thyme, taste it. That's a big thing for sauces as well, is just taste as you go. I mean, you're oh, it's kind of already the right amount of salty. You know, it's going to reduce. So it's only going to get saltier. You don't want to throw salt in there. You don't want to put soy sauce in there, something that's salty. And then at that point you have your sauce. You're just going to throw those quail breasts back in the pan just to kind of warm them through again.
and then you can serve it over whatever you want. I used egg noodles in mine. I like a wide noodle to kind of catch that sauce. So any type of wide pasta, but this would also be really good over mashed potatoes or polenta, something like that. so you're going to have, you have your, you're in my case, egg noodles, then you have your, quail cutlets and then your red wine sauce with mushrooms and more quail meat over the top. And of course that's going to pair really well with the same wine that you used in the sauce to make it.
we'll have you tell us about the wine. This is great moment to mention that Passalacqua does now have a Pear Wild Gift Pack available that features the Quail Forever wines. The gift pack includes both the red Pinot Noir that we're talking about in this recipe and the Fiano, the white, that we talked about in the last episode with the pheasant cutlets.
So both wines, a set of Yeti Tumblers, an OnX Premium membership, and the recipe cards for both of Ryan Sparks' recipes featured on these two episodes of On the Wing podcast. The pretzel crusted pheasant cutlets with apple cream sauce and spate-sul, and this episode's quail and red wine and mushroom sauce.
Speaker 1 (19:03)
A limited number of these holiday gift packages are available at Passalacqua Winery. That's Passalacqua with two S's. Winery.com slash quail dash forever will include a link in the show notes. The price of the entire package is a very affordable $150 for that full pack. It's a great gift for a friend, a family member, or yourself.
Order your bottles of Quail Forever White and Quail Forever Red on the website now. You'll get them in time for the holidays. All right. You mentioned it a couple of times you're using the Pinot Noir, the red with this. Tell us about your selection.
Well, it's really nice because it's not like a super oaky red wine, hits you over the head where it's going to just completely overwhelm all of the other flavors that are in there. So that's really nice. And then to serve the wine along with the wine that you used to cook, we talked in the last episode, you can kind of contrast or complement with wine pairings. And this one is definitely.
you're complimenting or it's you know, like wine with what's in the, what's in the dish. So, yeah, to sit down to a nice bottle of red wine and then taste that same red wine in the dish that's infused with that quail and mushrooms. It's, it's a, it's a really nice meal. It'd be a great one to serve to any company you might have. And it's a great way to make a, make a little bird go a long way and feed several people. So.
The last one, the pretzel crusted pheasant cutlets with apple cream sauce and spaetzle screamed Oktoberfest to me. This one is like Christmas Eve.
Speaker 2 (20:53)
Yeah, it's definitely like snowy, wintery.
Yeah. Yeah. And you're right. You like the previous one was sort of a contrast in flavors, acidity with sweetness. this one is just very, it's like harmony, everything together. And similarly, the other thing, the last episode was very German influenced in this. This is just French cuisine through and through, right?
I mean, it feels like chicken Marsala.
Marsala Yeah, yeah that was kind of the you know the inspiration for it although it's like at the end of the day it's nothing like chicken marsala other than it's a You know a bird in a sauce with mushrooms. Yeah, but like the marsala wine is like a very sweet fortified wine That in my opinion would overwhelm the quail a little bit. It would just like sweet cloying Marsala or this
You know, it's a nice red wine that pairs well with the coil.
Speaker 1 (22:02)
The impossible question, which one do you prefer?
Out of the two recipes or out of the wine?
Man, it kind of depends on what mood I'm in. You know, the other thing I'll say, you could flip the birds for either recipe. You could do quail cutlets. You could use pheasant in place of the quail here. You'd probably end up with a lot more, a meatier sauce, because there's obviously going to be more meat on the legs and thighs. You know, if I could only pick one.
I've been dreaming about that cutlet since we talked about it this morning. That pretzel cutlet is just, it's just a great meal. yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:42)
Well, they're both fantastic. They both scream holidays. So hopefully you, the listener, have some wild game in your freezer or maybe some fresh stuff you've been able to enjoy during this winter holiday season. Please check out Passalacqua's Quail Forever Collaborative Wines. First time we've been able to do a wine collaboration.
We're super proud of the partnership and even more proud of the wines. So please check it out, whether it be the gift packs or the wines themselves, get them in time for the holidays. Enjoy them before the hunting season is over and before the holidays are over. Again, you can check out the wines at Passalacquawinery.com. For Quail Forever editor Ryan Sparks and his terrific recipes. I'm Bob St. Pierre reminding you to always follow the dog. Something good will rise. Happy holidays, folks.