Plucking Great

The past four months have flown by and I can't quite believe that I'll be starting my course at Leiths tomorrow. The nerves are beginning to set it and I've spent the last few nights tossing and turning in bed, with my dreams spent in kitchens full of sinking souffles and failed pastry.

Having skipped the first term, I'll be joining the course a third of the way in. I've spent the past months teaching myself all the techniques covered in the first term, everything from choux pastry to filleting flat fish, and hopefully I will be able to hold my own alongside the other students. I'm sure there will be others joining at this stage as well. Still, there is always the worry that I will not be up to standard and will be starting on the back foot rather than the front foot.

One of the stranger elements that appears in the first "basic" term is plucking and drawing a pheasant. I guess for those wishing to go into the service of the Duke and Duchess of Snootyshire, this is probably a vital skill to have, however for most of us ready plucked pheasants are widely available at this time of year. Nevertheless I wanted to cover this off before January so back home in Birmingham, my Dad had two birds hanging in the garage awaiting our attention over Christmas.

My Dad has been shooting pheasants for many years and when as a teenager I was still living with my parents I would idly walk into the garage and be scared witless by two dead birds hanging from a hook in the corner. After several days of hanging he would put on his surgical gloves and green plastic apron and begin the process of plucking and disembowling the birds ready for eating. I always remember the stench of entrails which would creep under the door and drive the cat bonkers with excitement.

Luckily then, I had a master to learn from and we went off into the garage, leant over a dustbin, and started to pull the feathers from the body while trying to not to tear the skin (not easy). I don't seem to be that squeamish about handling dead birds, in fact live birds freak me out more. Chopping off the head, wings and feet was a pretty painless task, and actually getting my hand into the bird and pulling out the digestive tract was also fairly simple, if a little smelly. The most time consuming task was removing all the tiny hairs and feathers that remain on the pheasant after the bigger feathers have been removed for which a steady hand, a pair of tweezers, and tons of patience is required.



Pheasant meat is notorious for drying out while cooking so I decided to pot roast my hen and make a creamy mushroom sauce with the juices.



Apart from the need to cover it off for the course, I'm really glad I learnt how to pluck and draw a pheasant. In the event of a war and food becoming scarce, I'll be able to hang out with Ray Mears and live off the land.