Peacock Re: [Sca-cooks] larding turkeys and other meats

[jenne at fiedlerfamily.net]

> I have seen on one or two recipes in period for peacock and it involved
> skinning it so that it cold all be pulled forward in one piece, feathers and all,
> to just over the head and then spit roasting it until done and then puilling
> the skin back over the bird. I was thinking that it would look really pretty,
> but not food safe by our standards.

I figured that if we did do it, we would use the solution suggested by
Peter Brears, to put the skin over a wire frame for presentation, then
take it back into the kitchen 'for carving' and serve the carved peacock
from the kitchen... thus avoiding any touch between the cooked meat and
the raw skin.

> I did talk to someone that did attend a "peacock banquet" they had brought in
> one of the top chefs in the midwest to cook these birds. He tried everything
> to cook these farm raised peacocks. And according to the person that attended,
> the best taste he could get out of it was similar in texture to a very fatty
> gristly porkchop.

Could it have been an older peacock? I know some authors suggest that if
you want to cook peacock, you want to go for the younger ones. Peahen is
still available sometimes, I think...

> Peacock was a status dish, it was eaten because you could afford to eat it,
> not because you enjoy eating it. Very similar to eating swan, only the royalty
> could eat swan because it was a royal bird ( at least in England).

I've heard this before, but the statement makes me suspicious. Certainly,
all types of bird were eaten on a regular basis. And it may have been a
status animal. But you have to wonder if people are jumping to
conclusions..

>And from
> what I have been given to understand with similiar results, not very good
> tasting.

Well, it could be that they aren't using the right recipes-- modern cooks
might not be using the medieval recipes. I would suspect we would be going
for a young peacock, not an older one, and that might affect the taste,
too.

-- Pani Jadwiga Zajaczkowa, Knowledge Pika jenne at fiedlerfamily.net
 "in verbis et in herbis, et in lapidibus sunt virtutes"
(In words, and in plants, and in stones, there is power.)