[1828—PHEASANT (FAISAN)]
When this bird is young, its legs are grey and the ventral end of the sternum is tender and flexible. But with pheasants, as with partridges, an infallible sign of youth may be discovered at the extremity of the last large feather in the wing. If this feather be pointed, the bird is young; if it be round, the reverse is the case.
[1829—FAISAN A LA MODE D’ALCANTARA]
This recipe comes from the famous Alcantara convent. History tells us that at the beginning of the Portuguese campaign in 1807 the convent’s library was pillaged by Junot’s soldiers, and its precious manuscripts were used in the making of cartridges.
Now it happened that an officer of the commissariat who was witnessing the event found, among a collection of recipes selected by the monks, the particular one now under our notice, which was applied only to partridges.
It struck him as interesting, and after trying it when he returned to France in the following year, he surrendered it to the Duchess of Abrantès, who noted it in her memoirs.
It represents, perhaps, the only good thing the French derived from that unfortunate campaign, and it would tend to prove that foie gras and truffles, which had been known for so long in Languedoc and Gascony, were also known in Estremadura, where, even at the present day, tolerably good truffles are to be found.
The procedure is as follows:—
Empty the pheasant from the front; bone its breast, and stuff it with fine ducks’ foies gras, mixed with quartered truffles, cooked in port wine.
[Marinade] the pheasant for three days in port wine, taking care that it be well covered therewith. This done, cook it “[en casserole]” (the original recipe says on the spit, but the saucepan is more suitable). Reduce the port wine of the [marinade]; add to it a dozen medium-sized truffles; set the pheasant on these truffles, and heat for a further ten minutes.