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I never had a bird dog. Every bird hunter I've met will tell you that settles most of the question before you leave the house, and they're right.
The woods around home in West Gardiner had stone walls running straight through them, which tells you those woods were fields once. Somebody's great-grandfather cleared that ground and stacked those rocks by hand, and when the farms gave out the trees came back and the old apple trees at the edges went wild. The partridge moved in for the apples. In the fall I'd walk those walls with a shotgun, kicking through leaves that had already gone brown, and every so often a bird that had been sitting tight until I was nearly on top of it would go up all at once. The flush was a hard drumming I felt in my chest before I heard it, like a small engine catching all at once. It almost always came from behind me or from the far side of a spruce, and by the time the stock reached my cheek the woods were empty again.
My success rate stayed low enough that after a few seasons the hunting turned into something else. It became a fall walk in the Maine woods, with the shotgun along mostly out of habit and a bird every so often to show for it.
Nobody I knew hunted Canada geese when I was growing up, and in town they were a nuisance, the birds that took over the parks and taught every kid to watch where he stepped.
A partridge that spent October under those wild apple trees and up in the birches eating buds tastes of the forest floor, and a bird raised in a pen never will. Wine keeps the same kind of record of where it grew, the weather that year and the ground under the vines, which is most of the reason the two belong on the same table. Bird season is on now, and these are the pairings I'd pour when a partridge, a pheasant, a duck or a goose makes it home.
Partridge
Nobody I grew up around called it a ruffed grouse. It was a partridge, and it still is to anybody from Maine. The name it goes by everywhere else comes from the dark feathers around its neck. In spring the male stands on a fallen log, fans that ruff out, and beats his wings so fast the air makes a low drumming that carries through the woods. Plenty of people in Maine have heard that sound in May without ever knowing a bird was making it.
The meat is pale, almost translucent when it's raw, and lean, faintly sweet and woodsy from a fall of apples, wild grapes and birch and aspen buds. It dries out fast, so it gets roasted hot and quick with bacon laid over the breast.
The pour
Pour a red Burgundy, a Bourgogne Rouge from a good producer. Pinot Noir from Burgundy smells of red cherry and damp leaves, and that forest-floor side of it meets the woods in the meat. Its acidity does the work fat would do in a richer bird, so each bite stays juicy, and the tannin is light enough that it won't coat something this delicate. An Oregon Pinot Noir from the Willamette Valley is riper and rounder and does the same job.
At the wine shop, ask for a Bourgogne Rouge, the everyday red from Burgundy.
Pheasant
The ring-necked pheasant came to this country from China in the 1880s, and the first birds to take hold were released in Oregon's Willamette Valley, the same valley that now grows the Pinot Noir in the paragraph above. Pheasants have a hard time making it through a Maine winter on their own, so most of the birds in Maine fields each fall are stocked by the state.
Pheasant meant the open fields instead of the woods. A rooster going up out of dry grass is about as loud as a partridge and a lot easier to see, which didn't help my numbers as much as you'd think.
The meat eats like a very good chicken with more flavor to it, and the breast goes dry if you look away. A braise keeps it moist. In Normandy that braise means apples, cider and cream, and a Maine kitchen in October comes to the same answer with what's in the cellar.
The pour
Pour a white Burgundy, a Mâcon-Villages or a Mâcon-Lugny. These Chardonnays come from the southern end of Burgundy and see little or no new oak, so they taste of green apple and lemon with a little hazelnut. The acidity cuts through the cream in the pot, and the apple in the glass meets the apple in the sauce. For a California bottle, look for a Chardonnay with only light oak.
Ask the shop for a Mâcon-Villages. It's white Burgundy at a weeknight price.
Duck
A mallard is a dabbling duck. It feeds by tipping tail-up in shallow water instead of diving, picking at seeds, grain and plants along the bottom. That's why a mallard that spent the fall in flooded grain fields tastes clean and mild, while a sea duck that lives on mussels along the coast tastes like the mussels.
Without a dog, a mallard that falls into cold November water forty yards out stays there, and that was the end of duck hunting for me before it started. Duck still came to plenty of tables I sat at, and I never once turned it down.
Wild mallard is darker and leaner than a farm duck, with more iron to it. The breast is best cooked like a steak and served pink, and cherries are the old pairing for good reason.
The pour
Pour a Zinfandel from Dry Creek Valley in Sonoma County. Dry Creek Zinfandel runs to brambly blackberry and black pepper, and the ripe fruit meets the cherries while the pepper meets the iron in the meat. The same bottle can go in the sauce. These wines often run past 15 percent alcohol, so pour it a little cool, around 60 degrees, to keep it from tasting hot. An Oregon Pinot Noir works too, especially with a farm duck.
Ask for a Dry Creek Zinfandel, and buy two if one is going in the pan.
Canada goose
Maine had no breeding Canada geese before 1960. In the 1970s, state biologists trapped about 2,500 nuisance geese in Connecticut, New Jersey and Massachusetts and released them into Maine wetlands to start a population of their own. The ones that settled into town parks stayed year-round, and for decades there was no season on them at all. Maine held its first hunt for its resident geese in 1996. The birds that cross the sky in long uneven V's every October are different geese, migrants that mostly come down from the Maritime Provinces, and those are the wild ones hunters wait for.
Goose never made it to our table. The park geese had no season, and nobody I knew wanted anything to do with the birds that owned the park.
Seasons are open in most states now. A wild goose eats grass and grain, and its breast is much closer to red meat than to poultry, dark and lean enough that a lot of hunters cook it the way they'd cook venison.
The pour
Pour a Rioja Reserva. Traditional Rioja is aged in American oak, which gives it dried cherry with a little dill and vanilla, and leather as it ages. Years in barrel and bottle soften the tannin enough for a lean, dark breast, and the savory side of the wine suits a bird that lives on grass. If the goose ends up as jerky or sausage, a Côtes du Rhône is plenty.
Look for the word Reserva on the label. It means the wine aged at least three years before release, one of them in barrel.
Nobody in West Gardiner was opening a Rioja over a park goose. The bottle is for whoever goes after the wild ones.
Taste it first
Wild birds change with the season and with what they ate. A duck that fed in a grain field tastes milder than one that's been feeding along the coast, and a young bird is milder than an old one. Before settling on a bottle, cook a small piece and taste it. If it's stronger than expected, go a step bigger on the wine. If it's milder, go a step lighter.
I still think about the dog I never had. A good one would have found the birds I walked past and brought back the ducks I never shot at, and after a miss I'd have had somebody to look at besides the trees. Without one I walked those walls alone, and most afternoons I came home with cold hands and nothing in the game bag. Every so often there was a bird for the table, and on those nights nobody asked how long it had taken.
Recipes
None of these asks for much beyond a hot pan, cold butter and a bottle open before the bird comes out. As with the wild game recipes, my starting point is Marjorie Standish's Cooking Down East, and these four are my own.
Don't hunt? Farm-raised pheasant and duck are sold by specialty butchers and online. Partridge is almost never sold, so a Cornish game hen stands in for it in the roast; give it an extra 10 to 15 minutes. Wild goose can't be sold, so use farm duck breasts in the goose recipe and render the fat the way the duck recipe does. The wines stay the same.
Take the recipes with you
The four recipes in this story are a free printable PDF, one card each, with the wine to pour and what to ask for at the wine shop. They print two to a page on regular paper.
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Partridge roasted with bacon and thyme
- 2 partridge, cleaned
- 4 slices thick-cut bacon
- 2 tablespoons butter, softened
- 4 sprigs fresh thyme
- 1 small apple, quartered
- Salt and black pepper
- Heat the oven to 425°F. Pat the birds dry and season them inside and out with salt and pepper.
- Tuck an apple quarter and a thyme sprig into each cavity, rub the butter over the birds, and lay two slices of bacon across each breast. Skinned birds need the bacon even more than plucked ones.
- Roast in a small pan for 20 to 25 minutes, until the thickest part of the breast reads 155°F. Partridge is lean and dries out fast, so start checking early.
- Rest the birds 10 minutes, long enough for the breast to coast up to about 160°F, and spoon the pan drippings over them.
Suggested pairing: Bourgogne Rouge, or a Willamette Valley Pinot Noir
Pheasant braised in cider and cream
- 1 pheasant, cut into 2 breasts and 2 legs
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 1 onion, sliced
- 2 tart apples, peeled and cut into wedges
- 1 cup fresh apple cider
- ½ cup chicken broth
- ½ cup heavy cream
- 3 sprigs fresh thyme
- Salt and black pepper
- Season the pheasant with salt and pepper and brown it in the butter and oil in a Dutch oven over medium-high heat, 4 to 5 minutes a side. Set it aside.
- Cook the onion and apples in the same pot for about 5 minutes, until they start to soften.
- Pour in the cider and broth, scrape up the browned bits, and add the thyme. Put the legs back in, cover, and keep it at a gentle simmer for 30 minutes.
- Add the breasts, cover again, and simmer 15 to 20 minutes more, until the breast reads 160°F.
- Lift out the pheasant, stir the cream into the pot, and simmer 3 or 4 minutes until the sauce thickens. Season it and spoon it over the bird.
Suggested pairing: Mâcon-Villages or Mâcon-Lugny
Duck breast with Zinfandel cherry sauce
- 2 duck breasts, skin on
- 1 shallot, minced
- ½ cup Zinfandel
- ½ cup pitted cherries, fresh or frozen
- ½ cup chicken broth
- 1 tablespoon cold butter
- Salt and black pepper
- Score the skin in a crosshatch without cutting into the meat, and season both sides.
- Lay the breasts skin side down in a cold skillet and set it over medium heat. Let the fat render 8 to 10 minutes, until the skin is deep brown and crisp. Wild mallard carries much less fat and needs only 5 or 6 minutes.
- Turn the breasts and cook 2 to 4 minutes more, to 135°F for medium-rare. Rest them on a board for 5 minutes.
- Pour off all but a tablespoon of fat. Cook the shallot for a minute, then add the wine, cherries and broth and boil until it's reduced by half, about 5 minutes. Take the pan off the heat and swirl in the cold butter until the sauce turns glossy.
- Slice the duck across the grain and spoon the sauce over it.
Suggested pairing: Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel, or an Oregon Pinot Noir
Goose breast with wild blueberry sauce
- 2 goose breasts, skin removed and silver skin trimmed
- Salt and plenty of black pepper
- 2 tablespoons bacon fat or vegetable oil
- 1 shallot, minced
- ½ cup dry red wine
- 1 cup wild Maine blueberries, fresh or frozen
- ½ cup beef broth
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup
- 1 tablespoon cold butter
- Take the breasts out of the refrigerator half an hour before cooking. Pat them dry and season them hard with salt and pepper.
- Heat the fat in a cast iron skillet until it shimmers. Sear the breasts 3 to 4 minutes a side, until the thickest part reads 130°F for medium-rare. Goose cooked past medium turns tough and livery.
- Rest the breasts on a board for 10 minutes.
- Cook the shallot in the same pan for a minute, then add the wine, blueberries, broth and maple syrup. Boil until it thickens, about 5 minutes, then take it off the heat and swirl in the cold butter until the sauce turns glossy.
- Slice the goose thin across the grain and spoon the sauce over it.
Suggested pairing: Rioja Reserva
Who in your family had the bird dog? Tell me in the comments.
Sources: Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, Canada goose management history; Bangor Daily News outdoors coverage of Maine's 1995 goose season closure and the first resident goose season in 1996; Bill Graves, Mainely Outdoors, The County, on the 1970s goose transplants into Maine.