RECIPE FOR: Roasted Quail with Apricot-Port Wine Sauce
PAIRS WELL WITH: 2008 WillaKenzie Estate Pinot Noir Jory Hills Vineyard
Recipe from Hunter Angler Gardener Cook
For the Roast Quail
Ingredients:
Serves 2
OPTIONAL BRINE
1/4 cup kosher salt
4 cups white wine or water
4 bay leaves
QUAIL
4 quail
Olive oil or butter
Salt
2 celery sticks
Black pepper
Directions:
- If you choose to brine your quail, boil the water or wine with the kosher salt and bay leaves, then turn off the heat and let cool. Submerge the quail in this brine for 4-8 hours.
- Preheat your oven to 500 degrees. This will take a little while for most ovens, up to 30 minutes. While the oven is preheating, take the quail out of the fridge and pat them dry. Coat with olive oil or melted butter (your quail will be browner with melted butter) and salt generously. Set aside at room temperature while the oven heats.
- When the oven is hot, get a small roasting pan or cast-iron frying pan and set the quail in it. They will want to tip over, so steady them with cut pieces of the celery stick. Try to prevent the quail from touching each other to speed the cooking process.
- Roast the quail in the oven for 10-15 minutes. The lower end of the spectrum will give you quail that are juicy, succulent and a little pink on the inside. The higher end of the spectrum will give you a fully cooked quail, which is OK, but which I find boring. Your choice.
- When you take the quail out of the oven, place on a cutting board and loosely tent with foil for 5-10 minutes. Use this time to make the wild game sauce of your choice, or just squirt lemon juice on the birds before serving.
For the Apricot-Port Wine Sauce
Ingredients:
2 tablespoons duck fat or butter
4 tablespoons apricot jelly or jam
1 cup game or vegetable stock (duck, venison, etc)
1/2 cup Port wine
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 teaspoon red pepper puree, such as Sriracha
Salt to taste
Directions:
- If there is only a little fat in the pan you used to roast or sear your meat, melt the extra duck fat or butter first — but there will often be enough fat already in the pan. Deglaze the pan with the Port and stock. Let this boil furiously until it is reduced by half.
- Add the tomato paste, apricot jelly and the red pepper puree and mix well. You might need a whisk. Let it boil until it thickens, about 4-5 minutes.
- Taste the sauce. Add salt if needed.
- If you have one, pour the finished sauce into a fat separator and serve as fatless as possible. This is optional: The sauce is equally good with all the fat, but it looks less refined.
