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My father recalls, and none too fondly, the first time he brought home a limit of mallards and black ducks. Oh, the shooting and the birds themselves were fabulous. Most memorable; however, it's what happened afterwards that, well, tarnished the entire affair.
At that time - the early 70s, I believe - a relative newcomer to the art of waterfowling, my father worked laboriously hand-plucking each of the four birds he'd killed on the river that morning. "I wanted them to look nice because your mom was going to roast them," he told me on one of the very few occasions where he felt brave enough to recount the tale. The task complete, he turned the fowl over to my mother, a good cook in her own right, to do with as she saw fit.
About halfway through the standard one hour at 350 degrees that my mother deemed sufficient, the house, my father remembers, began to fill with an odor not unlike that of a beached carp. In June. In Phoenix. Emanating from the kitchen - more precisely they discovered, the oven - the stench, as he described it, rolled through their small home like a fog. And not on little cat feet like in the Robert Frost poem, but more like the treads of a D-9 Cat. Eyes watering, and with gag reflex flexing, my father grabbed the tin-foil-lined cake pan and set it outside. There the foul smell hung like a bad aura. "It got on you," remembered my father.
What helps explain this most educational experience was the fact that the hoards of mallards and black ducks my father found that morning had been gorging themselves on winter-killed gizzard shad. Upon the addition of heat to said waterfowl, the result, as my folks discovered, was something akin to putting a propane torch to a Twinkee filled with anchovy paste.
"It wasn't good," said my father, always the king of the understatement. "I learned a lot that day," he continued, hand poised on his mug of draft. "I guess your mother did too."
Field care
Prompt care of ducks and geese in the field can greatly add to their rating on the table. What's more, these rules as we'll call them, are relatively few in number and very black-and-white in their explanation and understanding.
1. Match your ammunition to both your quarry and your situation. Using the proper ammunition at the proper ranges will both result in clean, ethical harvests and a minimal loss of table fare.
2. Warm weather or cold, don't pile birds up. Separate the birds in the field so each will cool more quickly. This can be done by simply laying the birds out individually, or by using a duck strap or tote and hanging the birds in the blind.
3. To field dress, or not to field dress. Very seldom, over the years, have I field dressed waterfowl, the only exception being hunts during which the weather was extremely warm such as an early September goose hunt. If you do, remember two things: (1) leave the fully-feathered head attached as required by law, and (2) don't pluck and gut birds at the boat ramp, parking area, or other public access point.
4. For transportation purposes between the field and home or lodging, the above trio hold true. If necessary, put the birds in an iced cooler for the trip.
Home - Now what?
When it comes to separating duck from duck feathers, all waterfowlers, myself included, have both their favorite and least favorite methods. There are, I'm sure, more techniques than I'm about to discuss; however, what follows are what I'll refer to as the most popular.
1. Dry plucking - Starting with the bird held by the feet in the left hand, you simply pluck feathers and down from the bird's body. It seems to work most effectively going from tail to beak, or against the grain. Once the bird is denuded, a quick going-over with a propane torch removes any missed down and all those hair-like feathers that don't make for really good eating. Commercial or mechanical pluckers are also available. These range from baseball-sized units that can be operated with an ordinary 3/8-inch drill as a power source to huge industrial grade machines that come with feather vacuums and 55-gallon waste disposal drums.
2. Scalding - Hot tap water will work; however, water that's been heated to near boiling seems to work even better. Simply dunk the bird two or three times, or until it's thoroughly soaked through, into the hot water being careful not to cook it. Most of the feathers, including many if not all of the wing quills, can be easily removed.
3. Waxing - Birds are dipped into a special hot wax and the wax allowed to cool. Once hard, the wax, along with the feathers, can be peeled from the carcass in chunks, leaving only the finer, smaller feathers behind. The wax can then be remelted and the featheres strained in preparation for the next outing.
4. Skinning - To skin a duck, take a sharp knife and make a shallow incision from the base of the neck above the breastbone or keel, and down the sternum to the point where the thin stomach wall begins. This is between the vent and the base of the breastbone. Then, merely peel the skin in opposite directions away from the centerline. Continue to slide the skin away from the body, separating it with your fingers where necessary, to the point where you've almost encircled the bird. Next, disjoint and cut away the wings at the body. Now, taking your knife, cut through the stomach wall and backbone, BUT leave the tail attached to the skin. Grab the tail and pull it toward the head, collecting both wings and wing bones in the process. Peel the skin, tail, wings, and all up to the neck, and cut free.
5. Filleting - Filleting begins much the same way as does skinning, with a shallow incision from the neck, down the breast bone, to the end of the keel above the stomach wall. The next step is to expose both breast halves, just as you did in the skinning process, by sliding and working the skin off the breasts and around to the sides. Now, with the bird lying on its back, insert the point of a sharp fillet knife on one side, left or right, of the "V" at the bottom of the bird's wishbone. Push the blade down until you contact bone, and then slide the knife along the keel to the bottom. Repeat on the opposite side. Next, turn the blade toward the bird's beak and, starting at the original cut, work the blade along both the left and right sides of the wishbone. Done correctly, the cut will look just like the letter "Y". To finish, grab the corner of the fillet at the point of the wishbone and pull the meat away from the centerline. A little bit of knife work will separate the boneless fillet from both the ribs and the breastplate. Again, repeat on the other side.
Recipes - Species matters
How a certain duck rates on the table is a qualifier that essentially begins as soon as the bird breaks through its shell. More specifically, just what kind of duck is it?
As a rule of thumb, puddle ducks, with few exceptions are usually reliable in terms of taste. Divers, on the other hand, often leave much to be desired. Still, taste is in the eye, or rather on the palate, of either the beholder or taster, with some folks who would much rather sit down to a meal of crock pot bluebills or bufflehead than they would a roasted wood duck or mallard.
Puddle Ducks
1. Wood ducks - Little ducks, whose diet of acorns, plants, seeds, and other vegetables put them at the Number 1 position on the eating list. They're sweet, and absolutely fantastic slow-roasted.
2. Teal - It doesn't matter if it's blue-wing or green-wing. Sure, it takes several because they're small, but what they lack in size, they surely make up for in taste. Excellent roasted or split and broiled.
3. Mallards and blacks - As long as they're not eating shad, one of the finest ducks available. Stuffed with orange, apple, and onion slices, they're superb.
4. Widgeon - The baldpate doesn't get the credit he deserves. He decoys well, likes to hear calls, and usually proves fine-eating.
5. Gadwall - Another bird that gets a bum rap, often just because his head isn't green and he doesn't have a little curl on his butt. Like the widgeon, the gray duck decoys and responds to a call well. Split him in half and roast him on the grill, basting often with a mix of white wine and garlic.
6. Pintail - He's skinny, but good nonetheless.
7. Ringnecks - One year in Washington, we shot a bunch of ringnecks throughout the season off a little wooded pond near the house. Broiled with a little garlic, we liked them. Some folks don't.
8. Shovelers - Before my wife's youngest son learned to tell the difference between the species, Robbie got all the spoonies we shot, which weren't many. Personally, I think they taste like mud. Garlic just makes them taste like mud and garlic.
Divers
1. Canvasbacks - It's the fact that the "can" tastes so incredibly good, his diet being mainly water plants and grasses, that got him into trouble with the market hunters in the early part of the 20th century. Today, he's just as good. Thank goodness he's a big duck because one's all you can have in a bag limit.
2. Redheads - Most consider redheads to be nearly as good as canvasbacks. Trick here is to slow-roast them.
3. Bluebills - I've eaten scaup many times by thin-slicing breast fillets and using the strips in stir-fry. A little stronger than "cans," redheads, or the puddlers, but overall pretty good.
4. The other divers - My experience with divers like goldeneye and bufflehead is relatively limited. Some folks really like the taste of the tiny buffleheads, birds also known as butterballs. Me? I'd rather have widgeon or teal.
The end of chaos in the kitchen
Waterfowl recipes can be as simple or as complex as one's taste buds dictate; however, two rules of thumb hold true regardless of how the birds are prepared for the table - (1) moist, and (2) rare. Or at the very most, medium rare. Better yet, on the rare side of medium rare. Either way, this pair of factors, remembered, will result in excellent waterfowl time and time again. Forgotten? How about the words "shoe leather."
Article by M.D. Johnson.
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