The taste of Falls past

TimJ

TimJ

Well-known member
Every fall when I was a young boy we would take some of those early bluewing teal to my Grandmother. She would roast them over a bed of rice that had finely chopper onions, carrots and a little rubbed sage. The fat from the ducks oozed down into the rice making it even better.
For the last year and a half I've been pretty good about watching fats and carbs in my diet... but sometimes things are just suppose to be eaten a certain way. I feel greasy, stuffed and as happy as I can be after that meal.

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I hope everyone has a meal of wild game that brings back those great memories.

Tim
 
looks good Tim....very good.....I love a roast duck

Tom, I've no doubt that this will get a laugh from many people, but.... roast gills? like bluegills or do you actually roast the gills out of a fish?
 
No roasting just frying fillets of gills. Grandpa would take us fishin and grandma would cook them up
 
Looks great. My mother used to to serve rabbit legs on a bed of rice that looked very similar. She used the same corelle crazy daisy plate ;)
 
Funny, that's one of my memory meals also. My Mother would fry a platter full of gills for the family - 6 kids so there had to be alot. In those days we never filleted fish, just scaled, gutted and beheaded and all of us were adept at picking out bones. Always bread on the table incase a bone became stuck in your throat :) My Mother was so busy frying that she didn't have time to eat so when we all slowed to a stop she would sit down and had the rest of the platter of fish to herself.
 
Funny, that's one of my memory meals also. My Mother would fry a platter full of gills for the family - 6 kids so there had to be alot. In those days we never filleted fish, just scaled, gutted and beheaded and all of us were adept at picking out bones. Always bread on the table incase a bone became stuck in your throat :) My Mother was so busy frying that she didn't have time to eat so when we all slowed to a stop she would sit down and had the rest of the platter of fish to herself.
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Pete

Sounds like our kitchen table, except dad ran them all through a 'fish skinner' rather than scaling...and don't forget the bowls for the bones. I was probably about 12 (and had proven myself as a worthy help both catching and cleaning fish) when I convinced Dad to fillet instead.

Chuck
 
Chuck,

I was probably 23 or so before I filleted my first fish. Always loved the skin of gills and perch and all the kids fought over the crispy, crunch tails. A real family night at the table when we had fish - then again, we always ate dinner together back then.

Many of those values have been lost but as I am finding out this week - not everywhere. At the moment I am in a small coastal community on the west coast of Newfoundland called Cow Head. They are in the middle of their fall festival and the family values, community spirit I have seen here is a breath of fresh air for me. Talk about memory meals, I went to the Anglican Church last night for the Moose Supper put on by the ladies of the church and the rest of the community. Must have been 20 dishes and all had moose in them - wonderful.
 
Well, Tim, I think if you had that meal and then worked it off in the garden, you wouldn't have to worry about the carbs and fat. Or, maybe you will work it off chasing pheasants in one of those cornfields in your area.
I sure liked this thread. Good job.
Al
 
Tim,

It doesn't get any better than that. last night we had goose from the crockpot marinated in seasoned Merlot with pototes and onions with a salad from our garden. A couple of Budlites and I was a happy camper.
 
Looks amazing!

Duck fat is my secret ingredient for the best roasted potatoes you will ever have.

Peel or don't peel a bunch of new potatoes. Chop em up and boil until cooked. Transfer to a pyrex dish, with generous amount of puddle duck fat (or farm duck if you can get it from you local butcher). Roast, turn em occasionally, until crispy.

The duck fat keeps the potatoes from sticking so they end up looking perfect and tasting even better.
 
We always scaled fish until I was probably 10 and then by the time I was the full time cleaner in my early teens we fileted them all with an electric knife. Picking out the bones and eating that crispy skin seemed a lot more fun as a kid then what it does now when I try it.

I still feel full this morning, the joys of teal fat. Now I just need a couple pheasant next weekend to really get it tasting like fall.

Tim
 
Great post Tim, it really got me wanting to pluck a couple teal.

Funny the comment on the bones in the fish. I'm less tolerant every year of the bones, must be getting old myself.
 
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