While in France on a culinary mission, to find insperation for our French cooking classes and teambuilding cooking classes, Wickedfood cooking school came across this delicious roast pigeon at Le Petit Coq aux Champs, where it is a house speciality.

Vegetables in season
2 potatoes, coarsely grated
2 apples, coarsely grated
4 pigeons
Salt & pepper
5T soft butter
1/2 cup + 1T Pont Audemer (or berry liqueur)
1/2  cup water

1. Clean, slice and steam the vegetables and keep warm.
2. In a large frying pan, melt 1T butter. Arrange the grated potato in one thin layer, reduce the heat and fry. When golden brown and cooked through, spread the apple over the potato, gently flip, adding more butter if necessary and fry very quickly (the apple should still be crispy).
3. Rub the pigeons with remaining butter, season with salt and pepper, and place in preheated oven set at 200°C, basting regularly with 1/2 cup liqueur. Roast for ± 15 minutes. Once cooked, cut pigeons in half, set the breasts and drumsticks aside, keeping warm.
4. Deglaze the roasting pan with the water and add the bird carcasses. Boil over a high heat, to reduce by 3/4  and pass through a sieve. Add the remaining liqueur and adjust seasoning.
5. Arrange a pigeon and some vegetables on each plate, and moisten with the deglazed pan juices.divide the potato into four portions, plate and serve.

Serves 4

See  the following articles on French food:

Fig tart

Summer berries with a red wine coulis

Our six Normandy restaurants

Gastronomic tour of Normandy

A Taste of France

Wickedfood Cooking School

Sunninghill – (011) 234-3252 sunninghill@wickedfood.co.za

Boksburg – (011) 823-5365 boksburg@wickedfood.co.za

Runs cooking classes throughout the year at its purpose-built cooking studios. Classes are run in the mornings and evenings 7 days a week (subject to a minimum of 12 people). The venue is also popular for corporate events and private functions – team building cooking classes, birthdays, kitchen teas, and dinner parties with a difference.

Our classes are hands-on, where every person gets to participate in the preparation of the dishes. They are also a lot of fun where you not only learn new skills, but get to meet people with similar interests. For corporate groups and teambuilding cooking classes these classes are a novel way of creating staff interaction or entertaining clients.

Tags: cooking classes, French cooking classes, Le Petit Coq aux Champs, Roast pigeon, teambuilding

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 7th, 2009 at 5:43 pm and is filed under Poultry, Recipes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.