Goosed

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 16:11:37 -0500

It's common knowledge that Thanksgiving's leftovers are the best of the year. A turkey sandwich, piled with cranberry sauce and cold gravy, can cure anything. So our decision to roast a goose was a slight oversight. Geese, unlike their overbreed turkey cousins, do not have ginormous tatas. Our goose easily fed 8 hungry adults, but that was it. There were NO LEFTOVERS!

It wasn't until Friday morning that I found a glimmer of hope. I had forgotten to add the goose neck and giblets to the gravy. That was all I had; parts, a little cranberry sauce, some goose fat, and a bottle of hard cider. To me, that spells rillettes.

First off, I heated some of the cider with a little gelatin and set it in the bottom of a ramekin with the cranberries. Then, it was fat-rendering time. That's a goose neck, I swear.

The neck, gizzard, heart and liver all simmered away in the fat with a bay leaf, a garlic clove, and some spices for a long time. I'm not sure exactly how long because I was downing the rest of the hard cider. Remember, it was Friday morning, so things were a little hazed, but probably, like, 2 hours.Bubble, Bubble...

I let the confit-ed parts cool, shredded them, and placed them over the cranberry gel. After I woke up from a long nap, it was time to chow down on the goose neck rillettes; quite possibly some of the best Thanksgiving leftovers I've ever had.

Ian Knauer's Open Salon Blog

Goosed