Making or eating roast goose

Cafe Society
21

I had roast goose for dinner!

'Twasn’t easy. Took several tries.
a) Rolf’s, a German restaurant on the east side of Manhattan, despite reviews that said they have roast goose, do not, as I discovered awhile back, have roast goose on an everyday basis.

b) Zlata Praha, a Czecho/Sovakian eatery in Astoria, also does not always have goose on the menu but as it turns out, when I called them about the possibility of going in last night for a meal of roast goose, yes this was their first weekend of the winter season and yes they would have it. But, as I discovered later last night, having roast goose on the menu does not mean they won’t run out before you get there :frowning:

c) Although it wasn’t sufficient impediment to keep me away at this point (ha!), having goose on the menu and me setting out early so as to be sure as to be there early enough that the don’t run out of goose beforehand 2 nights in a row is no deterrent to the transit authority wreaking total havoc on the train lines and turning a 2-train commute into a 5-train cavalcade with a lot of time spend standing on cold platforms. Oh, and definitely no deterrent to the weather gods going for a 25° night with very brisk cold wind. But yeah I got there and I had my roast goose this evening.
No, it weren’t greasy. Not as prepared. Less so that duck usually is.

It did not taste like duck, turkey, chicken, or anything else in particular. It was its own meat. The texture of it had some commonalities with flank BEEF, coming apart onto the fork in distinct strands. Not tough and chewy, but definitely laid down in layers of stringlike fibers.

Not gamy. Nice taste and nothing to get “used to”, a large poultry that was very easy to make friends with.

The utensils they left me with for this were a plain flatware knife & fork. Because of the strand-like nature of the meat and the awkward size of the bones, I could have uses something tong-like or tweezer-like to hold the bit I wanted to snip off the bone, and I could have used a nice sharp cutting knife to do the incision. But a fork, enthusiastically jabbed and then rapidly twirled, worked adequately.

I don’t know why it is hard to find and only seasonally available in the restaurants that do have it; I’d eat it farily often if doing so was not difficult.

22

Ah, a food topic I know something about. Here’s my favorite goose recipe. I make it most years, either for my birthday, Christmas, or New Year’s

Goose with Wild Rice stuffing

Clean and pat dry the goose. Take a sharp fork and stab the goose all over, to create lots of tiny holes in the skin. Pay particular attention to fatty areas, making sure to poke lots of holes there. Lots and lots of holes.

Pre-heat the oven to 425
Wild Rice Stuffing:

Boil 1.5 cups of wild rice in enough water. Cook until mostly done, and then drain.

Chop
3 sticks celery,
1 large onion
1 package of mushrooms (12oz?)
And saute the chopped veggies in plenty of butter.

Chop
1 large handful of parsley

Mix rice, parsley, sauted veggies, and one 12 oz bag of cranberries

Loosely stuff the main cavity of the goose. Fasten the vent shut with poutry lacers, leaving the tail out.

(Put the rest of the stuffing in a sealed casserole with some extra butter and a little vegetable broth or water, and cook for your vegatarian friends.)

Turn the good upside down, and put more stuffing in the neck cavity, filling most of the loose skin left around the neck. Fasten that end shut with additional poultry lacers.

Shove a thermometer into the center of the stuffing, to monitor its temperature, and then place the bird, on one side, on a rack inside a large roasting container. The container must be large enough that you don’t have to obsessively remove the fat as the goose cooks. But you will have to remove the goose fat. A clean turkey baster works well for this. Save the fat you’ve removed–it makes excellent cooking fat.

(I also render the extra abdominal fat and save that, too.)

Cook the goose at 425 for 10-15 minutes, then use two strong metal or wooden serving spoons to flip it to the other side. Cook an additional 10-15 minutes. Then put the goose in its back and reduce heat to medium (325 or 350, depending on how long you want to be cooking) and cook until done. The interior of the stuffing must be at least 140, but usually the skin isn’t fully rendered and crispy until the interior stuffing temp is more like 160. If it looks like the wings are done, cover them loosely in aluminum foil to prevent burning.

While the goose cooks, boil the neck and any giblets with some kosher salt to make broth for the gravy. (If there is any liver, reserve that and cook and eat it separately. But there won’t be liver, that’s too valuable to leave in the cavity of the bird.)

Allow the goose to rest for a while (at least half an hour, preferably longer) before removing the stuffing or carving it. Leave the thermometer in place to make sure the stuffing remains hot enough to be safe until you remove it.

Remove most of the remaining fat from the pan, leaving enough for the gravy. Add some flour and cook on the stovetop until the flour browns. Then slowly add the broth, whisking vigourously to incorporate the roux into the broth. Pick off the meat clinging to the neck, and chop both that and the giblets to add to the gravy.

I remove the meat from the carcass and arrange it in an attractive pattern on a platter in the kitchen. I do not try to slice it at the table. It’s easiest to start by removing the wings and legs, then remove each half-breast in a single piece, and slice that up. Carbing the thighs is always a little messy – don’t let anyone watch you. :wink: I cut any extra skin (such as the skin over the stuffing in the front and back) into smallish squares and law those on the serving platter, as well. That’s arguably the best part of the goose.

23

D-r-a-a-i-i-n the grease.

24

About five years too late to do the OP any good. . . .

25

Julia recommends braising the goose:

26

I roasted a goose for Christmas several years ago. It turned out really well. The key is to roast it over a large, deep pan, which can collect all the rendered goose fat. I had to empty the pan a couple of times during the roasting process. (You raise the bird on a grate over the collecting pan, otherwise, the thing will be swimming in fat and it won’t turn out well at all.) And, depending on the goose, you could end up rendering a quart or more of it. Don’t throw it all away, though. Use a little goose fat to roast potatoes in or to add to other things you’re making that day.

27

Yes, the goose must sit on a rack, above the collecting fat.

I site the fat in the fridge and use it as cooking fat throughout the year. Popcorn cooked in goose fat is excellent. It’s very good for getting potatoes, too.

28

The younger the goose the less fatty it will be. You need to prick that skin all over the place to give the fat a chance to run out. Goose is delicious, not as meaty as turkey, much more flavorful though.

29

I’ve roasted them on a drying rack set over the bottom part of a broiler pan. Worked fine. And yes, if you’re accustomed to the ginormous freaks we call “chickens” and " turkeys" in this country, you’ll get surprisingly little meat. Still good, though.

30

Roast goose should be common in Chinese restaurants in New York. Well, make sure it’s a Cantonese dim sum place and not Panda Express. Seriously, any one of those restaurants where there is an old guy with a big ol’ honking round cutting board, a cleaver, hooks hanging down with cha siu pork, ducks and other stuff behind the glass wall will have roast goose. In the old days, the guy would have had a cigarette with an inch long ash parked in the corner of his mouth. Nowadays he probably wears disposable gloves and maybe a face mask. Regardless, you can ask for 1 1/4 pounds of whatever, and whack whack whack he will have chopped up just that amount of whatever you asked for in about 8 seconds.

31

Insofar as fifteen take away eight makes five, yes.

Is goose really as greasy as all that? I’ve never cooked one.

32

No, the finished nasty is not especially greasy. Less so than duck, as it is usually prepared.

But yes, the amount of fat that will drip off the goose is all that much. Having a plan to keep the cooking goose out of the rendering fat, and removing the rendering fat from the oven, is critically important.

And I avoid basting with anything aqueous because it will splatter like billy-o. (And it obviously doesn’t need extra fat in the skin, so I don’t baste goose.)

33

Eh. . . . uh. . . . yeah. . . .
[Looking at join date.]
Boy, I say, Boy, I know ya mean well, but. . . 2015 - *2010 = 5.

*Year the OP died.

34

:frowning:

Wow, I had no idea.

35

Whoops! typo. (corrected below)

36

Sorry to hear that. :frowning:

I would have posted even had I known, though. I posted in response to a thread on rabbit, and was intending to write to the people posting there, not to the OP, who presumably had either cooker her goose or not years ago.

37

I seem to remember hearing that they can be greasy…

38

Back in 1980 I convinced my mother to cook goose for Christmas since goose is the meal in Dickens “A Christmas Carol”. I won’t say it was very delicious but it wasn’t bad. Afterwards my mother commented to my grandmother, who agreed, that it wasn’t as greasy as they thought it would be.

My younger sister complained that it wasn't turkey as our Christmas dinners always had been so goose didn't become a tradition.
39

Is roast goose the poultry that gets served with cherry syrup sometimes? I vaguely recall seeing something on a cooking show. Or was that duck, or pheasant?

40

Orange sauce with Duck often.

I smoke a goose and a couple of ducks at Thanksgiving each year. I trim as much fat as possible to render for other uses, and then put them on the smoker at a low heat for a few hours. It comes out amazing, and the leftover meat is stripped from the bones for a cassaulet over the weekend.