Sugo di Piccione: Squab, Dove or Pigeon Ragu
User Reviews
5
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Prep Time
30 mins
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Cook Time
6 hrs
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Total Time
6 hrs 30 mins
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Servings
8 people
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Course
Main Course
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Cuisine
Italian
Sugo di Piccione: Squab, Dove or Pigeon Ragu
Description
This recipe starts by removing breast meat from pigeons and roasting their salted carcasses coated with oil until deeply browned. The carcasses then simmer with chopped carrots, celery, onions, garlic, crushed spices including juniper berries, black peppercorns, allspice, cloves, star anise, bay leaves, red wine, tomato paste, and wild game stock or beef stock. Water from the roasting pan deglazes the browned bits into the stockpot, increasing depth of flavor.
The mixture simmers gently for hours, allowing flavors and aromas to concentrate. Meanwhile, the breast meat is finely ground or chopped and kept refrigerated until incorporation. The long cooking time softens textures and creates a thick, richly flavored sauce. Butter added near the end enriches the ragu, which is then seasoned with black pepper and sherry or red wine vinegar to brighten the taste.
Sugo di Piccione is served over pasta and topped with grated cheese, balancing the gamey meat with acidity and richness for a satisfying meal. Using sharp-tailed, spruce, sage grouse, or prairie chickens is recommended for the dark meat in grouse-based versions.
Ingredients
- 12 to 20 pigeon or whole doves or 4 dark-meat grouse
- salt
- olive oil a little
- 2 quarts wild game stock or beef stock
- 2 cups red wine
- 1 ounce can tomato paste
- 3 carrot chopped
- 3 celery chopped
- 1 onion large, chopped
- 4 cloves garlic chopped
- 1 handful dried porcini mushroom optional
- 12 black peppercorn crushed
- 12 juniper berries crushed
- 12 allspice berries crushed
- 1 star anise (optional)
- 6 whole cloves or 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
- 3 bay leaf
- 4 to 6 tablespoons butter unsalted
- black pepper to taste
- sherry vinegar or red wine vinegar, to taste
- 1 pound pasta homemade or dried
- cheese for grating
Instructions
- Cut off the breast meat from all the birds and set aside. Salt the carcasses well and coat them with a little oil. Roast the carcasses in an oven at 400F until they are well browned, about an hour.
- Put the roasted carcasses along with everything in the ingredient list up to the butter into a large stockpot. Add another quart of water. Pour one more quart of water into the roasting pan you just used and use a wooden spoon to scrape up all the browned bits in that pan. Pour this into the stockpot, too.
- Bring the sugo to a simmer and let it cook gently, with no lid and slightly bubbling away, as long as you can stand it, about 4 to 8 hours. While this is simmering, grind the breast meat through meat grinder using a fine die. If you don't have a grinder, you can either hand chop the meat or pulse it in a food processor. Keep this in the fridge as the sugo cooks.
- As the sugo cooks, mush everything in the pot down every so often. Then, when you are ready, pour the contents of the pot through a chinois, colander or other strainer with large holes that has been set into a large bowl. Wipe out the stockpot and return the free-flowing sauce to that pot. Use a ladle and mash the meat, vegetables, etc. in the colander to remove as much liquid and good stuff as you can. You want the resulting "cake" in the colander to be dryish, as in no liquid dripping from it. Toss that or feed it to the cats.
- Mix the strained stuff in with the free-flowing liquid. Get a large, wide pan like a big frying pan and add the butter. Heat it over medium-high heat, and add the ground meat. Stir well and add a little salt. You want to break up the meat as much as possible and brown it well.
- When it's well browned and broken up, pour in the sugo and stir well. Bring this to a boil and reduce it to meat sauce consistency. If you can stand it, the sugo will be better if you let this process take an hour or so. But you can boil it down faster if you want.
- Get your pasta water ready by bringing a large pot of salty water to a boil. Start boiling your pasta. As it cooks, add salt, black pepper and vinegar to the sugo to taste. Get a big bowl ready.
- When the pasta is ready, put it in the big bowl and add a ladle of sugo. Toss to combine. Give everyone some pasta, top with some more sauce and grate some cheese over it.
Notes
- For dark meat recipes with grouse, use sharp-tailed grouse, spruce grouse, sage grouse, or prairie chickens for best flavor.
User Reviews
Overall Rating
5
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