Welcome to the summary page for FabulousFusionFood's Cook's Guide entry for Pheasant along with all the Pheasant containing recipes presented on this site, with 17 recipes in total.

This is a continuation of an entire series of pages that will, I hope, allow my visitors to better navigate this site. As well as displaying recipes by name, country and region of origin I am now planning a whole series of pages where recipes can be located by meal type and main ingredient. This page gives a listing of all the Pheasant recipes added to this site.

These recipes, all contain Pheasant as a major wild food ingredient.

Pheasant: The term refers to some members of the Phasianinae subfamily of Phasianidae in the order Galliformes. However, by far the most common is the Mongolian Ringneck-type Common Pheasant Phasianus colchicus.

Originally native to Georgia (Ancient Colchis), it has been extensively introduced around the globe as a game bird. It has been naturalized throughout Europe. It is a well-known game-bird, an is probably one of the most widespread and ancient one in the whole world. The Common Pheasant is one of the world's most hunted birds.

There are many colour forms of the male Common Pheasant, ranging in colour from nearly white to almost black in some melanistic examples. These are due to captive breeding and hybridization between subspecies and with the Green Pheasant, reinforced by continual releases of stock from varying sources to the wild. For example, the "Ring-necked Pheasants" common in Europe, North America and Australia do not pertain to any specific taxon, they rather represent a stereotyped hybrid swarm. In addition, various colour mutations are commonly encountered, mainly melanistic (black) and flavistic (isabelline or fawn) specimens. The former are rather common in some areas and are named Tenebrosus Pheasant (P. colchicus var. tenebrosus). Body weight can range from 0.5 to 3kg, with males averaging 1.2kg and females averaging 0.9kg.

Common Pheasants can now be found across the globe due to their readiness to breed in captivity and the fact they can naturalise in many climates. Pheasants were hunted in their natural range by Stone Age humans just like the grouse, partridges, junglefowls and perhaps peacocks that inhabited Europe at that time. At least since the Roman Empire the bird was extensively introduced in many places and has become a naturalized member at least of the European fauna. A few recipes for them are found in Apicius. They were introduced into Britain around the 10th century and are found in Medieval cookery books. However, they seem to have become extinct by the 17th century and were only re-introduced in the 1830s as a game bird (so there are no recipes for the bird in Elizabethan and Stewart cookbooks, nor in Hanna Glasse's cookbook, but they re-appear in Victorian cookbooks).

Pheasant farming is a common practice, and is sometimes done intensively. Birds are supplied both to hunting preserves/estates and restaurants, with smaller numbers being available for home cooks. Pheasant farms have some 10 million birds[citation needed] in the U.S. and 35 million in the United Kingdom. The carcasses were often hung for a time to improve the meat by slight decomposition, as with most other game. Modern cookery generally uses moist roasting and farm-raised female birds. In the U.K. and U.S., game is making somewhat of a comeback in popular cooking, and more pheasants than ever are being sold in supermarkets there.

Pheasants are very tasty, but not as 'gamey' as some other game fowls. However, they are typically quite low in fat and need to be prepared carefully so that they are not 'dry'. Pheasants can be prepared in the same way as chicken, except that the breasts need to be larded or covered in fat or fatty bacon prior to roasting. Roast pheasant is also an excellent meat for use in curries.

For information about roasting pheasants (and many other meats) to perfection, see this site's Guide to Roasting page.