Thread: Anyone hunted and eaten wild peacock?

I’ve eaten them several different ways from slow cooked hot curry, steaming, roasting, stir fried, minced. If the meat is fresh and un-aged / unhung then generally speaking it will be bland and tough compared to a supermarket chicken. The curry works well but I really had to cook the hell out of it, steaming was basically a disaster, roasting was kinda meh but doable. The stirfry I didn’t cook and the pheasant was one of several different meats in the dish and it didn’t really stand out.

I like the mince option the best - I had a GameBird Burger a little while ago that was a mix of peacock, pheasant, turkey and feral chickens. They were well prepared and aged in the fridge, and prepped with generous seasoning. It was really REALLY good. My buddy that makes these burgers often adds minced rabbit as well. After that experience that’s what I have decided we are going to do with our next peacock cull, plus there’s gazillions of pheasants around here so a few of them too. I will dry age the meat in my soon-to-be-constructed game fridge for a week before mincing. (I’ve got the fridge and just need the wire racks and the fan now.)

For roasting, you really should hang the birds for at least a week in the chiller then its much better. 8°C or close to, not too cold. I have not eaten pheasant or peacock has been hung in warm air until it starts to rot - that’s for mediaeval peasants. Not brave enough for that. That particular line in the sand comes from growing up in the country in Sussex and kicking around with my grandpa’s elderly mates who were mostly fairly disgusting and revelled in eating very smelly gamebirds, complete with a side of lead shot. (And, notably, the occasional roadkill roast.)