Thoroughly Cooking One's Goose: Of Giblets and Dark Broth

When I made the rather arbitrary decision to serve stuffed goose instead of the traditional turkey at this year's Thanksgiving table, I can't say I was making any knowledgeable or informed choice based on years of experience sampling the world's poultry. I've had duck on numerous occasions, and even tossed together a duck-and-roasted-coffee-bean Scandinavian recipe on the eve of Jane's 2007 deployment for a get-together with friends. And I suspect I've tasted goose at some fancy meal or other. But an expert on waterfowl? Not me. Rather, the idea of using one of the world's other noble birds for a holiday meal simply - can I say this without sounding excruciatingly posh? - touched my fancy. Plus, the notion of serving goose has always struck me as being uncommonly festive, a holiday tradition, perhaps more common around Christmas time, but perfect for any season of cold amid the cheer of company.

But while it was all well and good to announce goose on the Thanksgiving menu, it was quite another to actually set about acquiring the bird in question, finding a suitable recipe, convincing my guests on the appropriateness of my choice, and taking a crash course in goose preparation. I handled the problems one at a time.

First, finding the goose. I turned to the good folks over at Iowa Meat Farms, some kind of San Diego institution and vegetarian house of horrors tucked back among the loathsome sprawl of Mission Gorge Road. They boast a wide array of meats of both the farm and game variety (note to self: this is the place to head for when I get the hankering to try some of the many preparations for wild boar lurking in my cookbooks), and while they may not be the place to seek out when looking for bargains, their quality is impeccable. I'm still a bit shocked that my handsome 9.5 lb. goose rang up somewhere in the ballpark of $72. But I'm also shocked that a co-worker of mine served a $4 turkey to a family of six. Somewhere between the $4 turkey and the $72 goose must lie some kind of reasonable compromise. Our goose was frozen and as sturdy as a brick. We planned our thawing process out far in advance, and still needed the give the rigid fellow a bit of a warm water bath on the big day.

Next up was locating a suitable recipe. For that, I consulted my large array of European cookbooks. As the dinner's Mediterranean theme had already been decided, I quickly came across an Italian preparation that seemed perfect - Lombardy's oca farcita, or stuffed goose. The stuffed bit was essential - I may be a bit iconoclastic, but a Thanksgiving without stuffing strikes even me as anathema. This recipe called for a stuffing made out of roasted chestnuts, toasted filberts, prunes and salsicce sausage. It also called for the goose itself to be draped in bacon. Who was I to resist such a call?

My wife handled the delicate process of contacting our guests to inquire about their feelings concerning goose vs. turkey. All were amenable to the experiment, and my heart was warmed when one of our friends gave her official blessing with the words, "Whatever he wants to do will be great, I'm sure". I believe in the restaurant business, this is called 'throwing yourself at the mercy of the chef'. Game on.

Finally, I needed to familiarize myself a bit with this unfamiliar fowl. The oca farcita recipe itself gave very little advice. The goose packaging offered a little more in the way of concrete details. Word of mouth, on both the streets and the blogs, could be summed up in one sentence: "goose is a very oily bird". The oil mantra, as a matter of fact, was so all-encompassing that I soon had a notion of my goose as being little more than a dozing grease monster, an oozing mass of oil so dangerous that I would need to elevate it from my roasting pan and drain off the accumulating crude throughout the three hours of cooking time. Had I cursed myself? By opting out of the stereotypically dry turkey, was I about to subject my guests to a plate of OPEC?

In the end, I relied on a simple poultry-cooking rule of thumb: prick the bird all over with the spines of a fork to allow the juices and oil to run more freely. Midway through the roasting process, I poured out a large portion of the accumulated oil and fat, some of which was mingling with the bacon fat coursing down the sides of the goose. Healthy? Nope. But rather than pouring the fat down the drain (a major no-no at any rate), I collected the stuff in a large container to keep for future use. More on that later. As it turned out, the goose was perfectly moist and rich, and no excess of oil was noted by any of our discerning guests. In summation, at least on the matter of oil, I'd argue there's no need to fear the goose or the gander - just prick and drain (a lovely kitchen mantra).

In the preparation of the goose, I was aided by our guests, three of whom were physicians and one of whom spends his days in surgery. Sewing up the holiday bird after filling it with stuffing is a Thanksgiving tradition, but I doubt many have had the pleasure of witnessing as professional a suturing job go down in their kitchen as we did last Thursday. I may have been the chef, but Brian was the doctor (see below for the surgical footage).

I won't go into the entire process, but allow me to pat myself on the back and say that the goose was an unequivocal success, triumph, discovery. Like the kids say today, it was a"hit". The outer skin had crackled into a sweet richness that was only aided by the nearly candied-like fusion of the bacon strips into the sides. Everyone agreed that these bacon-fused skin chunks were like ice cream treats - tasty and utterly decadent. The goose meat itself was a pleasant surprise - certainly not oily but plenty moist, with an abundance of flavor that was simultaneously gamey yet smooth. It proved a far more substantial offering than the overly-familiar dry white meat of the turkey. It was indeed a noble bird and a noble dish.

And, much like the American Bison in the days before its near-extinction, our goose continued, and has continued, to offer up additional riches. I must admit to feeling a brief rush of that old pioneer spirit when I contemplate exactly how much we managed to wring out of our fairly pricey purchase. In addition to several full meals worth of bird (with leftovers), I was able to concoct a rich, yummy gravy from the enclosed giblets. I placed the liver, neck and other items on a baking sheet and roasted them with celery and onions, tossed with a bit of tomato paste and seasonings, and simmered on the stove top until dinner was ready, at which point the ingredients had thickened into a delightfully fragrant gravy. I'll admit it - I have always found the creation of authentic gravy to be one of the great magical processes of the kitchen. As a child, I adored the stuff poured over mashed potatoes and found it to be a lifesaver for turning dry turkey meat into something capable of being swallowed, but I had absolutely no idea how it came about. No doubt I suspected a can yielded up the stuff. I understand for many people, cans still supply the majority of holiday gravy. At the risk of offending any well-meaning reader out there, I would like to make a passionate plea for the criminalization of using canned gravy instead of the real thing. Don't get squeamish about handling the giblets - it's no less graphic than anything else you'll be handling when preparing a bird. And don't fret about the time required, either - gravy requires very little preparation and lots of non-supervised stove top simmering. The transformation from giblets, vegetables and water to a glistening saucer of rich gravy is a treat no cook should deny themselves. And anyway, the pre-made crap has tons of unnecessary added sodium inside. You'll be getting enough sodium as it is.

In addition to the gravy, I still had all that goose fat. I've left it to sit for a few days, and it has taken on the consistency of soft candle wax. We haven't yet reached the point where we're capable of making our own soap or candles from the rendered goose fat, but perhaps that day will soon come. At any rate, my wife and I both made remarks about our desire to jump into the wonderful world of soap making. Maybe another time. For now, I'll keep the goose fat for more basic pleasures. Besides being healthier than butter (less cholesterol, less saturated fats, higher in heart healthy mono- and polyunsaturated fats), goose fat is known as an intensely flavorful cooking agent. The French have been relying on goose fat instead of other oils or butter for quite some time and seem to be doing rather well. I hope to flavor soups and broths with my goose fat in the days to come, and especially look forward to roasting or baking sliced potatoes with the goose fat. I have a potato recipe in my favorite Scandinavian cookbook that calls for lemon and goose fat that I've been dying to try for years now.

Finally, when we had finished picking the goose free of any stray bits of meat in the days following Thanksgiving, I set about the process of cleaning and chopping the bones for the preparation of goose stock. This, too, was something I'd eagerly been awaiting. A gloriously colorful photo in the opening pages of the above-referenced cookbook has teased me for some time - beet soup with goose stock. I now have nearly four cups of thick goose stock to play with. I vary my stock recipes each time out, but I tend to always roast the bones first in the oven, sweat the celery, carrots and onions alongside, add a bit of tomato paste, then simmer with water on the stove for a few hours with peppercorns and bay leaves. The stock is strained twice, allowed to cool, then frozen. In addition to the beet soup, the flavorful stock will no doubt be called into duty for soups, broths, basting sauces and risotto dishes. We'll be enjoying various parts of our goose through the winter.

Looking back on the immense effort required to locate, prepare, consume and preserve our holiday goose, I can start to recognize why the purchase or slaughter of such a fine animal instilled a sense of respect and awe in our ancestors. This was no quickly-prepared and just-as-quickly-forgotten meal. This was an offering that will continue to appear in our kitchen for months to come. I understand why families in Europe saved up for their Christmas goose and why they humbly gave thanks for the bounty on their tables. We all agreed it was a noble bird that had found its way to our celebration. One needn't be accused of being maudlin for suggesting that we had a duty to honor it as best we could.