232: Roasted Pigeon with Blackpudding Cakes

Oooh, get me lah-di-dah. I think this sounds quite poncy-swish, like you might get for starters in a nice restaurant.

Or then again, it also sounds like av come in from t'pit and said summat along lines of "Eey up love I've found yon pigeon, get t'oven on".

Anyways..... A pigeon winked at me in the butcher's on saturday. Which is hard for a dead bird. £2.50 and my curiosity was roused; I don't think I've ever eaten pigeon before. I've certainly not cooked it before. So, off to my cookbook of choice - Mr google he say, plenty of salt, pepper and very hot oven for 15 minutes.

So, here it is. I thought I'd re-use the baking tray from my morning bacon, for a bit of extra salty lardy goodness. The preparation here amounted to get tray, plonk bird on tray and season.

Oh, the devil will find work for idle hands to do. I stole to the fridge and spied some black pudding. Because no one asked me to. I'll stop now, oh-ho-oh.

So, for the Black pudding cakes. I was the the midst of cooking a curry, so taking from that:

• Half an onion, 1 clove garlic, 1 chilli chopped and fried
• Two rounds of Bury Black pudding
• Two medium to small potatoes boiled

All these I chucked in a bowl and mashed together with a fork. And then formed in to patties.

Obviously, I was just making up how I should cook these. And here they come:

If this looks like I'd just slapped this on a plate, you'd be mostly right; they fell apart somewhat when I tried to take them off the tray. I very much liked the taste of the blackpudding cakes. However, they didn't get the crispy edges I'd hoped the hot oven would produce. Next time I do these I'll coat then in flour or breadcrumbs and fry them to get some crispyness going on.

The pigeon, I just sliced in half. This proved 15 minutes was not nearly enough. If I had had breadcrumbs on the Blackpudding then it might still have been interested in a quick peck. Swiftly back in to the oven for another 5 minutes, and the pigeon was still pretty rare.  And the verdict is, I 'appen t'like pigeon.

I shall cease and desist with this ecky thumpness now.