Jottings from Lancaster - Pheasant and Chorizo, birthday celebrations

It's my sister Gwenda's birthday today and she and her husband are over from Germany for a short stay during which she turns 57. OK, she isn't really 57 but that's near enough, particularly as I conveniently have those wax candle numbers left over from my 57th birthday which will do nicely on top of Hugh's little black cake and which is looking very chocolately and ready to eat later for tea time along with a glass of Prosecco.

We thought of going out to lunch and tossed about a few ideas ranging from the tried and trusted Lunesdale Arms (quite near and not too expensive) to the Inn at Whitewell which is altogether a bit posher, further away and more pricey. Eventually we decided to stay in and I would cook. It would be hard to think of what to make from a book which is for everyday cooking since a celebration meal usually entails a book that is dedicated to entertaining, but Hugh evidently thinks we could all be eating pheasant a couple of times a month and we all decided that it was worth a try. 


I haven't cooked pheasant before and Hansotto, who is my brother in law had some doubts about how it would work with butter beans and chorizo. He is a superb cook himself, as is Gwenda, so I had a lot to live up to. Normally I would have defaulted to roast lamb or something that I had cooked up enough to be confident with, but knowing and trusting the Everyday recipes I was keen to have a go at this one. For a start I got muddled up with lots of pans frying onions and pheasant and realising I hadn't used a big enough dish to cook the pheasants in the oven and I had to find increasingly bigger dishes out of the cupboard until I ended up the biggest one I had - which would do just nicely. Once I had sorted out all the pots and pans I put it into the oven and forgot about it for 2 hours as instructed. 


I had decided to do parsnip, carrot and potato mash, knowing that Gwenda likes parsnips. I would normally have done roast potatoes but somehow reading the mash recipe I felt that it was better to make that. It took some preparation and as I had to cook the potatoes and the carrots/parsnips separately it involved more saucepans - more washing up. But although it was a bit of a faff to make, having to whizz up the veggies and mashing the potatoes, it was well worth the extra bit of effort.


After 2 hours everything was ready and if I had had my wits about me I would have taken a photo BEFORE we ate all of it. As it is this is the best I can do...

Remains of a pheasant.

This is what was left on the plates (after 2nds all round)...

Carrot, parsnip and potato mash...

Satisfied brother-in-law...

All in all it was a very successful celebration lunch.  This is the birthday girl afterwards in some kind of ecstatic moment after eating the rich and tasty juices...???