150 Quail

cmcadams

cmcadams

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In a couple of weeks, I'm smoking 150 quail for some friends.

I've had quail but never smoked it... Any suggestions, other than just put on some rub or herbs and smoke away?
 
Inject with garlic rosemary butter.
 
The quail are farm raised, but shot by a group of guys i know... One of those farms where they set out quail for you to "hunt".

Neil, that would work pretty well. I'm thinking olive oil instead of butter, but a bit of garlic, a bit of herb of some sort... Maybe a mix.. Rosemary in some, basil in some others, thyme and sage in others.
 
I would say marinate as opposed to inject due to the small size, they should absorb it quickly. I would also cook them relatively quickly or cold smoke as they are very lean. We used to do them at a restaurant in the city, cold smoke the breast and pan roast to order and the legs/thighs were cooked confit style in a bbq type sauce (with fresh tamarind, etc). I think it was a David Burke recipe (you might be able to find on the interent) and it was really good.
 
Here's my favorite way to cook quail...I take an oyster, Really fresh....I like Texas Gulf Oysters( did you know that the Gulf Belongs to Texas):wink:......Place in the cup part of the breast ,season with salt, pepper, garlic pwdr,and a little cayenne. Wrap in bacon and cook indirect heat ,pretty high temp ,till done and outside is nice and brown.......MMMmmmMmmmm!!!!
 
John, sounds interesting, but doing 150 of them that way may be time prohibitive!

I'm thinking, after they're cooked, of lining them up in regiments, with commander quails at the front, saluting with their wings. Might make a fun photo! Too bad I don't have a brethren banner yet to put in the background.
 
cmcadams said:
John, sounds interesting, but doing 150 of them that way may be time prohibitive!

I'm thinking, after they're cooked, of lining them up in regiments, with commander quails at the front, saluting with their wings. Might make a fun photo! Too bad I don't have a brethren banner yet to put in the background.
Click to expand...
Hey Curt,
We used to do quail like this in fairly large #'s at a hunting camp I used to go to,an cook at. We would get 3 people and set up a line. After Qual were cleaned...one to season, on to stuff, one to wrap and toothpick...put 'em on the pit an they didn't take very long...we served 'em with dirty rice, and lots of beer !:wink: Great crowd pleaser all the guys loved 'em....we used to serve around 75 or 80 at a time. of course we had pretty easy access to fresh seafood as well.....

Let us know what you decide and post some pics, will ya??
 
John, I'm kind of shy about photos on here, so I don't know about that... But I'll at least tell you what I decide.
 
cmcadams said:
In a couple of weeks, I'm smoking 150 quail for some friends.
Click to expand...

Where does one come across 150 quail and how many friends will that feed?
 
The same friends shot them a couple of weeks ago. Must have been a decent day. next time, they have to take me, though I'm not sure about going... Last time I want bird hunting, my lab, Woody, did all the real work. I'm not sure how I feel about going without him along.

I don't know how many it will feed, but what isn't eaten will be frozen for later.
 
This is no more than a memory of a long time ago (almost 40 years since I last hunted quail). A friend of mines Mom, cooked a pan of quail in cornbread dressing and I'll never forget it. I love dressing anyway and here is this pan with the dressing coming up about half way on the quail with their legs sticking out...so everyone got a quail or two and some dressing out of the pan. Might be something you want to see what a little one pan batch turns out like.
 
we used to lay em out and skewer them the season em that grill em up or (prior to me having my smoker) and then sometimes we did them like we do dove, season and wrap around jalapeno slices and wrap in bacon.
 
Wild birds are leaner than the pen raised kind so so drying them out won't happen so fast. But still can happen. My theory for wild game is less is more. Taste the wild flavor. Rub em down and smoke em. Inject em if you like. I've brined some wild pheasant and they are good smoked might give that a try on some.

If it flies it dies, kill'em and grill'em.
 
Good luck! Sounds like an interesting time...I just shudder at the thought of handling 150 seperate birds multiple times!! I'd probably just rub them with olive oil and season them up -- they should cook up pretty quickly.
 
I'm actually starting to lean toward coating with olive oil and herbs, maybe do 3 batches... rosemary, basil/garlic and sage/thyme. Then I can set up the birds in a 3 way cage match afterwards, each herb type against the others, last bird standing wins!
 
I'm an avid Quail hunter and have experimented with quail since I started hunting them here in Texas. I've never had any 'gamey' quail problem.

I like to separate the breast meat from the bone - you do this by placing thumb and forefinger on each side of the back of the spine and then moving the fingers across the backbone to separate the meat from the bone. It takes a bit more time to do this but is worth the while when eating.

One of the hardest parts of eating quail is eating around the bone and this way you have the problem solved. I like to marinate in Italian dressing a couple hours before cooking and then adding a rub to them.
 
When I said the wild taste I didn't mean "gamey", its just that quail taste like quail, pheasant tastes like pheasant, don't try and make it into somethings its not. I would rather eat quail or pheasant over chicken any day:-D ! tkuehn what breed of dogs do you hunt over.
 
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