Partridge with Taragon Brown Butter

Spatchcocked Partridge with Tarragon Brown Butter

Ideally ask your butcher to spatchcock your partridge for you but if you’re doing it yourself we recommend a “cheater’s spatchcock” which is basically just splitting the thing in half.

Take a large kitchen knife and cut through the bird just beside the backbone. On any small bird this can be done just applying enough pressure to get through the ribs so you can open it up. When you’re through press down on the breasts to flatten it out slightly. Flattening it out means it’s much easier to get the bird cooked through nice and evenly.

Ingredients

1 Partridge spatchcocked

1 generous spoonful of butter

A good handful of tarragon roughly chopped

A good glug of olive oil

A small glug of white port (other sweet fortified wines like Madeira also work well here)

Salt and pepper to season

Method

Take your bird out of the fridge at least an hour before cooking to get to room temperature

Pre heat your oven to 180 degrees

Warm up your olive oil and butter in a frying pan to which you have a lid to a medium high heat, you don’t want the butter to take on too much colour yet

Place the partridge in skin side down and cook for 3 minutes before flipping over to cook from underneath making sure to continually baste the bird as you go. Add in some extra butter or a little olive oil if it looks like it’s starting to dry out

Place the whole pan, covered, into the oven for a further 5 minutes

After removing from the oven allow the bird to rest either on a board or wrapped in foil depending on how cooked you would like it. Partridge is traditionally served quite pink but, understandably, medium rare poultry can be quite challenging. There’s no shame in wanting to eat a game bird a little more cooked but beware it can dry out quite easily.

Putting the pan back on a medium high heat add your glug of port and chopped tarragon and mix through allowing the alcohol to burn off slightly and making sure the butter has gone a satisfying shade of brown and the oil is properly emulsified

Either serve the bird whole or cut in half along the breast bone to serve with the port brown butter poured over the top

Enjoy