I wanted to make a low-temp goose for a very long time. Now, I found a 4 kg one the other day and as we had visitors lately I thought that wold be a good opportunity. Roasting meat at low temperatures leads to the meat being very tender and not at all dry, and especially for fat fowl this is a good technique. It worked great for me and I'll try a duck soon.
Bread dumplings have been an all-time favorite of mine. We used to have them at our family get-togethers, home made. Lately, we tend to only have the ready-made kind. However, a few weeks ago, my mother made them the traditional way again, and I got inspired because it seemed to be really not much work. They are so delicious. It is a dumpling made of bread, without any yeast, and it may be filled with herbs and or ham, but one can experiment on that.
What I did:
We wanted to eat in the evening, not too late, because four kids who would be hungry early were around. So I was aiming at 19:00h. I took the goose out of the freezer one day before, so it would be defrosted in time. To defrost, it helps to take out the bag with the intestines. After defrosting, it is a good idea to cut off the large pieces of fat one can see and easily reach inside the goose (check both ends). Keep the fat, it will make a delicious bread spread.
At nine in the morning, I cut an onion and an apple in large squares and fried them for approximately 2 minutes. Then I mixed them with an orange cut in same-size squares and a handful of dried plums. This filling I placed inside the goose. Then I put the goose on a tray and placed it in a pre-heated oven at 220°C for one hour. I took out the goose, turned the oven off and let the door open. Then I drained all liquid from the tray. Goose back on tray and back in to the oven. I put the oven to 80°C. Now, here is the important thing: it has to be 80°C exactly. Less, and it will not be done, more and it can get dry. I don't have a fancy oven thermometer, but I used our kid's ear thermometer (one can measure surface temperature from a distance with that one up to 100°C) to check on the oven. It had to be actually at 102°C to heat the bird to 80°C. Then, I did nothing for 8 hours - except enjoying the smell that penetrated our kitchen soon.
Well, not nothing. The fat I cut off the goose earlier should be turned into a nice bread spread, and I wanted to do the same thing with the liver.
So: cut fat in small squares, do the same with an apple and an onion. Put in pan, season with salt, pepper and sweet marjoram and let sizzle at low temp for a bit less than an hour, until onions and greaves get brown. Take off the heat and drain into a clay pot. Take the liquid drained from the goose tray after the 220°C hour and drain the fat (keep the other liquid!). You can add part of the fat (as much as you like, but leave one teaspoon) to the greaves. Put greaves in freezer (hardens much faster in there).
Take the liver out of the intestines bag and clean it (try to remove all skin). Then cut it in little pieces. Put the left over teaspoon of goose grease in a pan, add a mashed garlic clove, thyme and the liver. Fry fast until done, then put in a pot. Add butter (about same amount as liver), salt, pepper and puree. Put in clay pot and into fridge. Veeery nice on bread. It even convinced a known intestine-hater person to try and he liked it :-)
Then I didn't do anything until 18:00h. At that time, I started with the dumplings: I took 500g of bread (part of it was old, dry bread, but that was not enough so I used some fresh, too, but that is not necessary). Cut it in small squares, put in large bowl, add 5 eggs, half a liter of warm milk, salt, pepper, nutmeg and let sit until the bread is soft (15min). In the meantime, cut an onion and fry it in a pan with 100g ham cut in small squares. Add the onions and ham to the bread. Note: if you only use fresh bread, you still need to let it sit as otherwise the gluten doesn't get set free and the dumplings will not stick. Then take a fresh and clean linen dish towel, make it wet and wring it out. Place it on the counter and put the dumpling doe on one end of the dish towel. Roll it up. Roll in the ends, making sure the doe sits very tight in the towel. Close both ends sugar-candy style with cotton kitchen yarn. Bring water with salt to boil in a large pot. Once it boils, turn the temperature down so it only simmers. Place dumpling inside and let sit for an hour.
In between, use the goose fond to make a nice sauce: Bring it to cook in a pan, add cranberry jam, red wine (I'd advice a hearty Cabernet or Syrah), pepper and salt to taste. If you like, you can make the sauce thicker by adding some flour that was dissolved in cold water before. Take care not to produce clots.
I served some red cabbage with the goose, if you like that, you can prepare it now.
Take out the dumpling, open the linen and cut the roll in finger-thick slices. Take the goose out of the oven. It should have been in there for about 8-9 hours. At the low temperatures, one hour more or less isn't important.
As a starter, I served roasted white bread with the greaves and liver pastes.
Then, goose, dumplings, sauce and red cabbage. A Pino Noir goes well with it (we had one from Sicily), - don't use the full bodied Cabernet-Bordaux type of red wines, they are to heavy. One could also have a white wine, but with the autumn and the cranberries I felt more like a red wine.
My partner made marzipan-filled oven apples for the dessert (will be another post). Wow. Who ever missed this dinner, you really missed something!
