I have promised Rozanne that I will blog about my adventure with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's set of three Christmas dishes from one goose. H.F.-W. serves all of the dishes at once, in a massive holiday blowout, but I have chosen to divide it into three meals, as such:

Day 1
ROASTED GOOSE BREAST
ROASTED WINTER VEGETABLES
APPLESAUCE
WINE GRAVY

Day 2
GOOSE GIBLET TERRINE
CREAMED BRUSSELS SPROUTS WITH BACON

Day 3
CONFIT OF GOOSE LEGS
PEPPERY SPLIT PEA PUREE

Day 3 will actually occur on Day 4 in real time, because on Day 3 the s.o. and I will be at a going-away party for a friend. The party will involve an obscene amount of food in its own right, so I really have no business making anything goosey on that day.

I should mention that this is my first goose ever. Until today, I never sampled goose, although I had it in my head that it would be a lot like ostrich--a beef taste with a poultry texture. It turns out that is as good a description of goose as you are likely to get. It is fabulous.

I am not going to reproduce H.F.-W.'s recipes here. My feeling is that if you are interested in Goosapalooza on this level, you should adjourn immediately to the nearest Amazon page and buy his River Cottage Year cookbook, where it is published.

Without further ado:

DAY 1

I prod the Schiltz All-American Holiday Goose with my pointer finger. It has been in the fridge for three days and is fully thawed. I pull it out, place it on a cutting board, and shuck off the netting and wrapper.

I reach inside and pull out a bag of giblets and a neck. The neck is without its skin, which means I will be making H.F.-W.'s "Giblet-Stuffed Neck of Goose" in the alternate terrine form. Good to know, good to know. I wrap the liver in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for later. Everything else goes in a pot with some stock vegetables. I add cold water to cover and place it on the back burner to simmer for a couple of hours.

I designate a large loaf pan as a Fat Repository and start pulling giant clumps of loose fat from the goose's cavity (I will need the fat for the confit three days from now). I also throw in some extremely fatty pieces of loose skin from the neck and tail regions. Then I bring out the poultry shears and start oh-so-carefully cutting through the skin and connective tissue that holds the legs against the body. I get all the way down to the thigh joints, crack them, and remove the leg-thigh pieces to a waiting Rubbermaid container. At this point I discover more clumps of fat underneath the wings (apparently geese have chubby armpits) and remove them to the loaf pan.

I preheat the oven to 350 degrees and pop the loaf pan in for half an hour to render the fat.

Meanwhile, I combine coarse salt with some herbs, spices and garlic and rub the mixture into the goose legs. I seal the container and stow it in the fridge to marinate for the next 48 hours.

Now I have a goose breast with wings attached. The cavity is hanging open, very much unlike H.F.-W.'s goose in the photo, so I ransack the house for some cooking twine. No luck. I find some strips of muslin and bind the goose so it isn't so exposed.

The fat has rendered. I remove the pan, strain out the cracklings, and set it aside. Then I crank up the heat to 425 degrees. I splash some olive oil in an oval ceramic dish and set it in the oven to get hot, then start cutting vegetables: potatoes, fennel, carrots, parsnips. I throw the potatoes into the hot oil and slide the pan into the oven on the bottom rack.

The goose, in its roasting pan, goes on the top rack. I set a timer for 40 minutes.

After five minutes, I throw in the fennel. After ten, I add the carrots and parsnips and toss everything in the oil. H.F.-W. is a little anal-retentive about individual roasting times, but it's probably worth it.

At this point I panic and remember that I am supposed to be making applesauce. I peel and slice some Granny Smiths (apologies to any British people who may be reading this, but we don't have Bramleys in the U.S.) and throw them in a pan with a little water, butter, sugar, and cinnamon. I turn it on pretty high and start stirring and breaking up the slices, trying to hurry up the process.

This, it turns out, is not necessary, because after 40 minutes the vegetables are done but the goose breast isn't. I have plenty of time to finish the applesauce before a thermometer inserted in the meat reads 170. Perfect! Still a little bloody at the bone. I let the goose rest for 10 minutes while I make a wine gravy out of a couple of ladlefuls of stock, a splash of merlot, a squirt of fat from the pan, some flour, and a little seasoning.

The meal is incredible. Whatever British person decided, back in the mists of time, that applesauce and wine gravy go well with goose was absolutely correct. It's so decadent!

After dinner I pick the remaining meat from the carcass and am a little taken aback by how much connective tissue geese have. Like, noticeably more than a turkey or a duck. They are put together well! Odd, but then again, this is an animal I have never encountered before...