Guinea fowl with marscapone

I keep coming across recipes for guinea fowl so I resolved to bring home one of these pintades whenever I saw them on sale. Perhaps because of the holidays, WholeFoods had a big case of diverse poultry the other day -- goose, duck, pheasant, turkey of course, and guinea fowl -- so I finally got one.

There were a couple of recipes for guinea fowl and savoy cabbage but I went instead with Anna Del Conte's recipe from Lodi in the Lombardy region. It appealed to me because of marscapone in the cavity and a combination of white wine and white rum as braising liquid. The recipe is simple -- put 4 Tbl (!) of butter, a cut up carrot, a cut up onion, and 2 cut up celery stalks and 4 whole cloves in the pot; spoon 2 Tbl marscapone into the cavity of the bird, salt and pepper, place in the pot on top of the vegetables, pour over 4 oz wine and 2 Tbl rum, bring to a boil, cover and put into 400-degree oven for 1 to 1-1/4 hours.

Though the recipe didn't call for it, I turned the bird halfway through since I had to put it in the pot sideways. When the bird is tender, remove and cut into 4 serving pieces. Remove the cloves (if you can find them) and purree the cooking liquid and vegetables into a sauce.

Guinea fowl, needless to say, tastes a lot like chicken. I find it a bit gamier, with a texture and color somewhere between chicken and duck. It doesn't have nearly as much fat as duck or goose. This came out tender and moist because of the braising and the marscapone. If you find yourself gravitating more and more to the dark meat in chicken and turkey, you will like guinea fowl. The sauce came out a surprising color of yellow and was delicious on the meat.

I toyed with the idea of serving Grunkohl, which I'm belatedly realizing is green kale, prepared in the German fashion (blanched, chopped and braised in onion and broth), but opted instead for a separate Anna Del Conte recipe for -- savoy cabbage! This recipe is from the Veneto region and starts with a soffrito of 4 oz. of pancetta, an onion, 1 Tbl rosemary needles, 1 garlic clove all chopped up together in a food processor then sauteed briefly in 2 Tbl. of olive oil. Trim and cut the cabbage into quarters, remove the core and cut into half-inch strips, add to pot and wilt, add 6 oz. white wine, cover and stew for 1-1/2 hours. It goes really well with guinea fowl.

I used a nice sauvignon blanc for cooking and accompanied the meal with the great Alsatian riesling we got at Iron Bridge, which manages to be bone dry and fruit forward at the same time. A bit extravagant for a weekday meal, but very nice.