Cooking Sandhill Crane Breast

Sandhillcranehunting wildeats fieldtotable sandhill crane is one of the best tasting game birds out there.

Cooking sandhill crane breast.

Seasoning each side of the crane breasts liberally and put them in a zip lock bag. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees when you are ready to cook the breast melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a pan and sear the breast skin side down to start. Cook indirectly for 30 45 minutes until the internal temperature of the breast reaches 120 125 degrees. The legs are relatively huge and full of tendons worse than any bird out there.

The older birds are as tough as shoe leather. Once the meat is thawed out and cleaned mix up 1 tsp. Cooking the sandhill crane. Next i add about a quarter to half of the bottle of the allegro marinade depending how many crane breasts i have.

Place the seasoned crane breasts on your soaked cedar planks and place them on the grill. Dry meat and cut into bite sized pieces. Sear for 4 5 minutes on each side then transfer the breast to a baking sheet and put in the oven while you make the sauce about 8 to 10 minutes for medium rare. Cut bacon strips in half crosswise and wrap each piece of crane with a section of bacon securing with a toothpick in the center.

Brine crane breasts for 24 hours in enough water to cover the breasts with 3 5 tablespoons of salt. Grill on bbq using a flat screen style tray other wise the thinly sliced crane will fall on to coals. Cook crane until nicely browned just as with all waterfowl do not over cook as meat is thin it will cook very quickly depending on how hot your coals are. Liberally coat breast in wild game rub ensuring meat is covered but rub is not caking off the breast.

When you have breasted your sandhill crane you will get two steaks you want to take the time to wash the meat off cut all of the silver skin off and trim any fat from the meat. I start out with the montreal steak seasoning and slap ya mama cajun seasoning. Red chile powder 1 tsp. Garlic salt and tsp.

This pre meal entree goes very well with a fine bottle of your favorite beer. Season lightly with salt and pepper. Let them sit in the fridge for at least 3 hours or over night. The breast meat is like roast beef hence the moniker the rib eye of the sky but again it can tough and dry if cooked too fast.

Onion powder in a small bowl or cup. The thighs are tasty the lightest colored and most moist meat on a crane. Roughly crush the peppercorns and rub them into the crane breast wrap in plastic wrap and let sit in the fridge for a few hours. Crane can be tough and a challenge to cook.