Roast Goose With Wild Rice-Chestnut Stuffing

Mikekey's Note:

This is one way Christmas dinner was prepared in Dicken's day! Adapted from YANKEE MAGAZINE. Cooking time includes about 1 1/2 hours for rice to cook and cool. (I used a wild rice blend I found in bulk) Canned chestnuts can be found in specialty stores. Make sure they are NOT packed in syrup! The original recipe did not pierce skin and fat, which I did to help "drain" off excess grease. It also said to put whole goose on serving platter and garnish with pine sprigs and sliced blood oranges, but I find it messy to try to carve at the table and dig stuffing out to serve. If you are more adventuresome, serve this way :) NOTE: 'Zaar will not let me put in "1 10-12 lb. goose" so it comes up "10 lbs. geese"

• Total Time: 6 hrs 40 mins
• Prep Time: 40 mins
• Cook Time: 6 hrs

Ingredients:

Servings: 6

• 1 cup wild rice , raw
• 10 lbs goose
• salt and pepper
• 4 tablespoons orange zest , grated
• 6 slices bacon , chopped
• 1 onion , chopped
• 1 cup celery , sliced (with leaves)
• ½ cup Italian parsley , chopped
• 1 (17 ounce) can whole chestnuts , drained and coarsely chopped
• 3 tablespoons fresh sage leaves , chopped (or 1 teaspoon dried sage)
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1 teaspoon dried marjoram

Directions:

1. Cooked wild rice according to package instructions (you should have about 4 cups cooked). Set aside to cool.
2. Preheat oven to 350ºF.
3. Remove giblets from goose. Remove loose fat from around cavity openings. Discard or reserve for another use.
4. Prick skin and fat with a skewer in several places, being careful not to pierce meat.
5. Sprinkle goose inside and out with salt and pepper. Rub with orange zest.
6. Fry bacon in a skillet until crisp. Add onion, celery and parsley and sauté 5 minutes.
7. Stir in chestnuts, cooked rice and herbs. Season to taste with salt.
8. Stuff goose with this mixture. "Sew" cavity shut with skewers and cotton twine. (do not stuff goose until ready to roast).
9. Place goose breast side up on a rack in a shallow roasting pan. Roast about 20 minutes per pound. (if skin begins to brown too much, cover loosely with foil.).
10. Remove to cutting board and let rest 15 minutes.
11. Remove stuffing to a bowl and carve goose.

Reviews

[bluemoon downunder]

We thoroughly enjoyed this stuffing - in a chicken not a goose. I'm not at all sure that I can recall ever having eaten goose but when I think of goose I continue to be haunted by my brother's experience on picking up his Christmas goose in England and being told that the goose he was buying was "Emily"; and that she'd always been "such a very nice little goose"... knowledge which, I gather, had rather detracted from their enjoyment in eating of Emily. So I really didn't want to know the chicken's name! Anyway, my focus was the stuffing. I was drawn to this recipe by the sheer yummy-sounding nature of the ingredients and made the full quota of the stuffing though it was clearly going to be more than one medium-sized free-range chicken could accommodate. Just loved the wild rice, orange zest, chestnuts and herbs in this - and bacon is always a great addition to stuffings. I also added a few drops of orange juice. Perhaps it was the act of a culinary philistine, but I did add one chopped leek and 4 cloves of minced garlic to the pan in step 6, then because I felt something was needed to bind the ingredients, I added an egg. What didn't fit into the chicken, I placed in an ovenproof dish and cooked separately. FABULOUS STUFFING: just loved it. and could happily eat it on its own by the spoonful. Moist and flavoursome and great textual variation : FANTASTIC. Thank you for sharing this recipe!