It’s tough living within a family of ‘super tasters’… everyone wants something new and interesting… I guess years of ‘Turduckens’ weren’t tasty enough? Now , the crowd is demanding a South African-style “Ostruducken.” I ‘assumed’ that an Ostruducken was put together much like any other bird within a bird recipe… you know… a chicken within a duck within a turkey … all stuffed into an Ostrich… however, it doesn’t work that way, since the Ostrich has very little breast meat…. but their legs are the size of a Buick! I went on the internet and found little help… Hormel is usually good… but not this time:
Similar to a turducken, this food is a combination of four meats, ostrich, turkey duck, and chicken that are layered together and rolled into a poultry roast. With the exception of the ostrich meat, turducken and osturducken are prepared in the same manner, starting by spreading a spicy seasoning over the meat, then placing a cornbread and sausage stuffing over the meat as they are layered together, and rolling the layers into the shape of a roast. Typically, the skin of each bird is kept on the meat if this is hand made, in order to add moisture and flavor to the combination of meats. Commercially produced osturducken often removes the skin and layers only the meats together.
So, have you ever cooked anything more than an Ostrich steak or burger? Frankly, I haven’t … and I was ready to build a giant smoker to handle this latest holiday challenge… but it isn’t imperative anymore…. Thanks to ‘Roger’ and the good folks at Blackwing Quality Meats … I have ordered what should be the right about of meat to cover my Turducken to transform it into an “Ostruducken.”
I still have a few loose ends… finding the right stuffing mixture to place between the Ostrich and the Turkey…. the right wine(s)…. but this is all the fun part.
I’ll post the final recipe after we do a little testing and let you know how it turned out!
Roger Freberg
