Bill’s Christmas Goose

in , , , on Wednesday, December 28, 2011



Is what’s good for the goose, good for the gander?  It could be true in some houses but, not quite in this one.  Bill has fond memories of Christmas when he was a kid and seeing a platter filled with a golden goose on the dinner table.  According to him, it was a delicacy with a sweet rich taste from his childhood.  I even grew up on a farm in Pickerington, Ohio and had never eaten goose until I met Bill and didn’t realize what I had missed.
       
Roasted goose was the rage on the Christmas dinner table in Victorian England, as you may recall from Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, but it did not become popular on this side of the pond until the early 1900’s.  These days, Americans consume less than one third of a pound per person yearly. 
                                 

 Since goose is a bit fattier than the traditional holiday turkey, the fat can either be trimmed away before roasting or just let it melt away as it roasts.  Actually, goose has less unhealthy saturated fats than beef, lamb and other such meats.  Many chefs claim that the texture of a goose with its darker, firmer, moister, more flavorful meat is better than the mushier turkey.  You will know that the fat has been successfully removed from the goose when the skin becomes crispy. 

We haven’t gone so far as to serve a side dish of roasted chestnuts along side of the goose but, who knows, it just might happen next year!

Bill’s Christmas Goose

Ingredients:

9 pound goose
4 carrots, coarsely chopped
2 medium Vidalia onions, quartered
2 celery stalks, coarsely chopped
Salt and pepper, to taste
Olive oil
1 stick butter, melted

Wash the goose thoroughly, removing innards.
Cut all excess fat out of the goose.  It will come out in large clumps.
Place vegetables inside goose.
With a meat fork, penetrate the skin on an angle about every 2 inches, trying not to go deep into the meat.  This will take a while but, it will help eliminate the fat.
Rub it generously with olive oil.
Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
Place in a roasting pan.
Roast in 375 degree oven.
Cook for one hour.


Remove the goose from the oven.  With a baster, remove all the fat from the bottom of the roaster.
With a brush, baste the goose liberally with butter.
Return to oven for 1 hour.
Remove the goose from the oven.
Drain all fat.
Baste the goose again liberally with the remainder of the butter.
Your golden brown goose should be fully roasted in another hour.
Remove the vegetables and discard.

Place goose on platter and serve.

Yum!!!  Enjoy while thinking of Tiny Tim!



Bill’s note:  do you know the difference between a tame goose and a wild goose?  A wild goose is two inches off center!



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