Pigeon Wellington

This is something that appears on the menu at The Kingham Plough from time to time. Emily's version is better than mine, so I mustn't have been paying enough attention when she was making it. Still, the home-made version was very tasty.

Here it is served with sautéed spinach, glazed carrots, and steamed Exquisa potatoes:

The pigeon breasts were cooked sous vide (25 minutes at 54.5℃) then fried for 10 seconds each side in a smoking-hot pan. The cooked breasts were then encased in puff pastry layered with blanched spinach and duxelle mushrooms. This was a very flavoursome dish, and the buttery puff pastry complemented the pigeon well. The only downside was that the pigeon was slightly overcooked when it came out of the oven - a shame given that they were a perfect medium rare after cooking sous vide. Next time I'll stop there.