Close-up!:)

Quail Roast

Quails Pan Roast

Quails Raw Meat

Quails in Wild

Quails Roast:

The Quail is called ‘Bater’ in Hindi. We call it has ‘kaadai’ or ‘Goudhari’ in Tamil. (Ofcource both are entirely different species )Quail is a small type of bird that belongs to the Pheasant family. There are two species of quail in India; the black-breasted quail found in jungle (Coturnix Coromandelica) and the brown-coloured Japanese Quail(Coturnix Coturnix Japonica) which is bred for meat or the one used for commercial Quail production. Until few years ago it was a game bird, hunted for pleasure and meat. Now it has been commercially cultured everywhere. The commercially cultured species are Japanese varieties called Couturnix quails.

Quail is a collective name for several genera of mid-sized birds in the pheasant family Phasianidae, or in the family Odontophoridae. The Old World species (Europe, Africa, Asia) . The New World quails(endemic to America) are not closely related, but are named for their similar appearance and behaviour. Anyways…as far as I get some quails here at Oxford, I am fine with any species!:)

According to gourmets, it is tastier than chicken. The breast and legs are considered delicacies. The meat is more gamier in taste! Besides taste, meat promotes good body and brain development in children. Best balanced food for pregnant and nursing mothers! The skin is so thin and less in fat content (very low calorific value) but more of phospholipds. So no worries of Cholesterol!

When compared to chicken meat(in raw) we get the following results:

When Quails have 73.93% moisture, chicken has 73-87%. Quails have 20.54% of protein compared with 20.66%. Fat 3.85% while for chicken 3.61%. Carbohydrate is so less 0.56% while chicken has 0.78%. Minerals account about 1.12% has chicken has 1.08%. Doesnt this sound amazing! I know some of you are thinking very intelligent now….what is the great difference, right! Hey imagine the size of the quails and chicken, please!

This is the first time I spotted some frozen quails in Walmart. Although not exactly like Indian Peasant bird(kaadai/ kowdhari). It was at least mid-sized bird. I thought of charcoal grilling them after a nice rub with Indian spices. Since it was so cold outside….decided to put them in an oven. So to get away with raw garlicky odour…was pan roasting them for a while…before taking it to the oven. And imagine what…it was half cooked by the time. So concluded as Pan-Roast! Doesn’t that sound nice!

Ingredients:

Quails 2
Garlic 1 whole head (peeled and grated)
Dry red chilies 1 fistful (toasted and grated)
Curry laves few (used them dry here…so crumbled)
Country tomatoes 2 finely chopped
Salt
Turmeric 1/4 spoon
Sesame oil few spoons
Cilantro.

Method:

Heat oil, in a wide pan. Add chili flakes,c Curry leaves and garlic. Fry real good….until the whole house is aromatic with nice garlic odour.

Now stir-in tomatoes…fry till they wilt and oil shows up on sides.

Add salt and turmeric. Now add whole of chopped quails. Fry them over low heat…until they coat oil, spices and getting cooked. Constantly roll them to finish cooking thoroughly all the sides(applies to one uses whole quails). One could possibly take it to oven roast. Must be great that way!

Serve to go with regular rasam rice or dhall rice.