32- Free like a Bird

I was wondering how could it be possible But he was more faster than me and walk riht away to talk with the person in charge. I stared at him, breath taking, imppresed by his ferocity.

Almost all game birds are considered aphrodisiacs, but not chickens, hens, and domestic turkeys, melancholic creatures that know nothing of love. These birds spend their short lives motionless inside atrocious cages, with no visual perspective other than the tail of another similar creature, fed with fish meal, saturated with hormones, and deceived by artificial light to force them to grow quickly and lay eggs obsessively. Barely reaching the ideal weight, they are killed. They know nothing of the adventure of hunting a worm in the ground or chasing another bird of the opposite sex. They are so unhappy that they cannot bring happiness to anyone. However, if you manage to get free-range chickens and turkeys, the ones that happily peck around under the sun, you can also incorporate them into your erotic cuisine.

Some of the birds we mention here also usually come from breeding grounds, but their brown, intense flavor meats have an exotic and wild touch capable of stimulating the human imagination, especially when prepared with abundant spices, herbs, and liquors. Wild birds have a reputation for being more aphrodisiac than their domestic counterparts. Pigeons also are, but what Christian would eat those little animals that symbolize the Holy Spirit, unless they were starving, like a friend of mine, exiled in Canada, who went out at night to hunt sleeping pigeons in the park to cook them on a clandestine stove in the small hotel room where he lived. That same rented room was heated with a coin-operated radiator, where coins were inserted through a slot. My friend discovered a cheaper way to make it work: he bought chocolate coins, carefully emptied the contents, leaving the metallic paper intact; he ate the chocolate, filled the wrapper with water and put it in the window, where the polar cold would freeze it in a few minutes, he removed the paper - which he would use as a mold again - and placed the ice coin on the heater. Every month, the inspector tried in vain to fix the device... Poor pigeons, they are birds without imagination or malice. One of them flew out of Noah's Ark after forty days of universal flood, and returned with an olive branch in its beak to indicate that they could now disembark, because there was dry land. The poor thing didn't suspect that it would end its days cooked in olive oil. Pigeons did not always represent fertile land for Jews or peace for Christians, before they were birds associated with Aphrodite, Astarte, and Juno, goddesses of sexuality. In Indian mythology, they represent copulation and life. With Panchita, we had decided not to include pigeon recipes in this book, so as not to hurt the sensitivities of religious individuals or lovers of metropolitan fauna, but we couldn't resist the temptation.

At first glance, these birds are all the same, but there are mourning doves disguised as partridges, chatty pigeons that bother at dawn, tourist pigeons from squares and cathedrals, guerrilla pigeons that defecate on balconies, and of course, messenger pigeons. You can attract all of them with breadcrumbs and catch them as soon as they let their guard down, and then put them in the oven with this ancient recipe:

And I know the love message is the most important part for every priestess when she is cooking.

Take two messenger pigeons and twist their necks mercilessly. Before they stiffen and torment your conscience, immerse them in boiling water for three minutes, remove them, and while still hot, pluck their feathers. Pass them over a gas flame to burn off any remaining fluff. Cut off the legs and head, and remove the innards through a cut in the belly. Rub them with butter, lemon, salt, and plenty of pepper, and let them rest in the peaceful sleep of the dead for twenty-four hours. Stick a clove into a garlic clove, and insert this into a new onion, which will be wrapped in a slice of bacon. (Repeat the process, as you will need two fillings). Place the seasoned onions inside the birds and close the opening with a toothpick. Pour a glass of good warm cognac over them and ignite it. When the flame goes out, cook the pigeons for half an hour in a hot oven, basting them with liquor and melted butter to taste. Serve with sweet potatoes and glazed carrots, and of course, accompanied by a good white wine.

I suggest buying your birds already dead and plucked. Many years ago, there was a chicken coop at the back of my grandfather's house, a pilgrimage idea that I do not recommend. After the old cook, in charge of feeding and slaughtering the birds, disappeared, they died of old age because no one wanted to take on the cruel responsibility of cooking beings with whom there was a personal relationship. When the chicken coop was neglected and the smell attracted the police, a close family friend offered to massacre them. He was a tall, dark-skinned man with a gladiator's neck and large worker's hands, who had lived for years in a strange religious sect and it was said that they had washed his brain and heart, foreveriving him of human emotions. The man entered the chicken coop with the step of a bullfighter and cast a mocking glance at the sleepy hens, arranged in the invariable semicircle in which their monotonous lives passed. I don't know what he saw in their eyes. He came out, this time retreating with the step of an ice skater, and asked for newspaper and glue. He spent the next hour making paper cones to cover the heads of the hens, so they would not have to witness the systematic murder of their companions while waiting their turn. Once all the birds were properly hooded, he chose the first one randomly and put it under his arm.