Dove hunting and its delicious result

September first is a bona fide holiday in our family. For generations, my hubby's family members have taken the day off of work and freed their kids from school to celebrate the opening day of mourning dove season.

When I first met the hubby (then boyfriend) I began joining him on this sacred holiday, and I have since learned to love dove openers. Unlike the wintertime water foul seasons, it's typically warm enough on September 1st to wear shorts. You pack a lunch, some water, and many, many boxes of shotgun shells and, if you're lucky, you come home with fewer than a dozen doves. If you're me, you come home with one bird...ok, so shotgunning fast-moving airborne game birds is not my strong suit. But my lack of success dove hunting doesn't keep me from going.

This year, we packed both of the kids, who were eager to participate in this family tradition. Though Little Sister is still too young and excitable to handle even a toy gun, Boy has demonstrated extremely disciplined gun handling skills with his toy guns and, as a result, was given his first shotgun for his 5th birthday.

This isn't any shotgun either. This JC Higgins 410 single-shot was his daddy's first shotgun, and his granddaddy's first shotgun as well. While Boy is still a bit too small to handle it by himself, he did get a chance to fire a round in the direction of a dove...with no success, but at least he was in good company. It was a fun morning, and the kids both came home dirty and tired, and we had a collective count of about 10 birds to show for our efforts.

The Hubby went out for the afternoon shoot, sans wife and kids, and came home with about 20 more. Out here, while there is a 15 bird limit on our native mourning dove, the larger, non-native Eurasian collared dove has begun to dominate the habitat and resources of the mourning dove, and is therefore considered a nuisance species. There is no limit on collared dove.

So what do you do with 30 or so dove?  I typically make a fun little appetizer called Dove Poppers which is a half dove breast marinated in Chipotle Tobasco sauce atop a cream cheese stuffed half jalapeno, wrapped with bacon and then baked, but this year, due to the volume of little dove breasts in the fridge, the Hubby suggested a dove jambalaya...ooooh, I love it when he talks food.

So we began looking into recipes and managed to adapt a few to meet our needs. I was extremely disappointed with the store-bought Cajun seasoning options, so the Hubby found a great recipe for it as well and I included it here too, but feel free to use a store-bought one you like if you'd rather. The jambalaya was a huge success, and we both agreed it was our new favorite recipe for dove! It made a huge pot, and was perfect for a group, and the dove meat was fork tender, moist and delicious. Even people who turn their noses up at game meat would be hard pressed to find flaw with this recipe, so without further ado, here it is.

Dove Jambalaya

• 
  6 slices thick cut bacon, cut into1-inch pieces
• 1 pound cooked ham, diced
• 2 pounds boneless dove breasts
• 1 package cooked andouille sausage
• 3 T butter
• 2 cups chopped celery
• 2 cups bell pepper, seeded and chopped
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 4 (14.5 ounce) cans diced tomatoes, with liquid
• 4 cups beef broth
• 4 cups chicken broth
• 6 T. Cajun seasoning (recipe below) divided
• 3 cups uncooked white rice

1. Sprinkle 3-4 T of Cajun seasoning over dove breasts and toss to coat.
2. In a large stockpot, cook bacon over medium heat until crisp. Remove bacon with a slotted spoon and set aside.
3. Add dove breasts to pot and brown in batches in bacon grease. Return browned meat and bacon to pan and add diced ham and sliced sausage. Set aside.
4. In a separate pan, heat butter over medium heat. Add celery, pepper, onion and garlic and saute until soft.
5. Add veggies to meat in stock pot, along with tomatoes, broth and 2 T. Cajun seasoning. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer approximately 2 hours.
6. Stir in rice and cover, setting timer for 20 minutes. Stir occasionally to keep rice from sticking to bottom of pot.
7. Remove pot from heat and let set 10 minutes before serving.

Cajun Seasoning

• 5 T. paprika
• 2 T. fresh ground black pepper
• 1 T. onion powder
• 1 T. garlic powder
• 1 T. dried oregano
• 1 T. dried basil
• 1 T dried thyme
• 1 T. salt
• 1 tsp. white pepper
• 1 tsp. cayenne pepper (or to taste)
• 1 tsp. ground coriander

Perfect day at the range!

The sun was shining, the wind was still, the babysitter was available...Saturday was a perfect day to let some lead fly at the range.

A few weeks ago, I posted about my new toy, the Saiga 12-gauge shotgun. Since then, we've made a few customizations to her including a new pistol grip, trigger group, adjustable buttstock, gas adjustment knob, and finished it up by ordering two 10-round magazines and a 20-round drum mag. The hubby even sacrificed his own load development and reloading to spend half a day on Friday converting her so we could take her out this weekend to give her a spin. This is the result:

I realize that you can't see the targets very well in the video, but there were 12 stationary targets and the last one was airborne clay pigeon. I obliterated all of them, even with the stove-pipe misfire to distract me. In fact, I've never been known for my accuracy with sporting clays (if I shoot 20%, I'm doing well), but to my surprise, I didn't miss a single flyer the whole day. (Note to self: get 2-round mag and take Saiga dove hunting this year)

Don't get me wrong, this gun is a brute. When I "function tested"  the 20-round mag for the first time, I felt all the adrenaline pumping excitement I did when I was kickboxing. It's loud, rough, has tons of muzzle climb, and about 12 rounds through the 20-round mag and you realize the recoil has backed you up about nine inches and you need to readjust your position. But even with all of that, there's no way to NOT feel like Rambo when you're done unloading 20 rounds.

As if all that wasn't enough to send me home from the range with a grin on my face, I was also able to smack the 500 yard plate on 4 out of 4 shots with the Hubby's home-made 260, and every draw from my new thigh rig felt fast and smooth. Oh, is there any greater joy than a perfect day on the range?

Momma's new toy

The hubby brought home a surprise for me last week: the Saiga 12-gauge shotgun. Here's a little demo of this handy little firearm in action.

Ok, so the version they're using in the video is modified, but it's hard to deny how awesome that baby is!

I'll never forget when I first saw the Saiga in action. The Hubby was trying to convince me that we needed one, and I was rolling my eyes, thinking, yeah, we already have tactical shotguns, and semi-auto shotguns...why would we need a mag fed shotgun? And then I saw the video. It was love at first sight, and when I found out it came with a 20-round drum mag...ooh la la! I had to have one. That was more than a year ago, but when the Feds recently decided to restrict the Saiga's importation claiming they had no function as a "sporting" shotgun, purchasing a Saiga went up a notch on our priority list.

I'm champing at the bit to try my new baby out at the range. Although I'm certain it will be a long time and a few modifications before I can run mine like the guys at R and R run theirs, I do look forward to employing it often enough to become competent, if not lethal with it.