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Holiday Alternatives to Turkey:Feast Your Family On TheseBY BETSY KISSAMThanksgiving, holidays, and turkey are about as inseparable as Mom and apple pie Or are they? If you're looking for something different to fix in the upcoming, holiday-packed weeks, some of Brooklyn%u2019s leading food experts have agreed to share their own recipes%u2014unusual. sumptuous dishes prepared from uncommon cuts of commonly cooked meats, and from game birds and animals or out-of-the-ordinary commercially raised meats.Cooking exotic meats is not as difficult as most people believe. Even game meats, by definition wild birds, animals, and even a fish that are hunted or taken for sport, are easily within any cook%u2019s competence. According to a Canadian cookbook first published in 1923 when hunting was more prevalent than it is today, venison is cooked in the same manner as veal; bear meat should be treated like pork; and moose and buffalo like bear. It's difficult to imagine having bear chops for Monday nitzhi supper but recipes that arc imaginative and festive, combining the flavor of meats with fruits and vegetables and sometimes a touch of wine or brandy, make elegant holiday fare.Buying unusual meats, too, is about as easy as walking into your local supermarket to buy a roast beef so long as you know where to look. Most game meats although they must be ordered a day or two in ad\\anoe. are readily acailable in Brooklyn. These include venison, quail, and pheasant. Rabbits, geese, ducks and guinea hens arc commercially raised and therefore more immediately obtainable. Other neats, such as pig%u2019s head and suckling pig, although not game, are not everyday fare and generally must be ordered.Live poultry markets, of which there are at least three south of Atlantic Avenue in downtown Brooklyn, are a rich source for many kinds of bird meat and even rabbit. George Penzavecchio, who%u2019s been in the business since 1938 and owns the Carrol! Live Poultry Market, sells chickens, guinea hens, ducks, geese, rabbits, and of course turkeys. If you%u2019re still planning on a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, you can walk in and pick out your bird by the gleam in its eye or the strut in its walk; you're never going to have a fresher turkey unless you go out and shoot it yourself.For anyone who's never even seen live poultry markets, a visit is an experience. The outside of the Carroll Live Poultry Market is unassuming as is the inside which is a large open space with wooden plank floors and rows of cages. Animals arrive on Tuesdays and are sold out by the following Tuesday when a new shipment arrives; in between water and grain %u2019roughs attached to the cages supply food.After a fowl is selected by a buyer, it is weighed, killed and the blood drained, plucked by an automatic plucking machine which whirs out a circle of feathers that look like an ancient funeral mound, and then the bird is eviscerated. The whole process takes onlv 10 minutes.RABBITRabbit is skinned and cleaned at the poultry markets as well; it is also available fresh and frozen at other markets. Braised rabbit, cooked the way of Jim Maraldo, owner of La Primavera, combines rabbit with wine and imported mushrooms.VENISONVenison, another animal with what The Joy of Cooking by Rombauer and Becker calls that %u201c deliciously gamey flavor which derives from the fruit, the seeds, the berries or the grasses on which the animal has fed.\Hubert's Restaurant, 148 Hoyt Street, byShowing off a pig's head at G. Esposito's Pork Store. (Feldman Photo)first marinating a saddle of venison, then roasting, and serving it with a brandy cream sauce.Winter was the time during the Middle Ages in northern Europe to eat game because it was difficult to keep domesticated animals alive and healthy through the cold. Venison was often served with %u201cfrumenty\wheat grains and almond milk, and enriched sometimes with egg volks.WILD BIRDSWild birds were an important food source as well, and in America, they were very plentiful in the early years of colonization. One food historian tells of the year 1770 when records showed that 120 to 130 passenger pigeons were killed with one shot of a blunderbuss. More than 75,000 were sold in New York in one day, he said.Alfred Foffc, the proprietor of Foffe%u2019s Restaurant at 155 Montague Street and himself a hunter, serves numerous game dishes, animal and bird, in his restaurant. His Quail a la Foffe is an easy, quick recipe combining the finest ingredients into an elegant, festive meal.PHEASANTRoast pheasant, as cooked by Jim Maraldo of La Primavera in Park Slope is another entree worthy of any festive occasion, but still easy to prepare. For Roast Squab a la Limousin by Karen Hubert, the birds arc stuffed with a wild rice mixture, or if you prefer French bread dipped in cream. Limousin is a former province in central France and the name generally means that the meat is wrappedBuying unusual meats is about as easy as walking into your local supermarket to buy a roast beef, so long as you know where to look.BRAISED RABBITiserves 4) by Jim Maraldo Rabbit (4to 5 lbs.)4 tablespoons olive oil 4 tablespoons butter b cup onion, finely chopped %u2018%u20222 cup celery, finely chopped b cup carrots, finely chopped 2 bay leaves 1 teaspoon thyme 1 cup chopped seeded tomatoes 1 cup white wine1 ounce dried imported Italian Porcini mushrooms 1 cup chicken brothPreheat oven to 350 degrees Soak mushrooms in warm water to cover for 30 minutes. Remove mushrooms; strain mushroom broth through a paper towel. Save broth and set aside.Saute onions, celery, carrots in 2 tablespoons olive oil and 2 tablespoons butter until golden.Rinse rabbit with cold water and tie legs so rabbit keeps its shapeIn separate fryingpan brown rabbit in 2 tablespoons olive oil and 2 tablespoons butter turning until browned evenly.Place rabbit in heavy casserole with onions, celery, and carrots.Pour wine in pan rabbit was browned in and bring to boil scraping up browned bits and drippings, fo u r into casserole with rabbit. Add tomatoes, bay leaves, thyme, mushrooms, mushroom broth, and chuk ii broth; bring to a bull on top of stoveO v e r and place in oven for approximately 50 minutes to 1 hour. Baste occasiorutlly until rabbit is tender and done. Removerabbit to warm platter; Discard bay leaves; Skim off fat and pour sauce over rabbit 1 If sauce is too thin, reduce by boiling gently on stove until right consistency. iSprve w ith buttered A rhnrin rice or withfresh buttered noodles.ROAST SADDLE OF VENISONi serves Bi In Karen Hubert2 cups olive oil3 onions, medium 3 bay leavesb bunch Italian parsley l b cups brandy 2 cups white wine or vermouth h cup white peppercorns 1 cup heavy cream12 saddle of venison (have butcher crack bones so that 1 to 11 1 inch chops can be cut: allow 2 chops per person iCrush peppercorns i preferably with rolling pin, not in blender). Press well into meat so they won%u2019t fall off.Marinate venison in olive oil. onions (sliced i, stalks of parsley, bay leaves, 1 cup brandy and 1 cup w hite wine. Marinate overnight in refrigerator. Remove from marinade. Roast in 475 degree oven. Should be served rare. Deglaze pan with 12 cup brandy and 1 cup white wine. Put mixture in saucepan and reduce until it is a sticky film.Pour in cream and reduce by half, or until cream thickens. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve sauce separately.Serve with pears lightly poached in red w ine 1 and a pinch of sugar 1, puree of white turnips and chestnuts, and watercress saladSADDLE OF REINDEER IN ANORWEGIAN WILD SAUCE(serves 10-12) by Kolbeln Waag6 lb. saddle of reindeer Remove sinews from m eat and lard it with strips of fat salt pork. Rub m eat with salt and pepper. Put reindeer in roasting pan containing fat (lard or butter) and roast in hot oven (400 degrees 1 for about \\ b miniitpc ru%u00bbr rvuinH (T limn if raromeat is desired,)To prepare sauce:Have butcher give you extra reindeer bones,cut in small pieces. Put in saucepan and brown well in butter, being careful not to burn. Add enough beef broth to cover bones and let simmer for a few hours (the longer the tim e, the tastier the sauce).Prepare a roux. Add one pint heavy cream and liquid strained from simmeredbones to which has been added four tablespoons of melted Norwegian goat cheese. Salt and pepper to taste. When m eat is finished roasting, add drippings to sauce.Core apples and fill with fresh Norwegian lingonberries. Carve m eat and replace on saddle. Surround platter with filled apples. Drizzle small amount of sauce on saddle. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with sauce on the side.ROAST PHEASANT(serves 4) by Jim MaraldoPheasant (2b to 3 lbs)Pork fat1 onion, finely chopped 1 carrot, finely chopped 6 tablespoons butter 1 cup brown stock 1 cup Madeira juice of b lemonRub inside of pheasant with salt and pepper Tie a thin sheet of pork fat over breast. Saute onion and carrot in 4 tablespoons butter until golden. Add pheasant and brown on all sides.Lower heat, cover pot and cook 45 minutes, turning pheasant often, and baste with juices. Remove pork fat for last 10 minutes so breast will brown.Remove pheasant and keep warm.Add brown stock and Madeira to pan and reduce by b . Add lemon juice Off heat, stir in 2 tablespoons butter a little at a time. Strain sauce; skim off any fat and taste for seasoning.Serve on buttered toast roundsPage 10, The PHOENIX, November 15, 1979