Slow Cooker Cornish Game Hens With Grand Marnier Sauce

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Cornish game hens are a close relative to pheasant. This is an elegant but easy recipe for slow cooker Cornish game hens with Grand Marnier sauce. Perfect for a holiday dinner!
Fantastic slow cooker recipe! Grand Marnier Cornish Game Hens and Wild Rice with Cranberries and Pecans. | Recipe on WhatAGirlEats.com

I had a built in “family” when I moved to England in 1984, attending college with Charles, whose family are farmers in Yorkshire.
I had spent time with them when I’d traveled around Europe after college.  So on weekends, I’d travel up to North Yorkshire for shooting parties. Those were great times, usually about 12 of us would stay in the house, with its dozen bedrooms.

The men would shoot game during the day and the girls would accompany them. In the evening, we’d have drinks in the drawing room, with Smoked Trout Mousse , then supper in the dining room that seated 22. Later, we’d play parlor games. It was a magical, 1940’s PBS drama, kind of time. On quieter weekends, we would go rabbit hunting to thin the population. I learned how to shoot a shotgun and a rifle, and the difference between them.

Although both the rabbit and game population were completely safe from me, I did learn to love the taste of game. My flatmates in London were all barristers. Perry, whose family owned our flat, was the son of a lord. When he would return from his own shooting weekends on his estate, he’d bring back a few brace of pheasant for us. Before we could eat them, he would hang them in our garage until they were properly “gamey”. If I recall correctly, a week or so, was about right.

When it was time to actually prepare them, Perry would have to pluck and remove the shot from the birds. This is not generally a popular job, but since I knew I probably wouldn’t have many opportunities to learn how to prepare a game bird, I offered to help him. I remember sitting on stools in the garage, plucking pheasant feathers onto newspaper and chatting about life.

I prepared a couple of pheasant for a dinner party one evening using a recipe I had clipped out of the London Times. The recipe calls for marinating the birds in strawberries for a couple of days. I think game goes really well with fruit, so I’ve developed my own easier recipe, using oranges and the slow cooker.

It calls for Cornish game hens, which is pretty much the only “game” bird you can get outside of England, unless you have friends in game-bird country.

If you do ever get to eat real wild game, it is not unusual to get some shot in your meat, and completely appropriate to set said shot on your dinner plate. I serve these Game Hens with  Cranberry Pecan Wild Rice. 

Enjoy the Cornish game hens recipe.

5 from 3 votes
Fantastic slow cooker recipe for Grand Marnier Cornish Game Hens and Wild Rice with Cranberries and Pecans. The perfect easy holiday dinner recipe! @whatagirleats.com
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Slow-Cooker Cornish Game Hen with Grand Marnier Sauce
Prep Time
10 mins
Cook Time
3 hrs
Total Time
3 hrs 10 mins
 
Slow-cooker Cornish game hens with Grand Marnier Sauce. I used 2 hens for my family of four. I also made them in the crock pot, which made them extra easy!
Course: Entree
Cuisine: British
Servings: 4
Author: Cynthia
Ingredients
  • 2 Cornish game hens split down the back and flattened out to fit inside a large slow-cooker
  • Zest and juice of one orange
  • 4 tablespoons gluten free soy sauce
  • 1 clove of garlic minced
  • 2 tablespoons of honey
  • 1 tablespoon of brown sugar
  • 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 1 tablespoons Grand Mariner
Instructions
  1. Mix all the above ingredients together and put in a crock pot.
  2. Split the birds down the back and flatten them out and put in crock pot.
  3. Cook on high for about 3 hours.
  4. Remove birds from crock pot and strain the juices.
  5. Heat the remaining juice/marinade over a medium heat until reduced by half and slightly thicker. Remove from heat.
  6. Finish sauce by whisking in 3-4 tablespoons butter and 1 tablespoon of Grand Mariner.
  7. Finish birds by browning skin under broiler for a couple of minutes until the skin in golden brown.
  8. Spoon some sauce over each bird.

 

Slow-cooker Cornish Game Hens with Grand Marnier make an easy and elegant dinner. Gluten free.

Slow-cooker Cornish Game Hens with Grand Marnier make an easy and elegant dinner. Gluten free.

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Comments

  4. Nicole Neverman says

    Thank you so much for attending week 6 of #PureBlogLove and linking your fantastic blog post. This hen recipe looks delicious, Cynthia! I can’t wait to see what you have in store for our party next week Thursday 8 PM EST- Sundays at midnight . Your post has been added to the #PureBlogLove Pinterest board for all to see 🙂 Have a great day!
    Nicole
    http://picnicnz.blogspot.co.nz/

    Reply

  7. Andi says


    I love game birds – pheasant, quail and eat as much of it as possible when I go back to Europe – since you’re right Cornish game hen is about all we get! I also love rabbit, something I had never eaten until moving to France. Now we eat it all the time. Our local butcher makes and amazing rabbit pate that I could eat by the pound!

    Reply

    • Cynthia says

      Andi, I’m with you on pate! I LOVE it! I went to cooking school in San Francisco…probably not too far from you. I would love to track down some great pate!

      Reply

  10. April says

    sounds like a magical time!!! i ate a lot of cornish game hen in law school… but it was from the freezer section of my market and cooked in the microwave. LOL

    Reply

    • Cynthia says

      Heather, I was a great time! I’m glad I realized it and savored the time rather than taking it for granted…I most assuredly DO NOT live in a PBS kind of world today!

      Reply

  12. estherjulee says

    that’s so cool that you got to experience the entire process. i don’t know if i have the stomach for plucking and removing the shots.. but i do love target shooting and have always wanted to try hunting. i imagine it’s so much more difficult. i was never really good at skeet shooting either with moving targets. 😛

    Reply

    • Cynthia says

      Des, they really are a pretty inexpensive meal. They are plentiful in my grocer’s freezer section right now. I think they also make a nice elegant meal for a small party.

      Reply

  16. Shashi at RunninSrilankan says

    Your painted such a lovely picture by describing your evenings in England as ” magical, 1940’s PBS drama, kind of time”. And speaking of magical – wow – cornish hens in the slow cooker must taste anything but magical indeed!

    Reply

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