An Ottomanelli butcher holds a pair of fine cockbirds.

CHOWING DOWN: The Art of the Game

So here we are, smack dab in the middle of holiday season. The signs are everywhere. There's a little nip to the air, so you break out the leather jacket (you know, of course, that fur just isn't PC). Lights are starting to pop up on the lawns in the country, prices are stating to climb up towards holiday levels and maybe you're starting to feel a little bit if the blahs. So even though you've got your mind on trimming the tree or lighting the candles or buying the presents or planning the big vacation or planning the best way to kill yourself, remember -- you gotta eat. And as long as you're gonna eat, you may as well eat good.

Beginning in the late fall and going straight through the winter is the time of year that the incredibly flavorful game meats and birds become readily available. Of course if your idea of game meats are the hot dogs at Giant Stadium and wild birds are the ones that the Colonel serves extra crispy, you should page on down to the end of this article.... But if you like your flavors big and bold, or like to experiment with some things that you may have never tried before, this is your time of year.

Before you attempt a home cooked meal centered around game, you should treat yourself to one prepared by an expert.

It's hunting season, and that makes it easiest to get quality game meats like deer, moose, and caribou and game birds like pheasant, goose, and wild duck at many butcher shops and restaurants.

There are only a couple of ways for you to get fresh game meat and birds, and each one has its advantages and disadvantages.

The first way is for you to go hunting. You put on a few layers of warm camouflage clothing and a bright orange vest (the vest is so that you don't get hunted accidentally), get yourself some type of big-ass rifle, and go sit in the woods for a few days until a wild animal comes close enough to you that you can bash it over the head with your rifle (because, get serious, you'll never hit the damn thing by shooting at it). We vote a definite no to this alternative. Your will probably starve and/or freeze before you actually kill something.

Next, you can have someone who really knows how to hunt give you something that they have recently killed for sport and pleasure. This is actually a very fine way to get some good eats. We have been on the receiving end a few times and like it so much that we have made it a yearly ritual to beg some type of fresh kill from our one and only hunter-friend Peter Faz. And by our asking him for some meat, it gives him the chance to relive his latest trip while telling us all about his tales of the great hunt. The downside of getting your wild game this way is two-fold. First, you have to listen to some seriously dull hunting stories and second is you run the risk of biting the proverbial -- and literal -- bullet. That has happened to us on a few occasions. When that did happen, we did with that bullet the only thing you should do with it. We gave the damn thing back to Peter Faz who put it on a chain and now proudly wears it around his neck (which provides him with yet another story that he can subject his friends to).