Maybe tinamou doesn’t immediately come to mind as you scan the
menu of your favourite eatery, looking for something new to try.
But Canadians may soon be feasting on the tender relative of the
ostrich and emu, thanks to a team of UBC researchers.
Animal Science Prof. Kim Cheng has been leading the Faculty of
Agricultural Sciences’ work in developing the tinamou, a native
of Chile, for commercial production since 1992 and may be within
a year of bringing the new poultry to market.
“We’ve successfully bred the bird in captivity and found a suitable
diet and housing for it,” Cheng says. “Once we find a farm site
to start production, tinamou could be available within months.”
Lower in fat and higher in protein than chicken, the bird has long
been prized in South America for its tender white breast meat and
mild flavour. Its tenderness is the result of spending most of its
time on the ground, flying only if it can’t find a hiding spot when
startled.
With close to 2,000 birds, UBC has the largest flock of tinamou
in North America, the descendants of a few birds which originally
arrived in the U.S. in 1972. Plans to introduce them as game birds
into California, Oregon and Washington states were abandoned for
lack of environmental impact studies.
Although the tinamou may live five years or longer in the wild,
in captivity it reaches its mature weight of about half a kilogram
between 12 and 16 weeks.
Master’s student Anthony Yuen has been analyzing post-mortem muscle
characteristics of the bird, including the degree of acidity, or
pH values, and sugar levels — factors which affect the meat’s ultimate
tenderness. His preliminary findings indicate that 13 weeks is the
optimum processing age. Some of B.C.’s finest chefs seem to agree.
“We’ve sent both young and old birds to several local restaurants,
including the Four Seasons Hotel and Bishop’s, and have received
mixed responses,” Cheng says. “Feedback on the younger birds was
good. Apparently they make a nice appetizer when the breast meat
is battered and flash fried. Older birds ended up in the stew pot
with tomatoes and garlic.”
Tinamou eggs are edible and similar to a chicken’s in flavour,
but it’s their glossy, dark chocolate-coloured shells that are most
valued, especially by the crafters of decorated eggs. On average,
a tinamou hen will lay two eggs a week, from mid-March to September,
each one weighing about 40 grams.
Wild, trapped tinamou were marketed as the South American quail
in Europe in the late 1800s until they became rare in the wild.
Cheng hopes that a commercial flock of 1,000 breeding hens will
be established for production this year.
“In a country as rich and industrialized as Canada, it’s hard to
remember that we need more variety in our diet,” he says. “We rely
heavily on chicken and turkey as a food source, and it’s not healthy
to depend on any one species as much.”
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