Spruce Grouse Vs. Ruffed Grouse Meat

[Ben Fougere]

Which is better (or do you prefer) and why, spruce grouse or ruffed grouse?

Anyone have any recipes for Spruce grouse?

[Wild one]

Prefer ruff because they are good no matter how you cook them

Spruce are still not getting passed on and the younger white meat spruce are still a versatile meat. Older dark meat spruce I use for stew, stir fry or breaded with a spicy Cajun style breading and pan fried

[elch jager]

Here in BC, I prefer Spruce... I enjoy the slightly gamier flavour and find they retain more moisture making the texture less chewy... In Ontario, we much preferred Ruffed... the Spruce there tasted much more gamey than here in BC. Likely due to what their diet was/is.

[russm]

I’ve only shot one spruce and it tasted rather woody compared to a ruffed, but blues taste better than both.

[Blainer]

Another vote for Ruffed
Sharptail are another tasty grouse

[BRvalley]

I prefer ruffed, but will only pass on sprucies if I already have a few ruffed on the rope...ruffies I cook like I would any chicken recipe, late season spruce will tend to put them in a stew, curry, etc to mask the gamier flavour...but they all taste good when you mcnugget them too

[ncurrie]

Spruce does have a gamier taste, but if you soak them in milk for a bit it cures that. Any grouse is one of my favourite meats to eat. My kids love when I make home made Mac and cheese with grouse and bacon.

https://instagram.com/p/BaKhYafH7ea/

[BRrooster]

prefer Ruffed , even the kids now have had enough Spruce and we let them walk. We had a Ruffed grouse that was kinda a hunting camp pet. He would come around
and feed and put put put around while we were going over our morning hunts around the campfire. So I told my brother in law that he was not allowed to whack him.
Said the grouses name was George. Later that season Brother in law told me that whenever he saw a grouse he would jump out of the truck and yell, "are you George" , and if the grouse didn't answer he got whacked.
As for recipes, we like to chunk up the grouse breasts and sometimes the thighs and season them then fry em up for bite size bits. Spruce grouse, we boil up with
a rock , throw the grouse away and eat the rock.

[mpotzold]

The grouse we normally hunt are the Ruffed & Blue. On a rare occasion a Spruce grouse aka Fool Hen will be shot with a gun or taken with an hatchet/axe throw.


From my experience the Ruffed that I’ve hunted since a teen has the best taste & is more tender.

No special spices or overnight soaking in buttermilk is needed. The breast is cut in pieces cooked in a frying pan using butter & olive oil with salt,pepper & garlic.


Blue grouse is much bigger & in the fall tastes like chewing on conifer needles & the meat is more chewier.


Spruce is OK until late fall when it tastes like spruce/pine needles.

The Spruce is hard to see because it rarely flushes & sits tight hiding in the branches.
Remember on a hunt near Germansen with R.M. killing a Spruce in the dense woods coming down the mountain & within minutes cooking it over fire using sharp alder sticks. The taste was great(probably because we were starved)

[quadrakid]

I like spruce grouse,then ruffed or willow as the island boys say.