Dove hunters compete in World Championship Dove Cook-Off

Hunters took the doves they hunted over the past week and turned them into some tasty dishes, Luis Lopez reports

YUMA, Ariz. (KYMA, KECY) - While many dove hunters bring their birds home to cook anyway, earlier on Saturday the best of the best got together for the World Championship Dove Cookoff in front of Sprague’s Sports in Yuma.

The participants in the contest had 45 minutes to make their dishes. Any dove meat used had to be from birds that were hunted by the team members.

Every team, which consisted of two people each, ended up with a dove-related take on some classic dishes.

The mother-daughter team of Kathy Weddle and Katelyn Gauld, or “Dovearitas,” used their birds to make an iconic Mexican dish, a tostada, which they promptly renamed for the occasion.

“We tried a few recipes that weren’t so, didn’t taste too well, so it came down to the 'Dove-stada,' on a freshly fried tortilla topped with an egg fried, homemade egg fried rice with some fresh caught dove here in Yuma,”

Justin Nelson of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers (BHA), the organization that sponsored the event, said that creativity is one of the keys to the competition.

“There’s a million other things we can do with dove, and we get creative with it, and some of the dishes that are being made here today really show that. It’s been a lot of fun to watch,” Nelson said.

In the end it was Fritz Grisby and Eric Hanson who took home 1st place, doing so by making date poppers wrapped in prosciutto.

The team says that they were happy they could use their birds for such a meal.

"It was a good way to kind of honor the doves that we shot while we were out here instead of just taking them home and eating them, you know, we were able to do something really cool with them," said Grisby.

The BHA says they’d like to make this event bigger and bigger with each dove hunting season.