For marinade, squeeze or juice two large lemons. This should provide 1 to 1½ cups of lemon juice. Slowly stir in olive oil. Stir in smashed garlic, black peppercorns, and 1 teaspoon kosher salt. Once thoroughly mixed, add quail to marinate for 2-3 hours.
To cook bulgur, bring 1 cup water to a boil. Once boiling, immediately add 1 cup bulgur. Stir in and reduce heat to medium-low. Continue to stir often as the bulgur absorbs water. After 10 minutes, turn heat to low and stir for another 5 to 10 minutes, until water is fully absorbed. Once water is fully absorbed, add ½ teaspoon kosher salt and ½ tablespoon salted butter. Stir in, then remove bulgur from stove and refrigerate.
To make the tabbouleh salad, remove heads of parsley from stems and chop/mince thoroughly. Your final product should have texture but not be minced into dust. Essentially, the parsley should be somewhere between a rough chop and fine mince.
Add remaining ingredients to salad: two finely diced on-the-vine tomatoes, ¼ cup finely diced red onion, 1 diced bunch of green onions, and ¼ cup of finely minced fresh mint. Add ½ teaspoon kosher salt and ½ teaspoon freshly cracked pepper. Mix delicately so as not to bruise the parsley or smash the tomatoes.
For the dressing, mix 2-3 tablespoons of freshly squeezed lemon juice (depends on how lemony you want it) along with ⅓ cup extra virgin olive oil. Delicately mix into salad.
Once the bulgur has cooled, add to salad and delicately mix in.
After the quail has marinated for 2-3 hours, grill until the exterior is crisp and the internal temperature has reached 160 degrees Fahrenheit. Do not rinse off the marinade prior to grilling. When finished cooking, remove quail and allow to rest for 5 minutes prior to serving.
Dish out the salad and top with grilled quail. Top the grilled quail with sprinklings of coarse sea salt to bring out the flavor. Kosher salt would work if you don’t have coarse sea salt.