I’ve always seen roasting a whole duck as a kind of ultimate kitchen challenge, primarily because getting that crispy skin without turning the meat into leather is essentially a paradox, but also that when you pull it off, it is a delicious thing.
While I love a perfectly moist duck breast, I’m still very much thigh guy when it comes to birds. Ironically for dark meat, it takes a monumental fail to mess it up, perhaps that’s why it is seen as a less ‘significant’ cut. But for me, its the tastiest part.
So anyway, back to the paradox on the crown, while I’m sure many cooks have invented a myriad of techniques to get round it, I’ve settled on the following basic recipe (videos of the cook here) which suits my home kitchen, and satisfies my weekend kitchen warrior tendencies.
Day 1. Crown the bird, rub with coarse salt, let air in fridge uncovered (I simply confit the legs in duck fat at 140degC for 2hours)
Day 2. Pour boiling water on skin, and dry it thoroughly with a hair dryer (serious). Pat it dry, put more coarse salt and put it back in the fridge, uncovered
At the end of Day 2, it should look like below.
Day 3. The Cook
I don’t know what you call it, but essentially I ‘slow’ cook it by firstly starting in the pan, and then alternating between high heat in oven followed by extended resting, and then back in the oven again.
The Pan
I start the bird in a smoking hot pan, and browning the bird starting from its back and move it all around till it is brown all over.
Make sure the pan is dry, and mop up any oils that flow out with kitchen towel
Brush the bird with either some butter or some of its own oils to lubricate
Rest for 5 min
The Oven-Rest
Glaze with honey/soya/mirin glaze and stick it in the oven set to 200C for 3mins
Rest for 3mins, and brush with some duck fat
Back in oven for 3mins
Rest for 3mins, and brush with glaze or duck fat
Repeat steps 7 and 8, for three more turns
Rest it finally for 10mins before carving
The Results
Four birds presented below
—
Roast Challans Duck No.1, with honey/soya glaze
Duck breast, warm salad of blood orange, hispi cabbage, peas tossed in the same pan to soak up the duck juices. Sauce is mirin, sake, soya, chicken stock and loads of fat and juices from confit of its legs.
Confit duck leg, 3 day old koshihikari rice fried in duck fat, fish sauce, soya sauce, chilli oil, peas and Perilla’s seaweed sourdough soaked and pan-fried in duck fat.
—
Roast Challans Duck No.2, with sugar glaze
Duck breast , jersey butter potato puree, cep, purple kale, baby kiwi and a mirin dashi sauce
I’ve always seen roasting a whole duck as a kind of ultimate kitchen challenge, primarily because getting that crispy skin without turning the meat into leather is essentially a paradox, but also that when you pull it off, it is a delicious thing.
While I love a perfectly moist duck breast, I’m still very much thigh guy when it comes to birds. Ironically for dark meat, it takes a monumental fail to mess it up, perhaps that’s why it is seen as a less ‘significant’ cut. But for me, its the tastiest part.
So anyway, back to the paradox on the crown, while I’m sure many cooks have invented a myriad of techniques to get round it, I’ve settled on the following basic recipe (videos of the cook here) which suits my home kitchen, and satisfies my weekend kitchen warrior tendencies.
Day 1. Crown the bird, rub with coarse salt, let air in fridge uncovered (I simply confit the legs in duck fat at 140degC for 2hours)
Day 2. Pour boiling water on skin, and dry it thoroughly with a hair dryer (serious). Pat it dry, put more coarse salt and put it back in the fridge, uncovered
At the end of Day 2, it should look like below.
Day 3. The Cook
I don’t know what you call it, but essentially I ‘slow’ cook it by firstly starting in the pan, and then alternating between high heat in oven followed by extended resting, and then back in the oven again.
The Pan
The Oven-Rest
The Results
Four birds presented below
—
Roast Challans Duck No.1, with honey/soya glaze
Duck breast, warm salad of blood orange, hispi cabbage, peas tossed in the same pan to soak up the duck juices. Sauce is mirin, sake, soya, chicken stock and loads of fat and juices from confit of its legs.
Confit duck leg, 3 day old koshihikari rice fried in duck fat, fish sauce, soya sauce, chilli oil, peas and Perilla’s seaweed sourdough soaked and pan-fried in duck fat.
—
Roast Challans Duck No.2, with sugar glaze
Duck breast , jersey butter potato puree, cep, purple kale, baby kiwi and a mirin dashi sauce
—
Roast Challans Duck No.3, with yuzu honey glaze
Yuzu honey glazed duck leg, roasting juices, pea & asparagus puree, blackberries, potato puree
—
Roast Mallard, no glaze
Mallard roasted on the crown, puree of poached forced rhubarb and plums, Duck liver millefeuille and mirin duck jus.