I have a great rancher from whom I get my beef, chicken, pork, and eggs. He started raising ducks, so now I can get duck too.
There is a recipe from Saveur that some of my cooking buddies (mentors really) had used, and I finally had time to try it today on one of Kenny's ducks. It's the amazing five hour duck recipe found here:
http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/The-Amazing-Five-Hour-Duck
It was easy peasy, and very few ingredients. Salt, pepper, 3 cloves of garlic, and some thyme. And duck of course.
Mine was a smallish duck so I made two adjustments on the recommendation of one of my cooking mentors. I used an initial heat of 250 Fahrenheit, and I reduced the slow roasting time by one hour.
After rinsing and patting dry the duck, I seasoned the cavity with salt and pepper, and rubbed the garlic over the duck, inside and out.
The duck then goes on a roasting rack, and I tucked the thyme into the cavity. Then you make dozens of little tiny slits all over the duck, making sure not topierce the meat.
It goes on the middle rack in the oven and roasts for an hour. Take it out, pour off (and keep!) the fat, and turn the duck over. Make dozens of tiny slits again. Roast another hour, repeat. Roast another hour, repeat. For my 3 1/2 lb duck I did the slow roast for a total of three hours.
Take out the duck and turn up the heat to 350 Fahrenheit. After pouring off the fat again, salt and pepper the outside of the duck before putting back in the 350 oven.
Roast one more hour, then take the duck out and let it rest 20 minutes.
The recipe is right when it says you get tender meat with crispy skin. We had risotto and cucumber salad with our duck.
Labels: Main Dish
