With all seven of my family members at home, it has been fun and a pleasant change to make an especially nice dinner on a Saturday night and to eat in the dining room rather than the kitchen. Not only does it feel more special, but it also tends to have the added benefit of putting everyone on their best behavior!
I had some frozen duck breasts and thought I would defrost them, prepare them over the course of two days and serve them with a red wine sauce.
Here’s what I did:
I defrosted six duck breasts overnight in the refrigerator which is the best way to defrost meat if you have the time. This morning, I lined a half sheet pan with a wire rack and put the duck breasts on it. I scored the duck skin by making slash marks with a knife diagonally from right to left and left to right, and seasoned the duck with lots of salt and pepper:
I could have left the duck like this and placed it in the refrigerator overnight, but I wanted to enhance the flavor. So I got out my mortar and pestle and I ground up a smallish spoon each of black peppercorns and allspice berries:
I sprinkled this on the duck skin and crushed three garlic cloves by smashing them with the blunt side of a knife, removed the skin and distributed them across the duck as well. I also added torn bay leaves:
This duck will now hang out in the refrigerator, uncovered, until I am ready to cook it tomorrow. The whole process took about five minutes and was pretty easy.
One hour before I started cooking, I took the duck out of the refrigerator. You want the duck to come up to room temperature before you cook it and it takes time for meat to warm up. Also, leaving meat out with marinade or aromatics “uber” flavors it — the seasonings penetrate much more quickly at room temperature. It’s’ a good trick if you don’t have a lot of time.
To cook the duck, I placed it in a cold stainless steel pan, skin side down:
I turned the heat to medium low and let the duck cook for 20-25 minutes, until the skin crisped up and the fat rendered. I removed the duck fat as the meat cooked to ensure it browned rather than steamed. Then I strained and stored the duck fat in a jar, and I will keep it in my freezer and use it to fry up potatoes another time:
Once the skin crisped I turned the duck over and cooked the flesh side on medium-high heat for 2 minutes. Then I let the duck rest on a cutting board:
I made a red wine pan sauce (beurre rouge) by adding 1 cup of red wine to the pan along with a clove of garlic, thyme sprigs and salt and pepper. I simmered the wine and scraped all the drippings from the duck into the sauce. Then I added 5 tablespoons of butter, whisking each in one at a time to create a thicker sauce:
I sliced the duck and served it as shown in the head photo.
Comments