Old Habits Die Hard
We don't have duck on the menu. About the only time duck appears anywhere on any of our menus is the banquet menu, which has a crostini with spiced duck breast and a cherry wine sauce. It's a delicious little thing to nibble on, but in order to make the crostinis, we order whole ducks. That's right. We just need the breasts, but we order whole ducks.My French-trained brain starts salivating when I see those carcasses: domestic Peking ducklings, usually from Long Island, grown for their nice large breast/body weight ratio and their high fat content. A duck is a treasure trove to any chef and, in reality, the breast is probably the least valued part. Breaking it down, you end up with the duck legs, the carcass and the fat-laden skin. Duck fat is culinary gold. Great for sauteing, wonderful in so many recipes and absolutely delish. The legs? Wonderful as confit! And the bones? Wonderful for roasting and turning them into a lovely brown duck stock for duck soup and sauces.
But in my kitchen, do we ever use duck fat for cooking? Nope.
In my kitchen, do we have any menu items with confit? Nope.
In my kitchen, does any sort of soup with the word "duck" on it sell? Nope.
Ugh.
But I still use all of the duck. It would be wasteful not to. The fat, I just keep on rendering off and recycling for making confit. Problem is, all you do is keep on accumulating the fat. I started off with a nine pan of fat and now I'm up to a full half pan of duck fat. Delicious stuff, but I have no idea when we're going to use it. Soap keeps on coming to mind, which makes sense considering I saw Fight Club the other night.
The bones? I've absolutely given up on using them for anything other than just throwing them in with the chicken bones for the general white chicken stock we use in fortifying our sauces and soups. Again, any soup with "duck" in the title doesn't sell and, in all reality, usually needs to be finished off with some veal stock to have a nice round flavor. But at least we're using them.
It's the confit that's really the habit that I can't break. 3 more ducks? 6 more legs of confit in the freezer. I think we've got 24 legs in the freezer right now. I love the whole process of curing the legs, cooking them in the fat, and relishing the wonderful flavor of confit with the perfect accompaniment, cassoulet, a rustic French white bean casserole with bacon, onion, thyme and sausage. But unfortunately, I just can't seem to sell it. Any specials with confit just never seem to sell. So I'll often make cassoulet with duck confit for family meal, but even then, many of the employees don't appreciate rustic French cuisine. So there's leftovers.
Old habits die hard. I don't want to waste a bit of that duck and, in the end, it works out well for me. I usually end up eating cassoulet with duck confit for days, which is all the better since cassoulet was one of those "love at first bite" dishes for me.
Just put another 8 duck legs away to cure today. Duck confit on Monday, cassoulet on Tuesday, leftovers Wednesday through Friday. Sounds like a plan.
2 Comments:
Oh stop! You're making me so hungry!
ok you must save some, and we should have duck at your place in two weeks
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