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cookery experiments
Jul. 15th, 2006 09:32 pmI made duck leg confit a couple of days ago, just to see if I could. I tried a bit yesterday, but left it until today to have it as part of a meal, as it's one of those dishes that matures over a couple of days. Cold, it's pleasant but very salty, and I should probably have cured it for less than the 24 hours it got (the recipes I found online varied from a couple of hours to 24-48 hours).
Tonight I reheated a leg by frying it in its own fat, as recommended by a recipe I saw at the beginning of the week and promptly lost. Chucked in a couple of slices of fresh ginger to flavour the fat. Steamed a potato in the microwave for five minutes, then sliced it and fried it in the pan with the duck. Chopped a spring onion and dumped that on top of the frying potatos, and added steamed peas as another vegetable. Since I knew this was likely to be very fatty, I did a rhubarb sauce to go with it, which I will doubtless pay for tomorrow (IBS trigger). Also had a tablepoon of lingonberry jam, as I've thought before that it's sharp enough and the right flavour to make a good substitute for redcurrent jelly on fatty meat dishes.
The duck was salty but extremely tasty, and frying it does crisp up the skin nicely - and drains off a surprising amount of the fat, so if you lift it out with a slotted spoon and let it drain over the pan for a few seconds, you get rid of much of the fat. The lingonberry jam made an excellent accompanying suace, and cut the saltiness as well as the fat. The rhubarb was less successful, but I should probably look up how to make a proper rhubarb sharp sauce instead of just cooking it in the microwave for a couple of minutes with a bit of sugar. :-)
There are three legs left, so those will probably be lunch over the next couple of weeks. And if I haven't completely sickened myself, I shall then make some more, and experiment with different herbs in the dry marinade.
Tonight I reheated a leg by frying it in its own fat, as recommended by a recipe I saw at the beginning of the week and promptly lost. Chucked in a couple of slices of fresh ginger to flavour the fat. Steamed a potato in the microwave for five minutes, then sliced it and fried it in the pan with the duck. Chopped a spring onion and dumped that on top of the frying potatos, and added steamed peas as another vegetable. Since I knew this was likely to be very fatty, I did a rhubarb sauce to go with it, which I will doubtless pay for tomorrow (IBS trigger). Also had a tablepoon of lingonberry jam, as I've thought before that it's sharp enough and the right flavour to make a good substitute for redcurrent jelly on fatty meat dishes.
The duck was salty but extremely tasty, and frying it does crisp up the skin nicely - and drains off a surprising amount of the fat, so if you lift it out with a slotted spoon and let it drain over the pan for a few seconds, you get rid of much of the fat. The lingonberry jam made an excellent accompanying suace, and cut the saltiness as well as the fat. The rhubarb was less successful, but I should probably look up how to make a proper rhubarb sharp sauce instead of just cooking it in the microwave for a couple of minutes with a bit of sugar. :-)
There are three legs left, so those will probably be lunch over the next couple of weeks. And if I haven't completely sickened myself, I shall then make some more, and experiment with different herbs in the dry marinade.