Stuffing for a duck

[Tengu]

Dad probably wont want to....However he got me a duck!

(He wanted turkey...I explained we both live on chicken and so turkey isnt much of a treat)

(I havent convinced him duck fat is healthy yet....he is so thin these days too)

But stuffing can be cooked in a separate dish

What would you do?

ingredient wise we have

bread
eggs
fresh sage or rosmary
I think we have onions
oranges
dried fruit

 

[Toddy]

Do you have oatmeal, Tengu ? or rice ?

A fruity kind of rice mixture (think North African) goes well with duck. Apricots, cranberries, pieces of apple that have been fried in butter, that kind of thing, keep it juicy.
Most ducks nowadays aren't very fatty. Old fashioned farm fed for the table ducks are sometimes fatty, but it's good useful fat....put your potatoes around it and they'll roast in it quite nicely.
You can make an orange and sugar and butter baste for the duck too.
It's going to smell glorious with the rosemary, etc., while it's cooking.

Oatmeal makes the base for a good savoury, herby stuffing though, and it's not gluey the way that bread stuffing can be. Mixed with onions, herbs, chopped nuts, butter, etc.,

 

[greenshooots]

duck should not be fatty, stuff orange in large cavity, sage onion in other one, rub with soy sauce and garlic roast on trivet out of fat stab thru with skewer for last hour so fat drains from bird skin should be crispy meat slightly pink

greenshoots

 

[Janne]

We trim excess fat around cavity entrance, blanch quickly in boiling water.
Salt, pepper. Under foil one hour, then remove foil, ***** skin and roast ( turn a few times and baste with fat) for another 1 to 1.5 hours.

No stuffing inside usually, sometimes quartered apples and prunes.

Mother baked the ‘stuffing’ in a separate dish.

Duck fat is ‘healthier’ than coconut oil, pig fat or butter, but I would not call it ‘healthy’.

It is no Olive oil!

But extremely tasty it is!
If you roast a duck without to much spices and stuff, then the fridge cold drippings are heavenly on bread. With a sprinkle of salt flakes.

 

[Janne]

Forgot: We trim away the neck skin too, that skin tube.
If the liver, neck and heart comes with the duck, we place them beside the duck, and I eat the liver after maybe 15 minutes under the foil.

 

[santaman2000]

I’d cook the stuffing as a side dish (we call it “dressing” when we do that—-which is almost always) There are obviously loads and loads of different types: bread stuffing, cornbread stuffing, oyster stuffing, rice stuffing, etc. and loads and loads more variations on each.

My favorite is and always will be cornbread dressing but I suspect that might be a bit off center for y’all. However I imagine a white & wild rice stuffing with walnuts will fit perfectly with duck or goose.

 

[Janne]

It is easy to roast a duck.
The big question is, what to have with it?
Cooked Sauerkraut?
Red Cabbage cooked C. Europe style? ( my fav)

Cooked veg?

I find plain steamed potatoes a must. Duck is too fatty for anything else.

Sauce? No sauce, just the drippings?

Drink. Very important. Beer is good with fatty food, but not with duck.
Wine? The acid is good. I like a nice, dry Rose with it.
Try a Ch. Minuty from Provence. A young one. Affordable, refreshing.

Has to be dry. But some people with refined palates likes Austrian Auslese or a Hungarian Tokai.

If you like that, LIDL should have something along those lines at a decent price.

Maybe they even have a dry rosé?

 

[TLM]

There is no way I would have Tokaji Aszu with duck. Other whites from the area yes but not the sweet one.

 

[Janne]

Well, some Gourmands swear by ultra sweet wines to fatty Food.

Not me, I prefer dry acidic.
Or a good Vodka/ brännvin.

Being not young anymore, my digestive system would not cope with the mix of fatty and sweet.

I can take a small starter with bird liver and sweet wine, or a sweet wine instead of a sweet desert, but that is it.

I have a couple bottles of a Trockenbeerenauslese I have had now for a couple of decades.

One day, one day...

Who will get the Bishop, Tengu, you or your dad?

 

[TLM]

I do like the std Tokaji whites but the sweet one only by the small glass.

 

[Janne]

You being a ’finnjävel’, a small glass means around 250 ml?

 

[TLM]

That is only for vodka, in wines about 1dl.

 

[santaman2000]

Y’all have reminded me I need to make a green bean casserole.

https://images.app.goo.gl/Ke6FzQDEiC8f3eym8

 

[Tengu]

Thanks for the ideas

What is the bishop?

 

[Janne]

The tail. It is shaped like a Bishop’s hat.
Triangular kind of.

It has two small glands, these glands produce the fat the duck water proofs the feathers with.
I like the taste.

Tengu, my best advice: keep it simple.
Do not forget to salt inside the duck. ***** the skin many times.
Cook low and slow. Baste.

Do not throw away the fat. Keeps for weeks in the fridge ( glass jar with a lid), use in cooking.
Unless you are a similar pig like myself and put it on bread....

Good Luck!

 

[Janne]

btw, is it a wild duck or a farmed one?

IMO a wild one needs to be cooked differently!

 

[Tengu]

That sounds good (the similar bit on the chicken goes down great) but my 'bird' appears to be a crown attached to two legs and so hasnt one.

I made sage and onion stuffing with sultanas and orange.

It was great but dad hasnt tasted it yet, and I doubt he will.