Smorgasbord Blog Magazine – The Food and Cookery Column with Carol Taylor – Delicious #Duck and Sauces

This week Carol is bringing us some delicious ways to prepare Duck… I adore crispy duck and pancakes and cold on a salad.. I know you will enjoy Carol’s expertise and also some alternative sauces to serve with this bird…

Delicious Duck with Carol Taylor

Duck … Duck always conjures up pretty images and so many cartoon characters are ducks and we think of them as cute and funny…Well I do…

Growing up we didn’t eat very much duck my uncle sometimes used to bring one to my mum when he had been out on his nightly travels…I think it was called it poaching…But it was what many people did then and sometimes just to survive… I remember his pet ferrets scary, fierce little animals…

Then as the times progressed it was the Chinese duck pancakes a real treat for us and the occasional duck eggs … It has only really been since I lived here that I have cooked with duck it is readily available and used in many dishes …

Is it a healthy meat??

Duck fat is high in monounsaturated fats and some saturated fats, it remains stable during cooking as the fat monocles don’t break down at a high heat and create harmful toxins which mean the fat can safely be reused and it also has a lovely taste which it imparts to the food…

When duck is cooked the fat needs to be well rendered down as it is unpleasant to eat if it is not…The actual duck meat is very lean and has a high iron content so is a good meat to eat as always with many foods it is what is added or accompanies the food which ramps up the calories or turns it into an unhealthy food.

Often when eating out the sauces come separately so if you are watching the calories just go sparingly on the sauce.

This Laab recipe I normally make with pork but we had a duck one when we ate out the other week and it was really nice a little drier than the pork but very nice.

Thai food is a great choice for gluten–free and dairy-free eaters because it is rice-based and uses a lot of coconut milk. … Traditional Thai soy sauce is gluten–free, but just be careful when eating out as restaurants may use wheat-based Chinese soy sauce.

Thai food is low on carbs, includes lots of fresh vegetables and herbs and most dishes are cooked very quickly so everything retains its colour and flavour, in fact, preparation most times takes longer than the actual cooking.

This Laab recipe can be made using Duck, Chicken or Pork.

Ingredients: Serves 1-2 people.

• 200 gm Duck, Pork or chicken mince.
• 3 shallots finely sliced.
• 2 spring onions finely sliced green tops as well.
• A handful of fresh Mint, pick the leaves from stem and tear the leaves into large pieces( mine is a big handful) I love mint.
• A handful of fresh coriander chopped.
• A few Thai Basil leaves for the decoration.
• I Lime use half to a whole lime juice depending on personal taste.
• Dried chillies…dry roasted in a pan and grind in pestle and mortar.
• 1 large tbsp toasted rice.( recipe below)
• 1-2tbsp Fish Sauce.
• Small amount palm sugar….I use it sparingly.

Let’s Cook!

Using a small saucepan dry cook the mince, I add a small amount of water to stop it from sticking.

Stir until cooked, remove the pan from the heat.

Stir in toasted rice, a small amount palm sugar, chilli( as desired) start with 1 tsp and once all the ingredients are added ..taste and add more if required.

Stir in the mint and coriander, shallots and spring onions, stir well but carefully.

Add fish sauce and half of the lime juice.

Taste!

If required add more chilli, fish sauce and or lime juice and Taste again.

Put in a serving dish.

Garnish with Thai Basil leaves.

Serve with steamed boiled rice /Thai sticky rice or if you don’t want to eat rice it is lovely served in lettuce cups.

As an accompaniment serve with sliced cucumber, sliced white cabbage, green beans and Thai basil leaves.

Thai’s eat a lot of raw vegetables with Laab which is why it’s a fairly healthy meal and if chicken or duck is used it has even fewer calories.

It is an ideal dish if you are watching the calories as are many Thai dishes.

NB: To make dried rice mix, take a thick bottomed pan put it on a medium to low heat, cover bottom with uncooked sticky rice( if you don’t have) normal rice will do. Stir until rice turns a golden brown colour, tip into pestle and pound until powdery but slightly coarse.

N.B. Glutinous rice is gluten–free. The misleading name simply comes from the fact that glutinous rice gets glue-like and sticky when cooked. … It all comes down to starch content.
You can store the rice in a small container and it will keep for 6-8 weeks…

I hope you enjoy this dish as much as I do…I love this salad.

It is also an ideal dish to make if you cook a duck and have some left over’s.

Now who hasn’t eaten Duck with an Orange sauce?? Here are three sauces with a little twist and still some O.J

Marmalade Sauce:

• 1 tbsp honey
• 50 gm marmalade
• 1 tbsp Cointreau
• 1 tbsp fresh squeezed O.J
• A handful of chopped coriander to garnish.

Let’s Cook!

Put all the wet ingredients into a pan and bring to a slow simmer allow to simmer until sauce thickens slightly if it does thicken too much thin with some O.J.
This one takes slightly longer to make but well worth it…

Port and Blackberry Sauce:

• 350 ml of Port
• 2 tsp sugar
• A punnet of blackberries
• 400 ml of chicken stock
• 1 tbsp of good balsamic vinegar
• 1 star Anise
• A tsp of corn flour mixed to a paste with water
• 50 gm butter.

Let’s Cook!

Put the Port in a pan and reduce the liquid by half, add the stock, blackberries, balsamic, star anise and simmer until reduced to 2/3 this takes about 15 minutes. Pass the mix through a sieve and return to the pan, add the corn flour/arrowroot mix stir and season then add butter.

You know have a perfect smooth, shiny sauce to go with your duck.

Lastly one which still has orange but some chilli…

My orange sauce with and Asian twist.

• 1 large orange segmented between the skins..then squeeze the core and retain the juice and maybe zest some orange skin.
• 1 red bird’s eye chilli sliced finely
• ½ tbsp finely chopped fresh ginger
• 1 star Anise
• 1 tsp of shredded lemongrass
• 1 tsp sugar
• 2 tbsp water

Let’s Cook!

Heat ½ tbsp oil in a pan and add chilli, ginger, lemon grass and star Anise cook for a few minutes to release the flavours add the reserved OJ and zest if using, 2 tbsp water, 1 tsp sugar and half of the orange segments.

Cook for 2-3 minutes and add the remainder of the orange segments cook for 1 minute.

Any of these sauces can be served with a nice roasted duck accompanied by rice or boulangere potatoes and some lightly steamed vegetables.

Duck Eggs and other bits….

Ducks are generally used for their meat, eggs and feathers (down) although in Asian cultures every bit is eaten from head to toe… Beak and feet included… If you like the recipe lease let me know…

Duck eggs are again widely eaten and always readily available here…A duck egg has a higher proportion of yolk than a chicken’s egg and can be bought fresh here or preserved…

We were given a gift of preserved Duck eggs and I must say I was slightly cautious as to what I would find…

This was a first for me these dry, salted duck eggs covered in a black, soot ashes and charcoal powder.

They are dried in mud taken from termite mounds and rolled in a mixture of soot, ashes and charcoal powder these dry salted eggs are produced locally near me in Khon Kaen.

Traditionally eaten with rice soup for breakfast in a hot country like Thailand this is a way of preserving eggs…Dry Salted Duck eggs are used rather than chicken eggs as the yolks are larger.

The date on the box informs you that the eggs can be pan-fried up until that date and afterwards MUST be boiled.

Although they look strange or maybe different is the word the black outer covering washes off and underneath is the egg in its shell. This my ever curious grandson cracked and fried. The yolk was a darker yellow than a normal chicken’s egg and pleasantly salty…A completely different taste to which I was expecting…

That sentence uttered purely on my experience of some foods I have tried whilst living here…Not all quite so pleasant… The shopkeeper who gifted them to us was correct they were aroy, aroy.

I hope you have enjoyed the recipes for duck …Do you cook with duck a lot if so what is your go to duck recipe???

My all time favourite Duck Curry is this one: Red Duck Curry( Kaeng Ped Pett Yang)
https://blondieaka.wordpress.com/2017/05/08/red-duck-curry-kaeng-ped-pett-yang/

That is all for this week I think next week I will have some more everyday meals that you can cook…

©Carol Taylor 2018

The other posts in the series can be found in this directory: https://smorgasbordinvitation.wordpress.com/carol-taylors-food-and-cookery-column-2018/

About Carol Taylor

Enjoying life in The Land Of Smiles I am having so much fun researching, finding new, authentic recipes both Thai and International to share with you. New recipes gleaned from those who I have met on my travels or are just passing through and stopped for a while. I hope you enjoy them.

I love shopping at the local markets, finding fresh, natural ingredients, new strange fruits and vegetables ones I have never seen or cooked with. I am generally the only European person and attract much attention and I love to try what I am offered and when I smile and say Aroy or Saab as it is here in the north I am met with much smiling.

Some of my recipes may not be in line with traditional ingredients and methods of cooking but are recipes I know and have become to love and maybe if you dare to try you will too. You will always get more than just a recipe from me as I love to research and find out what other properties the ingredients I use have to improve our health and wellbeing.

Exciting for me hence the title of my blog, Retired No One Told Me! I am having a wonderful ride and don’t want to get off, so if you wish to follow me on my adventures, then welcome! I hope you enjoy the ride also and if it encourages you to take a step into the unknown or untried, you know you want to…….Then, I will be happy!

Carol is a contributor to the Phuket Island Writers Anthology:  https://www.amazon.com/Phuket-Island-Writers-Anthology-Stories-ebook/dp/B00RU5IYNS

Connect to Carol

Blog: https://blondieaka.wordpress.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheRealCarolT
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/carol.taylor.1422

If you have missed previous posts in the Cook from Scratch series you can find them here: https://smorgasbordinvitation.wordpress.com/cook-from-scratch-with-sally-and-carol-recipes/

Thank you for dropping in today and Carol would be delighted to answer any of your questions and we always enjoy your feedback. Thanks Sally