so the parentals decided to visit this weekend, and i decided to make dinner friday night. this time, i decided to try making duck. ever since we had it at the modern in nyc at thanksgiving, and it was absolutely incredible, i've wanted to at least attempt to cook something similar. i saw a video a bit ago on how to cook duck breasts correctly (i.e. searing and roasting) and found some recipes online, and figured might as well try it when the family is here, as they wont mind if it fails horribly.
i started the dinner menu with a cold barley salad. (this is after an amuse bouche of pear slices with pancetta and goat cheese, which i forgot to take a picture of)started with barley mostly because...i keep getting barley in my CSA, and i have no clue what to do with it! i tried grinding it into a flour so i could make bread, but i failed horribly. the only option was to cook it like rice, essentially. so, i made a salad of barley, ricotta, greens, onions, and beets, with a lemon vinaigrette. it was...not exceptional. somewhat boring, really. ah well.
we then go to the side dishes of the evening. i totally lucked out with the CSA this week, and got parsnips! yay parsnips! perfect timing, because i found a lovely recipe for carrots and parsnips with a honey rosemary glaze. quiiiiite tasty. crumbled a little pancetta on top for even more deliciousness. very good side dish. the other side dish i went with was braised baby bok choy (butter, broth, and a little bit of sesame oil). wasnt quite as amazing as the first time i made it. but not terrible. guess i could have made the swiss chard i got this week in the farm share instead, but oh well.
and to the main course! i am happy to announce that not only was the duck edible, but it was really tasty too!!! yes, i was successful! how did i make it? well, it started with a trip to savenors on thursday night. the kind butcher helped me pick out some boneless duck breasts with skin, perrrfect. come friday night, i let them sit for 30 minutes or so, and then scored the skin. what i love about frying duck is that you just get it cooking, and the fat starts melting and then you just have a fry pan FILLED with duck fat. it just looks beautiful. horribly unhealthy, but BEAUTIFUL. seared the other side quick once the skin/fat side was nice and browned. poured off some of the fat, and then threw the pan in the oven. 8 sweet minutes later, the duck was perfectly roasted (we wanted it more medium to medium-well than medium-rare, as duck is usually done). rested for 10 minutes as we ate our barley, and then we cut into it and beautiful. beautiful perfect duck!!! but what to put on top of it?
what do you put on duck, i wondered? i needed some type of sauce to put on it, in case i poorly cooked it, or if it had no taste, etc. but what type of sauce?? such a hard decision! i found one online for an orange chipotle sauce. that sounded pretty tasty, but i was worried it might be a bit too spicy. and it definitely did have a tang to it...a nice little zip. but it ended up being really delicious with the duck, rather perfect really. the second sauce is a fig sauce...because i wanted a wine-based sauce, figs are tasty, and father loves figs, so i figured a win win. the sauce was...good, but not quite spectacular. i think that i should have reduced it more - the recipe didnt call for it to be reduced much at all, but i should have known better and boiled it down more, for a thicker sauce.
so overall, it was quite a tasty meal. the dessert was so spectacular it is going to have its own post. mmhmmm.
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