Whole ducks are always on offer in Sainsburys, half price, so it is a great time to try your hand at roast duck! Lots of people are put off duck because it’s a fatty bird but it’s delicious and if cooked properly it isn’t fatty at all. It’s dead simple to prepare and you can cook any other bird in the same way. Allow about 2-3 hours start to finish.
So what to look for when choosing your bird: Firstly don’t get the most expensive one on the shelf. I’ve noticed that the bigger the bird the fattier it is and you don’t necessarily get more meat, just more fat to pour off. I picked one that is between £5.50 and £6 and that is ~2Kg in weight. This is enough to feed four at a stretch or two with seconds and plenty left over for sandwiches and a stirfry off the carcas.
For a full roast dinner you will need the following:
1 Duck
1 tube of pork sausagemeat
White potatoes for roasting
Parsnips for roasting
Carrots for roasting
Oil for the roasting pan
Salt and pepper
Inside the duck is a bag containing the giblets. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES THROW THIS AWAY!!! This is the doorway to a delicious duck gravy and I’ll take you through how to make that first.
Open the giblet bag and chop everything into smaller 2cm pieces. This makes more surface area therefore it can release more flavour. Chop an onion in half, chop a small carrot in half and chop a celery stick into 3. If you have the wings on the bird chop them off and use them in the stock pan as well.
Get a large saucepan very hot, add a small dash of oil and bung that lot into the pan and brown it off. Browning it is important because you release some great flavours and it’ll make a richer gravy:
Splash over half a glass of white wine, and pour over about ¾ pint of boiling water. Chuck in a pinch of salt, a pinch of dried herbs and about 5 whole peppercorns. Reduce heat to a low simmer, cover the saucepan and leave it to bubble away for 1-2 hours.
Then pour it through a seive, scoop all the bits out, chuck them away or give them to the dog and this is your stock ready for the gravy.
The duck will take about 1.5 hours max to cook at 190-200 degrees in the oven. Don’t stuff the bird, cook the sausagemeat or stuffing separately. You need a large roasting pan, sit the duck in breast side up with no extra oil, sprinkle a little salt over it and stab the skin on the breast side and down the sides of the legs. When it cooks this will let the fat drain out and you can pour it off:
Okay, okay, I just noticed it's upside down in the picture - rumbled!
Bung the bird in the oven and leave it to roast for about ½ hour to 45 minutes. You’ll notice a lot of fat has come out, give it a baste and pour all that excess fat and juice into a large jug:
Told you it was a lot! Don't chuck the fat away, some of it is going on the roast vegetables but pour the clear oil at the top into a jar and it'll solidify pure white and keep for months in the fridge. The dark stuff at the bottom is pure flavour and this is going in the gravy.
Check it every half hour and pour the fat off each time until it’s done, this is the key to stopping it being fatty. You can tell when it’s cooked because it’ll brown off nicely, not so much fat will be coming out and if you push a knife into the back of the leg area the juice should be clear, not bloody. Take the bird out the oven and cover it with a bit of foil and it can stand for about 15 minutes on a chopping board while you finish the gravy. This last bit ensures the meat relaxes and the residual heat will complete the cooking process without drying the meat out.
For your roast potatoes boil them for 5-10 minutes and transfer to a roasting tray, then they need 45 minutes in the top of the oven so they are nice and crunchy on the outside. I like to use a good slug of olive oil with a good slug of Crisp n Dry and a good sprinkle of salt and pepper normally but since we've got lots of quality fat from the duck, use that instead. The roast veggies take about ½ hour and I do the same with the oil or fat.
To finish your gravy you need to reduce it and thicken it up. Do this right at the end after you have taken the duck out the oven. Scrape all the tasty stuff out the bottom of the pan you roasted the duck in and add that to the gravy pan and pour in all the dark juice that dropped to the bottom of the fat in the jug. This stock is loaded with flavour so there's no need to add anything else if you don't want to and you can simply boil it down until it's thick and season to taste. It's very strong tasting if you do it that way and I tend to not take it that far, just boil it down enough for the flavour and thicken it up with a little cornflour.
And there she is, carve it up and serve. I’m looking forward to the next one already quack quack
So what to look for when choosing your bird: Firstly don’t get the most expensive one on the shelf. I’ve noticed that the bigger the bird the fattier it is and you don’t necessarily get more meat, just more fat to pour off. I picked one that is between £5.50 and £6 and that is ~2Kg in weight. This is enough to feed four at a stretch or two with seconds and plenty left over for sandwiches and a stirfry off the carcas.
For a full roast dinner you will need the following:
1 Duck
1 tube of pork sausagemeat
White potatoes for roasting
Parsnips for roasting
Carrots for roasting
Oil for the roasting pan
Salt and pepper
Inside the duck is a bag containing the giblets. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES THROW THIS AWAY!!! This is the doorway to a delicious duck gravy and I’ll take you through how to make that first.
Open the giblet bag and chop everything into smaller 2cm pieces. This makes more surface area therefore it can release more flavour. Chop an onion in half, chop a small carrot in half and chop a celery stick into 3. If you have the wings on the bird chop them off and use them in the stock pan as well.
Get a large saucepan very hot, add a small dash of oil and bung that lot into the pan and brown it off. Browning it is important because you release some great flavours and it’ll make a richer gravy:
Splash over half a glass of white wine, and pour over about ¾ pint of boiling water. Chuck in a pinch of salt, a pinch of dried herbs and about 5 whole peppercorns. Reduce heat to a low simmer, cover the saucepan and leave it to bubble away for 1-2 hours.
Then pour it through a seive, scoop all the bits out, chuck them away or give them to the dog and this is your stock ready for the gravy.
The duck will take about 1.5 hours max to cook at 190-200 degrees in the oven. Don’t stuff the bird, cook the sausagemeat or stuffing separately. You need a large roasting pan, sit the duck in breast side up with no extra oil, sprinkle a little salt over it and stab the skin on the breast side and down the sides of the legs. When it cooks this will let the fat drain out and you can pour it off:
Okay, okay, I just noticed it's upside down in the picture - rumbled!
Bung the bird in the oven and leave it to roast for about ½ hour to 45 minutes. You’ll notice a lot of fat has come out, give it a baste and pour all that excess fat and juice into a large jug:
Told you it was a lot! Don't chuck the fat away, some of it is going on the roast vegetables but pour the clear oil at the top into a jar and it'll solidify pure white and keep for months in the fridge. The dark stuff at the bottom is pure flavour and this is going in the gravy.
Check it every half hour and pour the fat off each time until it’s done, this is the key to stopping it being fatty. You can tell when it’s cooked because it’ll brown off nicely, not so much fat will be coming out and if you push a knife into the back of the leg area the juice should be clear, not bloody. Take the bird out the oven and cover it with a bit of foil and it can stand for about 15 minutes on a chopping board while you finish the gravy. This last bit ensures the meat relaxes and the residual heat will complete the cooking process without drying the meat out.
For your roast potatoes boil them for 5-10 minutes and transfer to a roasting tray, then they need 45 minutes in the top of the oven so they are nice and crunchy on the outside. I like to use a good slug of olive oil with a good slug of Crisp n Dry and a good sprinkle of salt and pepper normally but since we've got lots of quality fat from the duck, use that instead. The roast veggies take about ½ hour and I do the same with the oil or fat.
To finish your gravy you need to reduce it and thicken it up. Do this right at the end after you have taken the duck out the oven. Scrape all the tasty stuff out the bottom of the pan you roasted the duck in and add that to the gravy pan and pour in all the dark juice that dropped to the bottom of the fat in the jug. This stock is loaded with flavour so there's no need to add anything else if you don't want to and you can simply boil it down until it's thick and season to taste. It's very strong tasting if you do it that way and I tend to not take it that far, just boil it down enough for the flavour and thicken it up with a little cornflour.
And there she is, carve it up and serve. I’m looking forward to the next one already quack quack
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