roast wild duck

i always strive to find an easy way to make duck, that helps remove the chances of overdoing it, which can ruin the bird. This is a recipe for a duck cooked to rare, so if you are not into that, this is not for you. i cooked my wood ducks for 15 minutes, but they were a bit under done, i would say aim around 17-20 for this sized bird. the skin is fairly crispy, the reduction is really good and my wood ducks tasted delicious. Plus the author got her ducks from Hank Shaw, one of my favorite cooks to read, he has been on meateater and has his own website (and maybe show??). http://www.honest-food.net/


http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes...ild_duck_teal/

• Wild (not domesticated) whole duck(s), prepped (gutted, head and feet removed, plucked clean of feathers, shot and any bruised areas removed)
• Olive oil
• Coarse salt
• Rosemary
• Onion
• Apple
• Whole Cloves
• Dry Sherry
• Cream

1 Preheat oven to 450°F. Inspect duck to see if there are any remaining pin feathers, if so, remove them. Rinse the duck with water. Thoroughly pat dry with paper towels. Lightly stuff duck with a sprig of rosemary, an apple slice with a few cloves poked in them to hold them in place, and a small wedge of onion.
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2 Slather the duck inside and out with olive oil. Sprinkle all sides of the duck with coarse salt. Lay, breast up, on a roast rack in a roasting pan. Place in the middle rack of the oven. Immediately lower the heat to 425°F.
Cooking times depend on the variety of the duck. Teal ducks typically weigh less than a pound and cook in 10-15 minutes. According to the Joy of Cooking a mallard can take up to 25 minutes. Our duck was perfectly done at 13 minutes. Another duck we cooked for 17 minutes was slightly overdone. Meat thermometers are hardly useful with the small fowl because there isn't enough flesh to put the thermometer into. But if you have an instant read thermometer and can get a good read, my pal Hank suggests cooking until the duck reaches an internal temp of 135°F. If you error on the rare and underdone side, you can always put the bird back in the oven for a few more minutes if it isn't done enough.
If you aren't using a meat thermometer, to test for doneness you can take the bird out of the oven and cut a part of it with the tip of a sharp knife. Note that the juices will run RED, and the meat will be quite red. You want the meat to be rare (wild duck only); it should look like a rare (not raw) steak. The more the meat is cooked beyond the rare stage, the more "livery" or gamey it will taste.
3 Remove the duck from the oven and remove to a separate rack or plate to rest, breast side down, for 10 to 15 minutes. Remove the stuffing in the cavity before serving.
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4 While the duck is resting, if there are drippings in the roasting pan, pour off the excess fat (save this wonderful fat for another recipe). Place the roasting pan on the stovetop, heat to medium, and deglaze with a little dry sherry or white wine. Scrape up the browned bits with a metal spatula. Use a metal whisk to break up the bits even further into the wine. Reduce and then add a little cream, (and a few juniper berries if you want an extra touch). Pour off into a gravy serving dish or little bowl.
Serve ducks with wild rice and gravy. Teal ducks are single serving ducks.
Note that you can get excellent stock from the duck carcass. Put the duck carcasses in a saucepan, cover with an inch of cold water, bring to a simmer, lower the heat to barely-a-bubble-simmer covered, and cook for 3 hours. Then strain the stock to a glass jar, let cool to room temperature and refrigerate. Use the duck stock in place of chicken stock for recipes.

looks delicious!

Oh man, just the description was enough to get the mouth watering, but no , you just had to go and add pics to

Surprisingly those pics copied right from the webpage, and showed up here.
Mine didn't look quite so good, but with a few more mins cooking it would've.
This ones simple and delicious enough to try, I've roasted ducks a bunch of ways, but I never have consistency. This recipe lends itself to that imo.

Looks good thanks for posting

Sounds good, next time I bring ducks home I will try it. yum

I did a duck recipe last weekend that my nephew showed me.

Cube duck breasts in dice size cubes
slice a pd of bacon across grain, into 5 equal parts about 1.5" -2.0" long each
wrap cube in bacon and pin with tooth pick

Heat fry pan to high
pat of butter
throw in bacon wrapped duck

Onion power (good shake) about 2tsp
Costco Garlic Medley 2tbs
1 glove of fresh garlic
salt (optional)

The butter and bacon will have enough grease to fast fry the meat. Since the duck is wrapped in bacon it takes just about enough time to crisp the bacon and cook the breast.

My own ending garnish I added once done, was a big handful of chopped fresh basil and another clove of chopped garlic. I thought about adding a splash of sweet red wine...but next time.

Bonus.. we found tons of fresh parsley within 20ft of camp site. Been there a long time, I just did not see it..until it was pointed out. Herb's within 10 ft of camper, Oregano, thyme, sage, mint...wild edibles

Man that looks so good, I going to try it next time, I used to be a mess at cooking in the outside, and also inside, but then if you follow recipies like an abecedario you can do just fine. Then when you have learned enough that you know how things go, you can try and be more creative