Canard à l'Cerises and Roasted Potatoes

29 years.


That's how long I spent on this planet before cooking my first duck.
Twenty. Nine. Years.
Normally, I encourage my vast and loyal army of readers to emulate me in all things, but in this one circumstance I'm giving you this special instruction; DON'T BE LIKE ME. I WAS A FOOL.

At the ripe old age of 29, I walked into a bookstore and picked up a copy of Anthony Bourdain's Le Halles Cookbook. I've long been a fan of his shows, and I had heard him speak with reverence about the mystical and awesome powers of duck fat. So, I picked up the book, and I got myself a duck, and promptly had my brain blown out of my butthole.

Many ducks later, I've come up with my own minor variation on Bourdain's classic Duck à l'Orange; Duck à l'Cerises, and I'm even throwing in my own recipe for potatoes roasted in duck fat, that elixir of the gods. You're welcome.

You will need:

1 Duck. 5lbs or so, fully defrosted
1 Buddha's Hand
1 C of sour cherries
Butcher's twine for trussing

Sauce
.5 C of red wine vinegar
2 oz. sugar
2 C of chicken or duck stock
1 C of sour cherries
3 fl.oz. Kirsch
Salt & Pepper

Potatoes
Rendered duck fat
6 cloves of garlic, minced
2-3 sprigs of fresh rosemary, leaves stripped and roughly chopped
1.5 tsp salt
1 tsp fresh ground black pepper
3 lbs russet potatoes, washed and cut to large bite size with skins still on

For the Duck (that's right, capital D. Respect.):

1. Preheat the oven to 250. Open up the plastic on your fully defrosted duck. Remove the neck, liver, & heart. Reserve the neck for use in the sauce, I'm sure the liver is probably pretty good too. Rinse out the cavity, and pat the bird dry with paper towels. Since we're doing something pretty explicitly French, now would be a good time to break out that CD of French jazz you've got hiding somewhere. And the Absinthe.


2. Cut off the wing tips at the joint. No meat, and they'll scorch. Get rid of 'em. Trim the excess fat & skin. The neck skin will come off in a big flap on the front of the bird, there will be flabby deposits around the cavity opening, trim these as well. Take these trimmings and cut them into small pieces (half inch strips). Put the trimmings into a sauce pan, and put that pan over medium heat. Render the fat- cook the trimmings until the skin starts to turn brown. Like this.Reserve the rendered fat for the potatoes.

3. Season the bird generously inside and out with salt and pepper. Cut the Buddha's hand into half inch strips and stuff the bird with the strips and 1 cup of the cherries. A word on the Buddha's Hand. It's a somewhat hard-to-come-by proto-citrus that they just happened to have at the store the day I decided to do this. They're fantastically aromatic and worth keeping around for the scent alone. You could probably substitute a couple of lemons cut into wedges if you didn't feel like being a pissy little ingredient fetishist like myself. Anyway. Truss the bird. There are a variety of ways to do this, and there are good videos available on YouTube to show you how. Like this one, for example.

4. Put the bird directly on the roasting pan and slap it in the oven for 25 minutes.

5. Now would be a good time to toss the reserved Duck fat with the garlic, rosemary, salt, & pepper in a large bowl, and then throw the potato chunks in there with it. Make sure the potatoes are coated with all that lovely golden fat. Take a moment and thank the Duck for its' tasty, tasty flab. I'll wait. Done? Good. Put your coated potatoes on a baking sheet in a single layer.

6. Once the 25 minutes is up, pull the bird out, and crank the oven up to 350. Put the bird on a rack inside the roasting pan. If you don't have one, used celery stalks or carrots to keep it up off of the bottom of the pan. Once the oven has come to temp, put the Duck and the potatoes in the oven and cook them both for an hour and fifteen minutes.

7. While the Duck and potatoes get happy, put the vinegar and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Boil until you've got something that looks like a light caramel. Now, this is the point where you add the stock to the molten sugar, but take a breath first. The sugar/vinegar mix is what we refer to as Fucking Hot. This stuff will stick to you like napalm and burn you like those guys at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Do you want to look like a melted Nazi? No. Nobody wants that. Be careful when pouring in the stock, it could foam up. Be ready to turn off the burner if necessary.

8. If you survived that, drop the Duck neck and the other cup of cherries into the stock pot, and let that simmer uncovered for 45 minutes.

9. When the Duck and the potatoes are done, remove the Duck to a serving platter or carving board to rest for at least 10 minutes. Put the roasting pan on the burner over medium high heat, and add the kirsch. Scrape all the cooked on stuff up off of the bottom. Pour the resulting liquid in with the sauce.

10. Mash the cherries with a potato masher, strain the sauce and skim off the fat.

11. Serve the Duck and potatoes with the sauce on the side.

12. Eat.

Chocolate Chip & Coconut ULTRA-CAKES

Look, I've never been a big fan of the pancake. Too many times when you get pancakes, they're just limp beige fail-cakes with all the exciting flavor of the bottom of a food scientist's test tube. Most people are content with pouring some mystery powder out of a box and mixing it with tap water, and cooking the resulting goop. I am not most people. Here's what you'll need.

• That box of bullshit from Globo-chem's pancake division
• 2 cups bread flour
• 2 tbs sugar
• 1/2 tsp table salt
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 cup shredded sweetened coconut
• 1/2 cup bittersweet chocolate chips (I use Ghirardelli)
• 2 cups buttermilk
• 1/4 cup sour cream
• 2 eggs
• 3 tbs unsalted butter, melted & cooled

First, get up out of bed, preferably after 10:00 on a weekend or whatever day you don't have to work. You're not gonna want to do much after you eat these bastards. Do not shower.

Step two: throw that box of imitation pancake bullshit in the trash.Put on some pancake making music. Hotcakes by Gas Huffer, or either of the first two albums by Presidents of the United States of America.
Get yourself two medium to large mixing bowls. When you make pancakes, it's important to keep the dry and wet ingredients separated in the beginning so that you don't over-mix the batter. Mixing wet flour develops gluten, and we want to keep that to a minimum.

Put your dry ingredients (bread flour, salt, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, shredded coconut, chocolate chips) into one bowl, and mix them with a fork or a whisk. Bread flour is important here because it's got more protein and helps with bubble retention, which is how we're gonna make some gigantic goddamn pancakes.Put the wet ingredients in the other bowl, making sure to cool the butter before it goes in. Put in hot butter, and you're not getting pancakes, you're getting effed-up scrambled eggs. Whisk the wet together, and then pour into the dry.
Get your silicon spatula and fold the whole mess together. Don't go nuts here. Don't beat the christ out of it with a whisk. Just fold it together enough times that the flour is entirely wet. Lumps are good. Lumps are good.
Let the batter sit for 10 minutes. Go make yourself some coffee.
A word on cooking surface choice. When I make pancakes, I use a cast iron griddle. Cast iron has excellent heat retention, which means it cooks evenly and won't lose much heat when you drop a big, room-temperature blob of pancake batter on it. If you're using a non-stick frying pan, you're going to need to set the burner slightly higher than the medium-low I use in this recipe. Warm up whatever you're using, and pour on a teaspoon or two of vegetable oil. When it shimmers, wipe the pan with a paper towel to spread the oil and remove the excess.
To pour the batter on the griddle, I use a large serving spoon and the silicon spatula. This batter is quite a bit thicker than your standard pancake batter, so once you drop it on the griddle, you're going to need to spread it out with the spatula. There's something of a learning curve here, but keep at it and you'll figure it out. It's sort of like making a crepe, only thick instead of runny.
After you've got it spread out, let it cook. These cakes will get much thicker than your average factory-cake. You'll know it's time to flip when bubbles pop on the top, around halfway between the center and the edge and don't immediately smooth back out again. I like to use a pretty flexible spatula for this. Run your spatula around the edge of the pancake so that it slides freely on the griddle, and then flip it over. Cook the other side until it's nice and brown. Remember, brown=sugar caramelization=flavor.Maple syrup is probably a little much to go on top of coconut & chocolate chip pancakes, but I do like to hit this with a little confectioner's sugar or whipped cream. This recipe will make about six big-assed pancakes. One is plenty for most people.

Gnocchi alla Vodka

Another favorite around Castle Von Rock is gnocchi with vodka sauce, based on one of Emeril Lagasse's recipies available on Food Network's website. Since I'm sure re-printing it is probably gonna get me in trouble, I'll leave it up to you to go read the recipe itself and then I'll show you how I make it. Also you should know that the recipe as written on the website is for one serving, I quadruple that for a family size dish. Ready? Ok, here goes.

First, prep work. Part of developing your skill in the kitchen is making sure you have the right tool for the job. The right knife goes a long way towards making things easier. My steel of choice? The Calphalon Katana 8" Chef's. The blade and handle are well balanced, and the bolster is shaped to allow you to easily hold the knife in the 3-finger "pinch" grip. Yes I know Guy Fieri uses one. Yes, he's a human singularity of infinite suck. Shut up.


Chop yer onion.

Peel the garlic and chop. The best way to peel garlic is to crush it under the flat of your knife. Put it under the side without the edge, and give it a smack. Once you've peeled it, mince it.

I also had a red bell pepper from the garden laying around, so I decided to give that a chop and toss it in too. Red bell pepper should perfectly compliment the vodka sauce's sweet and spicy flava combo.

Now that we're done playing with knives, heat up some extra virgin olive oil in a large skillet.

Brown the Italian sausage. No pink. Brown. Also, having the right wooden spoon for a job like this can really save you a set of aching hands. For what it's worth, after trying many other, lesser spoons, I read a recommendation in Cook's Illustrated for Mario Batali's 13" wooden spoon. I picked one up at Lakeside Mercantile for an extremely reasonable price, and it's been utterly fantastic. This dish isn't so bad, but man, my Macaroni and Cheese takes a lot of stirring and is super thick, and this spoon handles it without so much as a twinge in my poor, football shattered hands. Now is probably a good time to put on the water for the pasta, depending on how long your pot takes to come to a boil. The idea here, again, is to have the pasta come out at the same time or after the sauce.


When the sausage is completely browned, add the onion and pepper. Also a good time to add the salt, freshly ground pepper, and pepper flakes.


Saute until the onions start to turn yellow. Add the garlic and cook it until your kitchen smells awesome, around 30 seconds. Add the tomatoes.


Stir everything together and bring the sauce to a simmer. Simmer for around 4 minutes, and then add your vodka.


And now the cream.


Stir to combine, give it a minute or two to hang out, which should be just enough time to prep and add your basil chiffonade. I pulled some straight from the garden. Let's see, here we've got standard basil, Thai basil, strawberry plants, cilantro, and some overhanging gladiolus.


This should be plenty.


Chiffonade, and into the pan. Stir to combine, and there you have it: Vodka sauce.


If I was looking to make an afternoon of this, I'd have made my own gnocchi, but I didn't feel like it today. So, store-bought it is. Look for them in your grocer's freezer section. Russo's has great gnocchi, we particularly love the Asiago cheese ones. 3 1/2 minutes in boiling water.


Drain, put them in a bowl, cover with sauce, and top with a little chiffonade as garnish. Friggin delicious.


If you have extra sauce, that stores well in the refrigerator for a couple of days. The gnocchi's texture will suffer a bit. Enjoy!

Pasta Sauce

For my first recipe, I'm sharing my favorite pasta sauce. Making your own pasta sauce takes a good bit of time, but I find it really satisfying. It's one of the reasons I love cooking in general; the combination of pride in a thing done right with the connection to the common human experience. I usually serve this with penne rigate, I prefer De Cecco. It's a medium priced bronze extruded pasta that has a really nice mouthfeel. Follow the cooking time on the box, al dente pasta every time. When I cook pasta, I usually salt the water and add a couple of drops of olive oil. The oil does nothing to flavor the pasta, but it does lower surface tension on the water and limit foaming, which makes the pasta pot quicker to clean up afterward.

Pasta Sauce:
Serves 6 (yay leftovers!)

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil (I use Lucini)
1 large yellow onion, medium chop
1 generous pinch of salt
2 bay leaves
fresh ground black pepper
2 tbs sun-dried tomato paste
1/2 tbs red pepper flakes (I've been known to use more if the kids aren't eating)
3 or 4 sprigs fresh thyme
1 tsp oregano
1 green bell pepper, stem and seeds discarded, chopped
1 package white mushrooms, sliced
1 roasted red bell pepper, chopped (I use Cento's roasted red peppers marinaded with garlic)
4 or 5 large cloves garlic
1 cup approx dry red wine (House red around here is generally Rosemount Shiraz)
2 28oz cans crushed tomatoes (Cento also cans my favorite tomato. Whatever you get, make sure the tomatoes do not have added citric acid. It effs with the flavor, ya dig?)

Optional:
Fresh Basil Chiffonade
1 lb mild Italian sausage (Jimmy Dean's is fine)

Heat olive oil in a dutch oven over medium high heat. When the surface of the oil begins to shimmer, add onions & salt. Add bay leaves, pepper, tomato paste, red pepper flakes, thyme, and oregano. Saute the onions until transparent. Add green pepper, saute for 2-3 minutes, to soften it up. Add mushrooms, red bell pepper and garlic, saute until the mushrooms loose their liquid. Add wine and reduce by half. Reduce heat to medium low and add both cans of tomatoes, reserving a quarter of one can. Cover with a splatter screen and simmer for one hour. If you don't have a splatter screen, get one. You'll save yourself a lot of time cleaning up, and they're cheap.

When I make this sauce, I'll usually set my timer for half an hour so I can start the pasta water halfway through the cooking time. My pasta pot takes FOREVER to boil- yours might not need this much time- try to have your pasta finish around the same time or after your sauce finishes. The sauce can sit, the pasta should not.

In the meantime, you can completely brown your Italian sausage if you're using it, and/or prep your basil chiffonade. The basil may darken on you if you do it too soon, so wait as long as you can without making yourself rush at the last second. If you've never done a chiffonade before, this video does a good job explaining it.

After the sauce and pasta are done, take the two bay leaves out of the sauce (remember this step, those leaves aren't good eats) and stir in the reserved quarter can of tomatoes. Put the pasta, sausage, and basil into the pot containing the sauce and fold to combine, being careful not to destroy the pasta. Sometimes, for a creamy version of this sauce, I add half of a small tub of marscarpone cheese right before I add the pasta. Stir to combine. Put it in a bowl, grind on a little parmaggiano-reggiano, et voila. Instant happy.

(I'll post a picture next time I make it!)

Do-Over

Hi!

As you can see, this place has undergone a bit of re-purposing. I've decided to stop writing about stuff that drives me nuts, and to start writing about the things I really enjoy, like food, beer, wine, and music. So, if you're interested in watching me stumble my way towards a (hopefully) better understanding of the culinary universe, come on back and see what I've been up to. Onward and upwards, excelsior, and all that. CFC 2.0 is a go.