After the duck legs and wings had their day in the fridge, we had to slowly cook the meat in its own fat to create our Duck Confit Christmas Dinner. The biggest issue I'd had all year with trying to conquer this recipe was the difficulty in finding duck fat anywhere. So when I butchered the duck, I saved and rendered out as much fat as possible, but I was still a little short...
Luckily, I still had some bacon fat in the fridge, and our recipe noted that we could substitute vegetable oil if we were running low on the actual fat. So we ended up using a little bit of that, too.
To go along with the Duck Confit, I pulled out a recipe from my favorite cookbook and made up some Au Gratin Potatoes as well. These potatoes - they were to die for. I couldn't get enough of them, and my stomach was stuffed to the brim because I actually went back for seconds of these after I'd already finished a full dinner plate. (It's the Holidays, so I didn't get too mad at myself... Back into training soon!)
Over-all, we had a great Christmas Dinner. The duck legs and wings didn't give a ton of meat, but considering the fact that we each ate our weight in cheesy potatoes, maybe this was a good thing. It was a lot of work to do duck, and I'm not sure if it was amazing enough to go through the full process very often. But if I just buy some breasts or legs, instead of trying to butcher the duck myself, that would take a huge step out of the long process... So now we know for next time! But at least I can say that I did it once in my life. :)
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