duck a la cottage

maybe in my next life i'll be able to follow a recipe. to Julia i can only say, i tried, i tried. due to the overwhelming vote turn out (all three votes were for a la orange) i set out to make duck a la orange per Julia Child. what i found was this: i am not cut out to be a french chef. i meticulously read and re read all the directions and before i ever set foot in the kitchen was sick to death of all the fiddling and heating then cooling then re heating. i'm sure it would have been delectable if i had followed the directions, but i didn't. and you know what? it was delectable anyway. besides the fact that my duck weighed in at 6.4 pounds and Julia's cooking table only goes to 5.5 pounds. apparently i committed the base sin of purchasing a duck too large to address in an effort to feed everyone i had invited. so, i read the label on the duck for cooking times and directions but found i didn't like the ring of them either.... what to do? i recalled a goose recipe that i had tried with some success on Christmas (with what turned out to be a capon, incidentally) and decided to go with that for stuffing and take an average on cooking times. so, the duck got rinsed and salted inside and out early in the day and left to think about it in the sink. the neck and giblets went into a small pot with some butter, salt, and pepper to brown with some onion and carrot slices to make stock. per Julia i added herbs but later decided i didn't really need to, if you want to throw in a bay leaf and some parsley and thyme just be sure to take the bay out after a bit then strain everything else out after a few hours. after a while i peppered the duck too, just on the out side. two oranges got pricked all over with a fork then quartered and a ginger root got sliced length wise then into the duck went ginger and orange mixed about so that there was both ginger and orange aplenty in contact with the inside of the duck. here we revisit Julia, the duck went in on a rack at 425 for about twenty minutes, the heat was then reduced to 350 and the duck was turned on it's side for 30 minutes. it was then turned breast side down and left, due to it's size, for 45 minutes, then on to the other side for another 30 minutes, then back breast side up to finish, all together it was in the over for about two hours and 45 minutes with the heat on then rested for about fifteen minutes before it was served. i put some zucchini sticks in the pan under the duck to roast about halfway through the process and they cooked beautifully in the duck fat.

as to sauces, Julia calls for a mix of liqueur, zest, stock and butter (fiddle fiddle fiddle). for our table i put some of the drippings from the roasting pan in my skillet, got it hot and threw in the zest of about half a large orange which i had peeled off with a vegetable peeler then julienned. when this has sizzled for a minute i added the entire contents of a cute little sample bottle of grand marnier and lit it, once the flames died down i added two ladles of stock and reduced to make a sauce. in homage to Julia i did add cold butter whisked into the sauce after i removed it from the heat. i also prepared a dried fig port wine sauce as follows : one clove of garlic and an equal portion of red onion (a mix known as poor man's shallot) finely diced and caramelized lightly in butter, three dried adriatic figs chopped added post light caramelization, perhaps two thirds of a cup of port wine (wonderful zinfandel from terra del oro for us) in but not lit when things are getting moderately caramelized and reduced to syrup, then add stock and reduce to a sauce consistency you like. this also got cold butter whisked into it before it hit the table.

we enjoyed our feast with a nice jammy zinfandel from renwood winery compliments of uncle andrew and some creamy mashed potatoes. i hope at least one person who reads this gives duck a try, it's worth it.