Veg Week Pop-Up at Kitchener
Find me there selling mac n cheese!
Duck Breast w/ Raspberry Lambic Glaze
Yes, I’m still stuck on duck! Ducks and pigs are my favorite animals to cook with, because you can use everything. Unlike pigs, it’s easy to acquire whole ducks at your local butcher or Chinatown. Duck breasts are faster and easier to prepare than most other parts of the duck. That said, you don’t sear duck breasts in the same way you would most other cuts of meat. To achieve the delicious crispy crust, and the tender, mid-rare meat, you apply a much more gentle cooking process than you would to, say a pork chop.
Like a pork chop though, duck breasts are fatty. As such, they pair well with both sweet and tangy flavors. This recipe takes advantage of these properties. You may recognize some of the ingredients from duck cracklin’ sandwiches. I used the pickling liquid from the onions as a base for my glaze.
This recipe calls for 2 duck breasts. You can obviously adjust it for the number of duck breast you happen to have.
DCLT: Duck Cracklin’ Lettuce and Tomato
So, you remember the duck cracklins from last week’s confit post? Well, if you didn’t eat them all like pop-corn, here’s a delicious way to use them. It pairs the bacon like cracklins with two of the most classic bacon accompaniments, but I’ve also added pickled onions to the mix for sophistication and an additional sweet & sour punch. Tomatoes this time of year simply aren’t pulling their weight in the flavor department, but they do add moisture, so I didn’t want to pull them out entirely.
Valentine’s Day Market
Kitchener Oakland will be hosting a Valentine’s Night Market on Wednesday, February 13th from 5-9pm. I will be there, along with many other vendors. You can buy something for someone special (yourself, for example. Or a loved one. Whatever, barbarians don’t judge) while enjoying awesome food, wine, art, company and community.
We have a website set up so that you can pre-order your goodies which can be picked up that night. Check it out by clicking here! If you’re looking for a bulk discount, bay area deliveries or nationwide shipping (for an extra fee), or a different pick up date, you can also email me at barbariangourmet@gmail.com!
This my first recipe involving meat on this blog, and boy did I lead with the good stuff!
This is a long process (2-3 days, start to finish), and it can look intimidating, but it’s not particularly difficult. This blog post doesn’t just cover duck confit, either. It teaches you how to butcher a whole duck, render duck fat, and make cracklins, all of which can be used in countless other recipes. For people who are interested in having a more hands-on relationship with food, or experimenting with the slow food movement, ducks are a great place to start because they’re tasty, relatively inexpensive, widely available, and surprisingly easy to use the entire animal. Curious yet? Then read on!
Spare Duck Breasts
I’m going to be making duck confit later this week, and the breasts are basically biproducts. If you live in the bay area and would like me to make you a tasty duck breast, in your kitchen or mine, email barbariangourmet@gmail.com $5 a la carte, $8 with duck fat potatoes and a veg (plus delivery).
A note about the photo: I have no pictures of duck breast! I know, what’s wrong with me right? Duck is one of my favorite things to make! So, I went onto creative commons (which is a fantastic free and legal way to license images) and borrowed one from Girl Interrupted Eating. While I wish I had my own duck photo to share with you, I’m glad I got to explore her blog. Some very tasty looking recipes!
German Chocolate Cupcakes
These are my go-to cupcakes for my own birthdays. This particular batch, I made a couple weeks ago for a friend. They’re rich, dense, chocolaty, salty, and - above all - moist. Like most of cake recipes, it’s based off of a Joy of Baking recipe. It yields around 18 cupcakes.
