Duck recipes

[Tim Pierce]

I was given 2 mallards and a Canada goose by a coworker. They have not been plucked or dressed. I need advice on how to clean and dress. I also need your best recipe for cooking. Do I just breast out, or smoke and roast whole?

 

[PNWGATOR]

Jump on Hank Shaw’s Honest Food web site and see what he recommends. Send him a message. He’ll reply and I’m guessing give you a choice or choices that’ll be outstanding.

Whatever recipe(s) you choose, insure you cook the duck rare to no more than medium rare. Seriously.

 

[JeffP_Or]

Most often, I dry pluck the breast down to the flanks; then pull the breast on the bone plate with the skin on, out. Then skin the legs/thighs to the back and remove. Sometimes I just dip and pluck the whole thing for stuffing/roasting.
Then I can use it however I wish from that point. My current favorite is going the Hank Shaw route with the breast plate; sear it in duck fat about 1-2 minutes per face [I usually cook a domestic duck sometime during the year and harvest all the fat off those farm fed guys] and then put on a 450-degree oven until it reaches 125-128 on the thermometer [maybe 2-3 minutes?]. The searing usually sets off the smoke detector so be warned....
In the hot pan with duck fat - after the breastplate goes in the oven - I dredge the skinned legs in a mixture of flour, cornmeal, salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper and then fry those little nuggets - it takes a bit less time than the breast to reach temp; I then either snack on the legs from the pan or let rest with the breast [rest the breast for about 10 minutes after it hits the temp].
The WORST thing with duck geese is to overcook them! Treat them like a good steak. PNWGATOR knows what he's talking about there.
Other options, stir fry in teryaki or plum sauce. I also used to skin all the ducks and just roast/grille them covered with bacon to keep them moist. There was also a James Beard recipe my family used to do; roast them and some sort of jelly sauce - was rather involved and I lost touch with that recipe.
See the OTHER GOOSE THREAD for ideas there.

 

[Felton]

I’m a little late in the game here but here it goes.

I typically just breast my ducks out, we don’t shoot many mallards though. Sometimes I brine them to help pull the blood out if they are shot up and bloody. Id probably cut the mallard breast in half or maybe even thirds and season in with your favorite steak seasoning (Webber’s is good). Throw those nuggets in a frying pan with butter. Cook until rare or medium rare as said before. Eat and enjoy.

 

[brocksw]

Pluck the breast and the leg. Remove breast with skin attached and use a game shears to cut the leg off the body at the joint. Final product looks like the picture below. Salt, pepper, maybe inject with some garlic butter, throw on a smoking hot grill or pellet grill. Cook to medium rare.

 

[AdamLewis]

I like to use Judy Rogers' roast chicken recipe with them. Dry brine with salt and pepper for a couple of days in the fridge, stuff some herbs and butter under the skin. Roast them in a very hot oven.

Simple but really delicious.

 

[Will_m]

Pluck those mallards and breast them. Set aside breasts. Take the now breastless mallards and put them in a Dutch oven with 3-4 cups liquid. Can be broth, red wine, orange juice or even a mixture. Season to your preference and bake at 350 for a couple of hours. When that nears the end, season the breasts to preference and sear them.

Put down a bed of wild rice (can be normal but wild seems more fitting) lay a breast or two over the top, a whole duck to the side and then dish the gravy over all heavily.

10/10 meal and relatively easy.

 

[LongWayAround]

@brocksw It's pretty hard to best that right there.

I would add maybe hitting the skin with a butane torch while it's dry to burn off any residual down feathers and take care to remove pin feathers.

 

[willidru]

Dress like Brocksw said, then rub with olive oil, prime rib rub and Greek Season (Cavenders). Heat up grill screaming hot and cook rare

 

[Davidson51]

Some great suggestions here. For me, if it's a pintail, widgeon, mallard or teal, I treat them like a great steak. Spoonies and some other ducks go through the grinder and make some bomb tacos.

 

[JCohHTX]

for the Canada, you might consider making pastrami.

 

[Plainsman79]

I’ve always heard this was the best for any fowl.

Pluck the entire bird and scorch the pin feathers with a lighter. Clean out the cavity and stuff some fruit in there. Apples, peeled oranges or peaches. Whichever you prefer. Wrap the entire thing in bacon (thick cut applewood smoked) and oven baked @350 until the bird is medium and the bacon is done. Remove the bird from the oven and let it rest. Once it’s cooled remove the fruit and bacon, toss the bird in the garbage and enjoy the rest!

 

[Kodiak13]

Made jalapeño duck dogs the last 2 seasons and my wife who hates wild duck absolutely loved them. I’m never one to add pork or beef fat to my game and for this one used duck fat. I tried Hank Shaw’s recipe the first year, a little bland for my liking so juiced it up with jalepeno powder and a bit more of the other spices he has in his book, aside from the cure of course, and they turned out fantastic. Highly recommend all his books as others have stated

 

[cacklercrazy]

The duck are definitely worth plucking. The goose just breast,but leave skin on if you can singe the hair in it. Salt water brine before cooking. Smoking, roasting, or even plan BBQ can be good. Don't over cook! Rare to med rare is as far as want to go.

 

[Kodiak13]

Maybe not for the OP but if your a serious waterfowler you may want to look into the Fowl Plucker. My group split one, pricey but man does it work so well. They also have kits if you wanted to save cost by purchasing your own little motor etc

 

[BulldogCE]

Definitely pluck the ducks, even if you are breasting them out. Score the skin with a sharp knife, Kinders Buttery Steakhouse Rub, and cook on the egg or traegar at 400 until Medium Rare. Start skin down and flip and let the duck fat render over the top.....just doesn't get any better than that.

 

[bairdi]

For the birds that are a little shot up for plucking or the early season birds that have pin feathers and don't pluck very well I like to make duck pilaf.

You can either debone the meat before cooking or after. I usually try to leave at least some of the bones in for cooking as I think they add some richness. Toss 2-3 ducks worth of meat or meat on carcass chunks into a pressure cooker. Add a decent amount of diced mushrooms, onions, some garlic, salt, pepper, a bay leaf or two, and anything else that looks good. Add a couple cups of chicken stock or broth, or even better if you have some sort of game or game bird based bone broth. Eyeball the liquid so that there will be at least a couple cups leftover in the pressure cooker after cooking. Cook on high pressure for 25-30 mins depending on how much meat and how big thew pieces are. Once it is done pressure cooking, pull the meat pieces out and set aside. Dump the rest of the contents of the pressure cooker through a strainer and into a bowl to seperate the liquid for all the veggie bits. Find and discard the bay leaf. If not already done, debone the meat and shred it up by hand. Use the leftover broth from the pressure cooker to make a pot of some sort of wild rice bend. I like the mixture of texamati and wild rice. I do this right in the pressure cooker pot on the stove top to save on dishes. Once the rice is done, add back the duck meat, the cooked veggies, and add enough of the leftover broth from pressure cooking the duck to make sure the meat-rice-veggie mixture is moist but not soggy. Give it a good stir while recombining everything. Add salt and pepper to taste. Other than plucked and roasted or smoked ducks, this is my favorite way to eat them. Even my friends who definitely do not like eating duck or other waterfowl love this stuff. And the leftovers are just as good or even better the next day!!!

 

[DG1010]

Any good tips for small diver ducks?

 

[DG1010]

Any good tips for small diver ducks?

Bufflehead and goldeneyes

 

[100percent]

Any good tips for small diver ducks?

Brine for several hours then offer them to your pets!