This is super tasty and really very fast to make after a busy day at work, so long as you remember to get the duck breasts in to marinate the night before anyway. This feeds two greedy adults and is an almost direct go at the Ching He Huang recipe from Chinese Food Made Easy, which is well worth a watch or peruse if you like a Chinese dinner now and then.
So, you'll need to start with your two duck breasts and a sealie bag. Stick the following things into the baggie and mush it up a bit: tsp ground five-spice, tbsp sesame oil, 3 tbsp hoisin sauce, 1-2 tbsp soft brown sugar, 3 tbsp water, 1 tbsp dark soy sauce. Add the duck, seal up and bung in a bowl in the fridge until tomorrow dinnertime.
Next day, get the oven on at 200°C and pat down the duck breasts (throw away the marinade). Pan fry them in a dry pan on a high heat for a couple of minutes either side, then put in a baking tray (skin up) and roast for 15 minutes or so.
While they're roasting get a litre of chicken stock on the hob and bring to a simmer. Add a tablespoon each of shaoxing rice wine (or sherry), soy sauce and rice vinegar (or any vinegar).
At the same time put some noodles on to cook, they should only take a few minutes. When they're done drain them and hold them under the cold tap for a bit to stop them going soggy.
Add some shitake mushrooms and sliced spring greens or cabbage to the soup and cook for a few minutes.
Take the duck breasts out of the oven and rest on a cold plate for at least 5 minutes, before slicing. Add the noodles, some sliced spring onion and chopped coriander to the hot soup, lay the duck slices on the top and garnish with thin slices of green chilli.
Gyoza are those wonderful pan-fried dumplings available in specialist restaurants, bars and some of the busier food courts at shopping centers, train stations and airports. If you aren't already familiar with them I'd urge you to give them a try - they've become one of the most popular Japanese imports to the UK, alongside sushi.
I believe they were originally Chinese and are served as part of the new year celebrations, however the style I'm most familiar with is Japanese.
This was my first attempt at making them but they turned out really well. The only thing I'd change next time is to be a bit more patient, cooking them in batches rather than overfilling the frying pan.
First things first - you need some gyoza pastry rounds. It's not the mythical ingredient it sounds, you can find them in the freezer at loads of Asian grocery shops. Just like anything, you should be able to make it yourself too, I found a recipe on japan-guide.com that suggests 170ml water to 200g strong flour which I'm going to try next time.
I think the filling is pretty flexible, I made mine with a reasonably cheap cut of pork, the shoulder, cut into chunks and then minced in a food processor. You only need about 250g at the most to make loads of gyoza.
You definitely need alliums in this mixture, I didn't have enough spring onions so I also used a finely diced purple onion as well.
To this, I added a couple of handfuls of mushrooms, some broccoli (any greens will do, particularly cabbage), a tablespoon of fresh ginger and a couple of small garlic cloves. I seasoned with salt, pepper, a dash of soy sauce and another of sesame oil.
A quick whizz in the processor and you should have a nice fine-grained filling ready to go.
Next, lay out a gyoza wrapper on a chopping board and lay a heaped teaspoon of filling slightly off-center on top. Using a finger, wet the edges of the wrapper and then fold the wrapper over and around the filling. Make sure you press the edges together firmly. Repeat until you've used up all the wrappers, run out of filling, or gotten bored.
Heat up a frying pan with a small amount of oil and lay the dumplings flat. Add just enough hot water to come up about a third of the height of the dumplings. Cover and cook on a high heat until all of the water has evaporated.
At this point, drizzle with sesame oil and continue to cook until the pastry is crisping up and going brown; almost, but not quite, to the point of burning.
Serve with a dipping sauce mixed to taste using soy sauce, rice vinegar, chilli oil and caster sugar.
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| QUACK! |
I salivate just thinking about this weekend treat! It is so much nicer than the takeaway version, if only because the sauce and pancakes are that much tastier, but also because you avoid the gamble of receiving burned, dry duck meat and ensure that your duck has been farmed responsibly and ethically.
Here is a good idea for using up the leftover bones and meat the following day: Thai Duck & Noodle Soup. I also use the little pancakes to go with other rich meats, such as this Spicy Beef with Wasabi Mayo dish.
It's best of all if you can marinate the duck for 24 hours before cooking, but if you don't have time (as I didn't) then it'll be fine just applied on the night. I got the ingredients for this marinade from a recipe in Ching He Huang's "Chinese Food Made Easy" but have changed the ratios.
For the marinade, mix together 2 tablespoons light soy sauce, 2 tablespoons shiao xing rice wine (or sherry), 4 tablespoons honey, 1 tablespoon of hot chilli sauce, a teaspoon of ground allspice, a teaspoon of cinnamon, a teaspoon of ground ginger, a teaspoon of salt and a crushed large clove of garlic. Stir to mix really well.
If you have time to marinade, pop him in a large (waterproof!) plastic bag with the marinade and leave in the fridge for 24 hours. Otherwise brush the marinade over the duck, really work it in, and pour the rest into the cavity and over the top.
Position the duck in a large baking tray upside down on a trivet and put in a preheated oven at 180 degrees C. Turn the duck over every half an hour, ensuring that the last half hour is with the breast side up.
Plum Sauce
I got the basics of this recipe from Jamie Oliver's "Cook with Jamie". De-stone and chop up 5 or 6 purple plums. In a saucepan, assemble a star anise, 80g caster sugar, a teaspoon of salt, a teaspoon of cinnamon, a sprinkle of hot chilli powder, a squeeze of lemon juice and lots of black pepper.
Add a small amount of water
gently dissolve the sugar over the heat. When you have a liquid bring it
up to the boil and simmer until it starts bubbling.
Add the plum peices and give it a good stir. Simmer for a further 15 minutes or so, stirring occasionally, then pour into a serving dish and leave to one side to cool down.
Chinese Pancakes
The original recipe for these came from BBC Good Food, but I adapted it and make it my way these days. This makes enough for two hungry people.
Fill a teacup with mostly plain flour, topped up with wholemeal flour. Mix this in a bowl with a teaspoon of caster sugar and 100ml of boiling water. Knead this briefly until it comes together as a dough and then leave, covered, to rest.
When you're almost ready to eat (usually while the duck is resting out of the oven), break the dough up into eight small balls. Flour the worksurface and splat the first ball with the palm of your hand, then a second one. Coat the upper surface of the first splat with sesame oil then put the second splat on top. Use a rolling pin to flatten both of them and lay over the edge of a bowl while you repeat the process with the other balls.
Heat up a dry frying pan until it's really hot and lay the first pancake in. Be really careful not to overcook these, you want them to be soft and flexible not hard and crispy. Flip the pancake as soon as it has mostly puffed up and only cook the other side for 20 or 30 seconds. Take it out and on a clean plate find the seam where the two peices were rolled together and unpick them - be careful of the steam inside - to make two pancakes. Keep under a moistened teatowel until ready to serve.
