A Bird Beyond Chicken

About author / Amy Powell

World traveler; gourmet 30 minute meals; lover of exotic ingredients; winner on FoodTV's Chefs vs City; graduate French Culinary Institute. Her recipes will tantalize your taste buds.

If you are the person who by-passes the scramble for breast meat at Thanksgiving in favor of the deeper, richer flavor of a turkey thigh, this article is for you. Even if you are a die-hard white meat fan, read on, as I still have hope for your culinary intrepidness. Turkey breast and boneless, skinless chicken breasts are by far the playing-it-safe, default protein choice of most Americans. But with the way the poultry industry has bred their flocks to a hormonally enhanced consistency, the bland and sponge-y result makes for generic meat pretty far from the taste of its free-roaming counterparts. Essentially, being the Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast Guy is akin to only liking white bread, no crusts, or vanilla ice cream, hold the toppings.

Before I start on the “BORING” war cry aimed at those white meat lovers, I have to accept that not everyone is like me. I see wild chickens and salivate over the tastiness of their lean and muscular thighs. A flock of quail running by has me dreaming of a plate of the smallest morsels of birds grilled to an almost char, the most tender bit of poultry flesh on the tiniest of bones. It is getting to the point that I might consider taking up hunting just to make sure that my winter braised pheasant would have the deepest, richest flavor possible.

Understanding fully well that the Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast girl might be leery of jumping headfirst from her safety meat to wild game, there is a bird out there that is meaty but not too much so, pretty widely available in markets, and used in a number of cuisines. Enter the duck. If you are new to the gamier meat family, I would suggest starting by disassociating your dinner from the flock of ducks swimming in your near-by lake or the one named Donald you watched as a kid. From this point on, it is just another piece of poultry with breasts and thighs ready to be your next dinner.

Unless you have taken up hunting, duck that you find in your market has been commercially raised. For that reason alone, it will be a little less gamey and thus a little more acceptable to the average diner than wild game birds. And just like America’s favorite dinner bird, a duck has pretty much all the same usable parts: breasts for sautéing, thighs for braising, or the whole bird for roasting.

The difference here between duck and chicken is going to be in the preparation. Because duck has more developed muscle fibers than chicken, the cooking time is going to be longer as it will take more time to break down those fibers to have a tender end-result. Thighs are best treated with long cooking times such as braising. One of the most popular cooking techniques for thighs is to make them into confit: a technique wherein the thighs are cooked covered in melted duck fat in a very low temperature oven for several hours, and then packed to be cured indefinitely in their own fat. Duck thigh confit can then be removed from the fat for use in salads, pastas, or reheated whole and served as a hearty winter dish with beans. Certain meat purveyors such as D’Artagnan sell duck confit by the thigh, vacuum sealed, a terrific shortcut to a delicious duck confit-based dinner.

The most common use for the duck, and the simplest for home cooks, is to make use of the breast. If you can buy just the breasts, already butchered and cleaned, the process of cooking them is fairly straight-forward--but will take up nearly the whole cooking time if you are trying to get dinner on the table in 30 minutes. Luckily, as the breasts cook away over a medium low heat to get the perfect crispy skinned exterior with medium-rare interior, the cook is free to whip up a lovely sauce and some sort of tasty side.

Fruits and fruit sauces are a common pairing, but I like duck to be served with a vinegar reduction, slightly sweetened. The vinegar cuts through the fattiness that has been mostly rendered from the skin. Add a sautéed or poached fruit to accompany the thinly sliced breast with vinegar sauce and you have the perfect combination of meaty richness, with sweet fruit, and the smallest bite from the acidity of the vinegar. If you have a little extra time, don’t discard or discount the fat rendered from those chicken breasts. Pour off a little as you go (this is a good thing to do anyhow so you don’t deep fry the duck breasts in their own fat) and fry up some diced new potatoes in the rendered fat. Truly, once you have tried potatoes cooked in duck fat, you might never go back to olive and butter again.

Once you have tried duck, you might just find yourself switching teams. Next thing you know you will be switching from white to rye bread and from vanilla to Chunky Monkey. Before you know it, you might just find yourself staring out your window at the passing birds, dreaming up your next dinner.

Serves/Makes: 4

• 4 boneless duck breasts
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• salt and pepper
• 1 cup white wine vinegar
• 1 lime
• 1 piece (2 inch size) fresh ginger
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 small pineapple
• coarse sea salt or red salt